United States Court of Appeals
Fifth Circuit
F I L E D
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FIFTH CIRCUIT August 23, 2006
Charles R. Fulbruge III
Clerk
No. 05-20189
Summary Calendar
NORMAN E. CARRIO,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
versus
TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE,
INSTITUTIONAL DIVISION; TEXAS BOARD OF
PARDON & PAROLE; R. THALER; W. JENNINGS;
S. HUBBARD; TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE;
GUARD BURROWS; BYRD; C. POPP; E. ROBBINS,
Defendants-Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Texas
(4:03-CV-1505)
Before WIENER, BARKSDALE, and BENAVIDES, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:*
Norman E. Carrio, Texas prisoner # 355695, was convicted of
murder in 1983 and sentenced to 60 years imprisonment. He appeals,
pro se, the 28 U.S.C. § 1915A dismissal, as frivolous, of his 42
U.S.C. § 1983 action. Even under pro se standards, his brief is
essentially undecipherable. He claims: the confiscation of his
*
Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that
this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except
under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR. R. 47.5.4.
legal materials as a result of his exceeding the amount of personal
property permitted under the prison storage policy violated his
right of access to the courts and was undertaken in retaliation for
his having testified against an officer in 1995; the confiscation
of his religious property violated his First Amendment rights and
the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000,
28 U.S.C. § 2000cc, (RLUIPA); and has been wrongfully denied parole
and work-time credits. The district court’s dismissal, as
frivolous, is reviewed for abuse of discretion. Martin v. Scott,
156 F.3d 578, 580 (5th Cir. 1998), cert. denied, 527 U.S. 1041
(1999).
Carrio does not renew his claim that the confiscations
resulting from the change in prison property-storage procedures
violated his due-process rights; therefore, it is waived. See
Yohey v. Collins, 985 F.2d 222, 224-25 (5th Cir. 1993). If Carrio
is raising an ex post facto claim concerning the change in Parole
Board voting procedures after he began serving his sentence, he
fails to adequately brief it, even under the liberal standards
applied to pro se briefs. E.g., Price v. Digital Equipment Corp.,
846 F.2d 1026, 1028 (5th Cir. 1988) (“Although we liberally
construe the briefs of pro se appellants ... we also require that
arguments must be briefed to be preserved.”) Therefore, it is
waived. Id.
Construing his brief liberally, Carrio maintains, for the
first time on appeal: his legal materials were confiscated in
retaliation for his having provided other inmates with legal
assistance; and the confiscation of his religious materials
violated his equal-protection rights because he was discriminated
against as a Catholic, when Muslim and Jewish inmates are provided
more allowances for their faith. These new claims will not be
considered. See id. at 225 (“[T]his Court does not review issues
raised for the first time on appeal”.).
Carrio’s denial-of-access claim lacks merit because he has not
shown how his position as a litigant has been prejudiced as a
result of the confiscations. See McDonald v. Steward, 132 F.3d
225, 230-31 (5th Cir. 1998). His retaliation claim similarly lacks
merit because he has not presented any direct evidence of
retaliatory motivation, nor has he alleged a chronology of events
from which retaliatory may be plausibly inferred. See Woods v.
Smith, 60 F.3d 1161, 1166 (5th Cir. 1995), cert. denied, 516 U.S.
1084 (1996). The claim is based on no more than his subjective
beliefs and, therefore was properly dismissed. See Johnson v.
Rodriguez, 110 F.3d 299, 310 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 522 U.S. 995
(1997).
Carrio’s claimed denial of his First Amendment right to free
exercise of his religion when prison officials enforced a new
prison storage policy was also properly dismissed because the
storage policy is reasonably related to legitimate penological
interests. See Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78, 89 (1987); see also
Yohey, 985 F.2d at 224-25. The RLUIPA claim is likewise without
merit because Carrio has not demonstrated that the storage policy
has substantially burdened his religious exercise. 42 U.S.C. §
2000cc-1; see Adkins v. Kaspar, 393 F.3d 559, 570-71 (5th Cir.
2004), cert. denied, 125 S. Ct. 2549 (2005).
Because Carrio, as a Texas prisoner, has no liberty interest
in parole, his claim that he has been wrongfully denied parole is
not cognizable. Orellana v. Kyle, 65 F.3d 29, 31-32 (5th Cir.
1995), cert. denied, 516 U.S. 1059 (1996). Carrio has not provided
authority for the proposition that the Constitution guarantees
credit for time worked in prison. Thus, his claim that he is being
denied work-time credits is also without merit. See Johnson v.
Dallas Indep. Sch. Dist., 38 F.3d 198, 200 (5th Cir. 1994), cert.
denied, 514 U.S. 1017 (1995).
The motions for oral argument and to advance on the docket are
DENIED.
AFFIRMED; MOTIONS DENIED