RENDERED: NOVEMBER2, 2017
TO BE PUBLISHED
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2016-SC-000320-DG
JANET CONOVER, WARDEN APPELLANTS
AND
KRISTINE GOETZINGER,
ADJUSTMENT OFFICER
ON REVIEW FROM COURT OF APPEALS
v. CASE 'NO. 2015-CA-000039-MR
SHELBY CIRCUIT C.OURT NO. 14-CI-00550
KRISTY LAWLESS APPELLEE
OPINION OF THE COURT BY JUSTICE CUNNINGHAM
REVERSING
This is a prison discipline· case ix:ivolving a fight between two inmates in
which a Corrections officer was injured. One of the inmates involved in the
altercation, Appellee, Kristy Lawless, was disciplined ~s a result of the officer's
injury .. She appealed that disciplinary determination through the appropriate
channels and eventually exhausted her appeals as a matter of right resulting in
a decision by the Court of Appeais ruling in her fa~or. For the forgoing
reasons, we reverse the decision of the Court of Appeals and reinstate the trial
court's order denying Lawless' petition.
Background
In 2014, Appellee, Kristy Lawless, and Remonia Mills were inmates at the
Kentucky Correctional Institute for Women (KCIW). Mills had previously·
assaulted Lawless and was labeled as "maximum assaultive status." On
February 24, 2014: Mills violently attacked Lawless during recreation time.
Two Corrections officers, Officer Jessica Evans and Sergeant Timothy Schmid,
intervened to break up the altercation.,· Officer Evans was injured.
Officer Evans subsequently filed a·disciplinary report claiming that
Lawless kicked her in the knee during the fight. As a result of th~ report, an
investigation commenced and Lawless was charged with a disciplinary
violation-physical actions resulting in death or injury to an employee.
Adjustment Officer (AO), Kristine Goetzinger, conducted a hearing in March
2014. At the hearing, Lawless denied kicking Officer Evans and stated that she
was ~erely trying to defend herself from Mills. Lawless requested that AO .
Goetzinger review the security ~ideo that do~umented the fight. She als.o
presented statements from two witnesses. One statement was from the other
Corrections officer who responded to the ·altercation. · That offic~r confirmed
that Lawless was attempting to defend herself and was coope~ative once Mills
was separated from her. The officer made no mention of Officer Evans' injury.
The second statement was from another irimate claiming that she did not
witness Lawless strike Officer Evans and that Lawless was as compliant as
possible.
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After considering the evidence, AO Goetzinger found Lawless guilty of the
charged disciplinary offense and sentenced her to 365 days in segregation and
1,321 days of lost good-time credit. AO Gbetzinger's findings state in pertinent
part as follows:·
Inmate stated that Officer Evans was in the middle of breaking up
the fight and is questioning how the officer could determirie who
caused the injury to her. Inmate states that she was compliant,
just like [Sergeant Schmid's] statement is saying, but that the
other. inmate was not compliant·. . . . Due to this report from
[Officer Evans] that injury was caused from this inmate while
trying to separate a physical altercation, I am going to find her
guilty of this charge.
Lawless appealed to the Warden, who affirmed but reduced h~r punishment to
180 days in segregation and 199 days of lost good-time credit.
Lawless then filed a prose declaration of rights action against Warden
Conover and AO Goetzinger in Shelby· Circuit Court wherein she argued that
the disciplinary proceeding violated her Fourteenth Amendment right to due
process. Approximately two weeks later, AO Goetzinger executed an affidavit
. .
stating: 1) she reviewed the surveillance video per Lawless' request; 2) nothing
in the camera footage altered her determination th.at Lawless was guilty; and 3)
·that her determination was not based on the camera footage but rather on the
· statement of the officer (victim) regarding who injured her.
Two days later, the ~ircuit court dismissed Lawless' petition finding that
she had "received due process and there is some evidence in the record to
support the finding of the adjustmerit officer." The court did not discuss the
surveillance video which apparently was not in the record. Lawless appealed
. the court's decision to the Court ·of Appeals which,' in a spilt opinion, reversed
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the trial court's order dismissing Lawless' petition. The Court of_ Appeals
remanded the case to the trial court and ordered the court review and consider
the surveillance video .. Warden Conover and AO Goetzinger (Appellants),
appealed to this Court. I
Standard of Review
)
"[P]rison disciplinary proceedings are not criminal prosecutions_; and
'-" · punishment is imposed as warranted by the ~everity of the offense in order to
correct and control inmate behavior within the·prison." Ramirez v. Nietzel, 424
S.W.3d 911, 916 (Ky. 2014). Generally s~eaking, due process is satisfied if "the
findings of the prison disciplinary board are supported by some evidence in the
I •
record .... " Superintendent, Massachusetts Correctional Institution, Walpole v.
Hill, 472 U.S. 445, 454 (1985). "The primary inquiry is 'whether there is any
evidence in the record that could support the conclusion reached by the
disciplinary board~"' Ramirez, 424 S.W.3d at 917 (citation omitted). With this
minimal standard in mind, we now turn to the merits of the present case.
