Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit; August 19, 2004; Federal Appellate Court
The August 19, 2004 opinion is amended to clarify key points regarding First Amendment rights and retaliation claims. The phrase “harmed the prisoner” is replaced with “chilled the inmate’s exercise of his First Amendment rights,” emphasizing that actions need not completely suppress speech to be actionable. Additionally, references to actions not being “narrowly tailored” are modified to state they were not undertaken to advance legitimate penological purposes.
Paragraphs concerning the requirement of demonstrating a total chilling of rights are deleted and replaced with the assertion that a total chilling is not necessary to establish a retaliation claim; chilling can occur without complete silencing. The inquiry should focus on whether a person of ordinary firmness would be deterred from future First Amendment activities. The opinion cites relevant case law to support this position, emphasizing that it would be unjust to allow a defendant to evade liability based on the persistence of a plaintiff.
The panel unanimously denies the Petition for Rehearing, with specific judges voting against the Petition for Rehearing En Banc. The full court has been informed of the en banc petition, and no judge requested a vote on it. Consequently, both the petition for rehearing and the en banc petition are denied, with no further petitions accepted.
Kavin Maurice Rhodes, an inmate at California State Prison, Los Angeles County, is pursuing a pro se legal action against several correctional officers, claiming retaliation for exercising his First Amendment rights in 1988. The conflict originated when Rhodes's Canon typewriter was repeatedly damaged during off-site repairs, allegedly due to intentional delays by Officer M. Robinson. After filing a grievance against Robinson for mishandling his typewriter and requesting its return in its original shipping container, Rhodes's grievance was denied.
In retaliation for this grievance, Robinson coerced Rhodes into sending home either his CD player or television to retrieve his typewriter. When Rhodes refused, Robinson confiscated both the CD player and the typewriter. In response, Rhodes organized a group appeal signed by approximately 120 inmates, accusing Robinson of having a vendetta against those with personal property and of damaging their belongings. Following this appeal, Robinson allegedly altered Rhodes's CD player to falsely suggest theft and conspired with prison ombudswoman Sara Malone to prevent the group appeal from being filed, thereby evading a timely response from the prison.
Rhodes sought assistance from Lieutenant Huebner, who discussed the situation with Robinson and Officer R. Blevins, but neither admitted to any wrongdoing. They claimed the delay in returning Rhodes’s typewriter was due to his refusal to request it directly from them.
Rhodes approached CCI’s Facility Captain, A. Lopez, to report grievances against a staff member, Robinson, and submitted his complaints in writing, including a grievance he had previously filed. Lopez failed to respond and refused to return Rhodes's documents. Subsequently, Rhodes claims the defendants conspired to transfer him to High Desert State Prison to evade addressing his grievances. In anticipation of this transfer, Rhodes filed a grievance to protect his personal property, fearing it would be destroyed. He also contacted outside authorities, filing a complaint with the Kern County Grand Jury, which dismissed his complaint, citing an unexhausted administrative remedy. However, Rhodes provided a sworn declaration suggesting that his group appeal was never submitted to the Men’s Advisory Council for action.
While contemplating donating a kidney to his mother, Rhodes’s transfer was halted due to medical compatibility concerns. When he sought to reclaim his personal property, he encountered hostility from Blevins, who confiscated some of Rhodes's items and acknowledged that his preemptive grievance had been sent to the Appeals Coordinator. Rhodes perceived these actions as retaliatory. Upon receiving his typewriter back, he found it destroyed. This prompted Rhodes to file a second complaint with the Grand Jury, detailing the retaliatory actions he faced and accusing Malone of misrepresenting facts to the Grand Jury, claiming her involvement in obstructing justice.
Following a physical altercation with correctional officers, who allegedly threatened him and humiliated him, the Grand Jury dismissed his second complaint. With his internal and external appeals blocked, Rhodes turned to federal court, filing a pro se amended complaint in March 2002, alleging First Amendment retaliation based on the outlined events.
The plaintiff sought a declaratory judgment affirming that his First Amendment rights were violated by the officers, an injunction to prevent future retaliation, the return of his property, and an order to stop the officers from removing him from his position as a legal clerk or confiscating his legal papers. He claimed retaliation in response to his grievances, evidenced by the confiscation and destruction of his property, asserting that the defendants conspired to infringe upon his First Amendment rights without serving legitimate penological interests. The state filed a motion to dismiss, citing qualified immunity and arguing that the plaintiff failed to demonstrate any chilling effect on his First Amendment rights. On December 13, 2002, Magistrate Judge Dennis L. Beck recommended granting the motion, noting that the plaintiff continued to exercise his rights after the alleged retaliation. The district court adopted the recommendation, dismissing the case on January 31, 2003, and Rhodes appealed. The excerpt also references a philosophical reflection from "Catch-22," illustrating a paradoxical situation faced by the character Orr, which highlights the complexities of rational thought under duress.
