Court Opinion

ID: 9474217
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:50:53.559983+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:43:57.732841
License: Public Domain

WEIS, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
The plaintiff prisoner contends that he is fearful of being assaulted by inmates who have access to his cell during the daylight hours, 6:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. He, however, has not alleged that he has been assaulted or actually threatened. In addition, he has not been subjected to a deprivation of property, except for one incident when his cell was robbed, apparently when he was absent.
The complaint alleges that "access to inmates cells is through the pulling of a cell-door bar lock which once pulled opens every cell door for access (entry or exit) on the entire tier range.” The plaintiff’s allegations are not clear, but apparently the designated inmates do not have keys to individual cell doors. It seems that certain prisoners are given access to a “cell door bar,” which when pulled can lock or unlock all cells on the “A” block tier.1
In his brief, plaintiff tells us that one inmate’s nose was broken when he was assaulted in his cell in 1984. In the following year another prisoner had two teeth knocked out. Plaintiff, however, does not argue that the assaults were caused by prison conditions or that the incidents were any different from those which occurred in other parts of the prison, i.e., mess halls, exercise area, shops, and library. In short, the plaintiff’s eighth amendment claim is based on a generalized fear for his safety because the cells are not kept locked during the daylight hours when inmates presumably are permitted to move to designated areas within the prison.
From an eighth amendment standpoint, I see no difference between the complaint that plaintiff makes here and the situation where all cells are opened during the daylight hours. The decision to leave cells open during the day or to allow limited access by certain inmates is a matter of internal administration. The traffic problems and security concerns involved in the movement and control of more than 1,000 inmates in a limited area obviously are details within the discretion of prison officials. See Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 551, 99 S.Ct. 1861, 1880, 60 L.Ed.2d 447 (1979).
Violence is unfortunately too common in prisons, and at times prisoners are justifiably apprehensive; however, such conditions do not themselves establish mental distress which will constitute cruel and unusual punishment. If the mere fear or threat of assault is sufficient to raise a federal constitutional violation, then every inmate in every prison and jail in this country would have a viable eighth amendment claim.
Davidson v. O’Lone, 752 F.2d 817 (3d Cir.1984), (in banc), cert. granted sub nom., Davidson v. Cannon, — U.S. —, 105 S.Ct. 2673, 86 L.Ed.2d 692 (1985) presented a somewhat similar issue. In that case, the plaintiff inmate filed a § 1983 action against prison officials for negligently failing to take reasonable steps to protect him from another prisoner. In discussing the responsibility of prison officials under § 1983, we stated that liability could be imposed “even when the assault has been committed by another prisoner, if there was intentional conduct, deliberate or reckless indifference to the prisoner’s safety, or callous disregard on the part of prison officials.” Id. at 828. We thus reviewed the officials’ conduct under the deliberate indifference standard of care applicable to an *150eighth amendment claim as articulated by the Supreme Court in Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. 97, 97 S.Ct. 285, 50 L.Ed.2d 251 (1976). See O’Lone, 752 F.2d at 829 n. 9.
In Rhodes v. Chapman, 452 U.S. 337, 101 S.Ct. 2392, 69 L.Ed.2d 59 (1981), the Supreme Court rejected an alleged eighth amendment violation stemming from the use of double celling. The Court noted that “there is no evidence that double celling under these circumstances either inflicts unnecessary or wanton pain or is grossly disproportionate to the severity of crimes warranting punishment.” Id. at 348, 101 S.Ct. at 2400. The Court cautioned lower federal courts to “bear in mind that their inquiries ‘spring from constitutional requirements and that judicial answers to them must reflect that fact rather than a court’s idea of how best to operate a detention facility.’ ” Id. at 351, 101 S.Ct. at 2401, quoting Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. at 539, 99 S.Ct. at 1874. In addition, the Court noted that “a prison’s internal security is peculiarly a matter normally left to the discretion of prison administrators.” 452 U.S. at 349 n. 14, 101 S.Ct. at 2400 n. 14.
The complaint in the case at hand does not satisfy the requirements for an eighth amendment violation set forth in Rhodes v. Chapman, Bell v. Wolfish, and Davidson v. O’Lone. Whether plaintiff has a cause of action under state statutory or common law has not been presented here.
In the wake of Rhodes, the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit has modified Withers v. Levine, 615 F.2d 158 (4th Cir.1980), and Woodhous v. Virginia, 487 F.2d 889 (4th Cir.1973) — cases cited favorably by the majority here. In Shrader v. White, 761 F.2d 975 (4th Cir.1985), the court acknowledged that its previous reasonable care standard was no longer applicable. Because the Supreme Court had adopted a more restrictive eighth amendment standard, the court of appeals said “The eighth amendment prohibits punishments which involve the unnecessary and wanton infliction of pain.” Id. at 980. Hence, the court approved the trial court’s conclusion that fear of attack must “result in significant mental pain to be of constitutional dimensions.” Id. at 979.
In Shrader, the court also noted the inevitability of violence by inmates and the difficulty of its prevention. The court further observed that the methods used by prison administrators to protect prisoners from one another are often condemned as cruel and unusual by the same inmates who later complain about the lack of protection. The prisoners in Shrader also complained about cell locks but the court dismissed that contention stating, “Any locking system for a prison cell will produce complaints from inmates who might prefer something different.” Id. at 982.
Although the complaint in this case may, perhaps, have described a procedure that is undesirable or even negligent, I am convinced that it has not presented a claim that rises to the level required to establish an eighth amendment violation. I would affirm the order of the district court.

. This case illustrates once again the problems presented by defense motions for dismissal under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6), which requires the courts to assume the truth of allegations in the complaint. Particularly, in pro se matters such as this, the courts would be aided by factual information which would present these cases in a proper perspective.