Analysis
The primary issue in this case is whether Lawless' procedural due
. process rights were violated. That issue is squarely resolved by our holding in.
Ramirez:
When a prisoner maintains that he was denied a meaningful
opportunity to present a defense due to [an AO's] refus_al to
consider exculpatory evidence, then procedural due process
requires a [circuit] court to conduct an in camera review·of the
After the parties filed their briefs, Lawless 'filed a motion to strike a
portion of Appellants' reply brief. That moti~n is hereby denied.
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evidence to determine whether it wa·s indeed exculpatory and
whether, in light of the new evidence, "some evidence" existed for
the AO's finding of guilt.
Id. at 920 (quoting Felder v. McBride, 121 Fed.Appx. 655, 656-57 (7th
Cir.2004)).
In applying our: holding in Ramirez to the present facts, it is clear that Lawless
was-not denied a meaningfulopportunity to con.sider exculpatory evidence-the
surveillance video. In fact, the AO submitted an affidavit specifically
addressirig that video. Although she executed the affidavit after she rendered
· her disciplinary decision! she suppleme:r:ited her findings in a timely manner
and in compliance with the due process dictates discussed in Ramirez.. Any
error that may have occurred here was harmless. Moreover, the AO was very
clear that she based her disciplinary decision on the statement of the officer
. .
(victim). That certainly satisfies the "som(;! evidence" standard adopted by the
' .
\
United States Supreme Court.· Walpole, 472 U.S . .at 454. Therefore, there was
no .error requiring reversal of the AO's decision.
A secondary issu~ discussed at length by the Court of Appeals concerns
what steps the circuit court must take in order to satisfy due process. The
Court of Appeals read Ramirez to require that the circuit court review allegedly
. exculpatory evidence and to document its finding based on tqat evidence.
! .
However, Ramirez makes no such pronouncement.
Ramirez is distinguishable from this case because "the AO denied
[Ramirez's] request" to introdµce surveillance-camera footage of the incident.
Ramirez, 424 S.W.3d at 915. We held that "an AO must review security footage
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if an inmate requests such review[.]" Id. at 920. The trial court's review in
Ramirez was- necessary only because Ramirez's due process right to request in
camera review was denied by the AO, which was not the case here. It appears
that the Court of Appeals in the present case read Ramirez in the context of
Fo,ley v. Haney, 345 S.W.3d 861 (Ky. App. 2011).
Foley concerned an AO's failure to review allegedly exculpatory cafeteria
and medical records, and to make other necessary findings. Id. at 864. The
court he~d the AO denied the inmate due process by failing to review the
records. On remand; the Foley court ordered the AO to rev:iew the allegedly
exculpatory recorc;ls, indicate that he reviewed the records in his written
-·
finding, and· describe whether the _records confirrn.~d or contradicted the
inmate's narrative. Id. at 866. Because Ramirez was published after Foley, the
Court of Appeals determined that Ramirez implicitly reaffirmed Foley.. The
Court of Appeals then extended Foley to apply not only to AO decisions, but
also the review. of those decisions by the circuit court. It is therefore necessary
to Clarify our decision in Ramire_z and how it relates to Foley.
'1n order to satisfy due process, AOs must do the following when
requested by an inmate to review allegedly exculpatory evidence that .is
.. reasonably accessible and available for review: 1) review allegedly exculpatory
records; 2) indicate that she reviewed the records in her written finding; and 3) .·
consider the impact of that evidence when rendering h_er decision. That
· . standard
. was satisfied in the present case by the AO's timely execution of a
supplemental affidavit.
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For appeals before the circuit court, however, ~uch findings are not
necessary. Rather, the circuit court is required to review the allegedly
exculpatory evidence in the event the AO failed to do so. In the absence of a·
dispute concerning whether the AO considered allegedly exculpatory evidence,
"[t]he primary inquiry [of the circuit court] is 'whether there is any evidence in
the record that could support the conclusion reached by the disciplinary
board. m Ramirez, 424 'S.W.3d at 917 (citation omitted).· That st.andard was
satisfied here.
·Lastly, the Court of.Appeals discussed an issue that neither party
briefed-who. is responsible for transmitting the record in prison disciplinary
cases. The court determined that the burden was upon the Department of
Corrections. Because this issue was not raised before the circuit court or by
the parties, we need not discuss it here.
Conclusion
For the foregoing reasons, we hereby reverse the decision of the Court of
Appeals and reinstate the trial court's order denying Lawless' petition.
Minton, C.J.; Hughes, Keller, Venters, and Wright, JJ.; sitting. All
coricur. VanMeter, J., not sitting.
COUNSEL FOR APPELLANTS:
Angela Turner Dunham
Justice and Public Safety Cabinet
COUNSEL FOR APPELLEE:
Heather Hodgson
Assistant Public Advocate
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