Inmates retain protections against arbitrary state actions, even when their due process rights are not at stake, by invoking the First and Eighth Amendments and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. They can also utilize internal grievance procedures and state judicial review. Crucial to inmates are their First Amendment rights, particularly the rights to file grievances and pursue civil rights litigation. Retaliatory actions against inmates for exercising these rights violate constitutional protections, independent of any underlying misconduct. This prohibition against retaliatory punishment is recognized as "clearly established law" in the Ninth Circuit and has been acknowledged in other circuits. A valid claim for First Amendment retaliation in prison requires demonstrating five elements: (1) an adverse action by a state actor, (2) due to (3) the inmate’s protected conduct, (4) that chilled the inmate's exercise of First Amendment rights, and (5) did not reasonably advance a legitimate correctional goal.
Rhodes's complaint meets the necessary pleading requirements for a First Amendment retaliation claim against the officers, who do not contest this fact. He alleges that the officers confiscated, withheld, and destroyed his property, threatened his transfer to another institution, and assaulted him due to his exercise of First Amendment rights in filing grievances and seeking legal access. Additionally, he claims these actions chilled his rights and were not aimed at legitimate penological interests. The complaint is compared to established case law that supports claims of retaliation, such as in Gomez v. Vernon and Hines, where threats and false allegations leading to confinement were deemed violations of the First Amendment.
The officers argue that the facts presented by Rhodes demonstrate he is not entitled to relief, which contradicts established precedents that do not require a total chilling of rights to validate a retaliation claim. The standard for evaluating such claims is whether an official's conduct would deter a person of ordinary firmness from exercising their First Amendment rights, as articulated in Mendocino Environmental Center v. Mendocino County. It is noted that Rhodes need only show that his rights were chilled, not necessarily suppressed, to support his claim.
Adopting the rule proposed by the officers and accepted by the district court would effectively bar most prisoner retaliation suits from federal court, which would be an unjust outcome. The Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995 (PLRA) mandates that prisoners exhaust available administrative remedies before filing civil rights lawsuits under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 or any federal law. If Rhodes’s suit were rejected because he filed administrative grievances, it would create a paradox where fulfilling the necessary prerequisites to pursue a claim in federal court would prevent him from actually prosecuting that claim. The district court's assertion that filing the lawsuit precludes relief on the retaliation claim exacerbates this issue, leaving prisoners in a Catch-22 situation where they cannot effectively seek redress for retaliatory actions.
Regarding qualified immunity, the State did not address this issue in court, despite Rhodes’s detailed arguments and the State’s previous claims in the district court. The prohibition against retaliatory punishment is established law in the Ninth Circuit, meaning that actions causing harm beyond mere chilling of rights can result in liability. Furthermore, the officers' argument that it is not clearly established that prisoners have a constitutional right free from non-chilling retaliatory conduct contradicts the principles of qualified immunity, which protects officials only if the law was not clearly established at the time of their actions. Thus, it is unreasonable to hold officials liable for actions they were unaware were unlawful.
In Harlow v. Fitzgerald, the Supreme Court established that an official can only claim qualified immunity if the law was clearly established at the time of their conduct. An official cannot be expected to know that their actions were unlawful if such conduct was not previously identified as illegal. The critical question is whether a reasonable officer would understand their actions as unlawful based on the information available at that time. The argument presented by the officers incorrectly shifts the focus from the time of the conduct to its consequences, which contradicts the purpose of qualified immunity, as it could protect retaliatory conduct based solely on later outcomes.
The district court's decision to grant the officers' motion to dismiss is reversed, with the case remanded for further proceedings. While Rhodes had alleged harm, he also claimed a chilling effect, which is necessary for a First Amendment retaliation claim. The court treats all of Rhodes's factual allegations as true in light of the dismissal motion, drawing inferences in his favor. Rhodes contends that the operational procedures cited by Robinson regarding the possession of appliances were misapplied, arguing that his typewriter, deemed battery-operated, should not be classified as an electrical appliance. He supports his claims with prison records showing prior possession of multiple devices without issue, and notes a past service charge related to the typewriter's use. Rhodes also accuses Defendant M. Robinson of retaliatory practices aimed at discouraging inmates from using the grievance process, suggesting that Malone's actions during Grand Jury proceedings further indicate a conspiracy to suppress his complaints.
The Men’s Advisory Council, representing inmates, lacked the authority to address misconduct by correctional officers, implying that Malone's response to the Grand Jury was intended to mislead investigators regarding Rhodes's complaint. Huebner allegedly informed Rhodes that his grievance had been stolen and claimed he would testify that Rhodes had not attempted to retrieve a typewriter. Since Rhodes is no longer incarcerated at CCI, his requests for injunctive relief are likely moot, except for the return of any personal property held by the officers. Claims for monetary damages can survive a prisoner’s release, as established in case law. Rhodes's claim for damages, which requires an evaluation of whether the officers violated his rights, subsumes his request for declaratory relief. Judge Beck dismissed Rhodes's claims, citing a lack of alleged constitutional violations, without addressing the second step of qualified immunity regarding whether the right was clearly established. The officers did not raise the issue of qualified immunity in their briefing and argued instead that Rhodes's complaint did not sufficiently demonstrate a chilling effect on his First Amendment rights. The constitutional right of access to courts mandates that prisons provide adequate legal resources. Allegations of harm may suffice to support a First Amendment retaliation claim, even without demonstrating a chilling effect. The Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA) requires all inmate lawsuits concerning prison life to exhaust administrative remedies, regardless of the nature of the allegations.
