Collazo-Leon v. United States Bureau of Prisons

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIRST CIRCUIT

No. 94-2061

VLADIMIR COLLAZO-LEON,

Plaintiff - Appellee,

v.

UNITED STATES BUREAU OF PRISONS, ET AL.,

Defendants - Appellants.

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO

[Hon. Carmen Consuelo Cerezo, U.S. District Judge]

Before

Selya and Boudin, Circuit Judges,

and Carter,* District Judge.

Sean Connelly, Attorney, United States Department of

Justice, with whom Guillermo Gil, United States Attorney, Mar a

Hortensia R os-G ndara, Assistant United States Attorney, and

Paul W. Layer, United States Bureau of Prisons, were on brief for

appellants.
Marcia G. Shein, with whom Law Office of Miller & Shein, was

on brief for appellee.

April 7, 1995

* Of the District of Maine, sitting by designation.

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CARTER, Chief District Judge. Appellee Vladimir
CARTER, Chief District Judge

Collazo-Le n, a pretrial detainee at the Metropolitan Detention

Center at Guaynabo, Puerto Rico, brought a habeas corpus action

alleging that he had been denied both substantive and procedural

due process by the United States Bureau of Prisons (BOP) when he

was placed in disciplinary segregation for ninety days and had

his telephone and visitation privileges taken away for six months

as punishment for misconduct. After being placed in segregation,

Collazo-Le n applied for a writ of habeas corpus which the

magistrate judge recommended that the court deny. The district

court disagreed and granted the petition finding that the

practice violated substantive due process of law. The BOP

appeals the district court's grant of a writ of habeas corpus to

Collazo-Le n.

FACTS
FACTS

Collazo-Le n was named in eleven counts of a thirteen-

count indictment, returned in the District of Puerto Rico,

charging conspiracy to import and distribute cocaine. On April

7, 1994, while being held in pretrial detention, Collazo-Le n

appeared before a disciplinary hearing officer (DHO), was

informed of disciplinary charges against him, and, based upon an

affidavit, was found to have attempted escape and to have offered

a bribe to a prison guard to induce his assistance in Defendant's

escape attempt. The charges for both acts arise out of the same

set of facts: Collazo-Le n offered a prison guard one million

dollars to get him "to the avenue." The sanction imposed by the

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DHO for the attempted escape was sixty days of segregation and

the loss of visiting privileges for six months. The sanction

imposed by the DHO for the offer of a bribe was thirty days

segregation and the loss of telephone privileges for six

months.1

Collazo-Le n was placed in segregation and applied for

a writ of habeas corpus, charging a denial of both substantive

and procedural due process. 28 U.S.C. 2255. The magistrate

judge found that Collazo-Le n had been afforded procedural due

process and that the practice of placing a pretrial detainee in

disciplinary segregation, and taking away his telephone and

visitation privileges as punishment for misconduct, was

permissible under the circumstances. Accordingly, the magistrate

judge recommended that the district court deny the writ of habeas

corpus. Despite this recommendation, the district court granted

the writ, permitting Collazo-Le n's return to the general prison

population before the end of his ninety-day segregation.

The district court did not address the magistrate

judge's finding on Collazo-Le n's claim for denial of procedural

due process. Instead, the court directed all its attention to

the substantive violation finding that the express intent of the

prison regulation authorizing segregation was "punishment," 28

1 The terms of disciplinary segregation are to be served
consecutively. The segregation consists of being placed in a
room for twenty-three hours a day, with the remaining hour used
for active or passive recreation. Collazo-Le n's loss of
telephone and visiting privileges does not include any
restriction of those activities which involve communication with
his attorneys.

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C.F.R. 541.20(a),2 and that "less drastic resources were not

considered" as alternatives to the segregation and loss of

privileges. The court concluded that the disciplinary action

taken amounted to impermissible punishment and served no

legitimate regulatory purpose in the effective management of the

correctional institution. Thereafter, the district court denied

the BOP's motion for reconsideration. The BOP now appeals the

district court's decision.

DISCUSSION
DISCUSSION

The BOP argues that the district court expanded the

principle established by the Supreme Court in Bell v. Wolfish,

441 U.S. 520 (1979), and created a rule that the Constitution

prohibits the discipline of pretrial detainees. Collazo-Le n

responds that the district court correctly found that the
2 Section 541.20(a) provides:

Constitution prohibits disciplining pretrial detainees who
Except as provided in paragraph (b) of
this section, an inmate may be placed in
violate prison rules in the manner imposed here because doing so
disciplinary segregation only by order of
the Disciplinary Hearing Officer
amounts to impermissible punishment.3 To a great extent, both
following a hearing in which the inmate
has been found to have committed a
prohibited act in the Greatest, High, or
Moderate Category, or a repeated offense
in the Low Moderate Category. The DHO
may order placement in disciplinary
segregation only when other available
dispositions are inadequate to achieve
the purpose of punishment and deterrence
necessary to regulate an inmate's
behavior within acceptable limits.

3 Collazo-Le n also argues that the case is moot because he is
no longer a pretrial detainee but has pled guilty and was
scheduled to be sentenced on February 16, 1995. The BOP responds
that there remains a live controversy. In its brief, the BOP
explains that if this Court reverses the district court, it
intends to carry out the remainder of the ninety-day segregation
term and the six-month telephone and visitation suspensions. We
agree with the BOP that there remains a live controversy.

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parties' arguments are built on semantics: labeling the action as

either permissible discipline or impermissible punishment. This

Court, however, does not find that there is any meaningful

distinction between the terms "punishment" and "discipline" in

this case.

In Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, the Supreme Court

examined some aspects of the constitutional rights of pretrial

detainees. Bell teaches that punishment cannot be inflicted

upon pretrial detainees prior to an adjudication of guilt in

accordance with due process of law. The inquiry, however, does

not end with the designation of a condition of confinement as

"punishment." To distinguish between impermissible and

permissible measures, the Bell Court stated:

A court must decide whether the
disability is imposed for the purpose of
punishment or whether it is but an
incident of some other legitimate
governmental purpose. See Flemming v.

Nestor, [363 U.S. 603,] at 613-617. . . .

[I]f a particular condition or
restriction of pretrial detention is
reasonably related to a legitimate
governmental objective, it does not,
without more, amount to "punishment."
Conversely, if a restriction or condition
is not reasonably related to a legitimate
goal -- if it is arbitrary or purposeless
-- a court permissibly may infer that the
purpose of the governmental action is
punishment that may not constitutionally
be inflicted upon detainees qua

detainees.

Id. at 538-39 (footnotes omitted).

Bell was a class action seeking injunctive relief and

challenging various general conditions, practices, and policies

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to which all pretrial detainees were subjected, including double-

bunking, strip-searches, and various other security measures.

The conditions imposed on the pretrial detainees in Bell involved

no direct or individualized disciplinary or deterrent purpose.

Here, by contrast, the segregation and loss of privileges are

directly related to the exercise of the prison staff's

disciplinary authority by both punishing Collazo-Le n for his

institutional misconduct and deterring him from engaging in it in

the future. In Bell, the Court was not faced with the situation

where discrete sanctions were imposed on individual pretrial

detainees as discipline for specific in-house violations.

Although factually distinguishable, the theoretical

constitutional premises of Bell's analysis provides some rational

guidance in this case.

On the authority of Bell, it may be divined that even

if a restriction or condition may be viewed as having a punitive

effect on the pretrial detainee, it is nonetheless constitutional

if it also furthers some legitimate governmental objective such

as addressing a specific institutional violation and is not

excessive in light of the seriousness of the violation. Bell,

441 U.S. at 538-39; Youngberg v. Romeo, 457 U.S. 307, 320

(1982)(requiring that restrictions on the liberty of an

involuntarily confined mental patient be reasonably related to

legitimate government interests in imposing those restrictions).

Among the legitimate objectives recognized by the Supreme Court

are ensuring a detainee's presence at trial and maintaining

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safety, internal order, and security within the institution.

Bell, 441 U.S. at 540. If there is a reasonable relation between

the sanctions and legitimate institutional policies, an intent to

punish the detainee for prior unproven criminal conduct cannot be

inferred. Accordingly, this Court must determine whether the

punishment imposed here was incident to some legitimate

governmental purpose.

In this case, the district court looked at whether the

sanction imposed on Collazo-Le n was of a "punitive" character.

The court found it to be punitive, reasoning that because after

Collazo-Le n serves his time in segregation, he will present "the

same risk of flight and the same security hazard that he did when

[the BOP] determined that his conduct justified placing him in

isolation," the discipline did not serve the BOP's legitimate

goal of providing a safe and orderly environment for inmates.

This Court finds that statement by the district court

particularly curious. Although Collazo-Le n may continue to be a

risk to security after release from segregation that does not

mean that legitimate governmental goals are not served by the

disciplinary action. If the district court's statement regarding

Collazo-Le n's continued security risk is taken to its logical

conclusion, any type of discipline imposed would not be allowable

because Collazo-Le n must, inevitably, be returned to the general

prison population. This overlooks entirely any reasonable

expectation that the discipline will have a deterrent effect on

the Defendant.

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The administrators of the prison must be free, within

appropriate limits, to sanction the prison's pretrial detainees

for infractions of reasonable prison regulations that address

concerns of safety and security within the detention environment.

The district court found that the severity of the sanction on the

pretrial detainee for "whom no attempt is made to deal with his

disciplinary problem by means of less drastic actions, compel[s]

the conclusion that the purpose in segregating is to punish." We

agree that the measure is punishment, but we disagree that it is

improper under the circumstances of this case. The Supreme Court

has warned that when

determining whether restrictions or
conditions are reasonably related to the
Government's interest in maintaining
security and order and operating the
institution in a manageable fashion,
courts must heed our warning that '[s]uch
considerations are peculiarly within the
province and professional expertise of
corrections officials, and, in the
absence of substantial evidence in the
record to indicate that the officials
have exaggerated their response to these
considerations, courts should ordinarily
defer to their expert judgment in such
matters.'

Id. at 540-41 n.23 (quoting Pell v. Procunier, 417 U.S. 817, 827

(1974)). This recognition is a clear approval of a broad

exercise of discretion by prison authorities to take reasonable

and necessary action, including punishment, to enforce the prison

disciplinary regime and to deter even pretrial detainees from

violation of its requirements. What the Constitution prohibits

is the undue expansion of the exercise of such authority for the

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purpose, or with the unintended effect, of punishing the pretrial

detainee for the acts that are the basis for his prosecution and

his consequent pretrial detention. In other words, reasonable

punishment may be imposed to enforce reasonable prison

disciplinary requirements but may not be imposed to sanction

prior unproven criminal conduct. Recognizing the need to accord

prison officials considerable latitude in matters of internal

discipline, we will not interfere with the execution of

reasonable means, such as the internal discipline effort involved

here, adopted by the BOP to achieve a legitimate governmental

objective. We cannot say that the sanctions imposed, in light of

the seriousness of the violations, were so extreme as to be

unreasonable by the constitutional standard.

For the reasons discussed above, the district court's

grant of the writ of habeas corpus on the substantive due process

grounds is VACATED. The case is REMANDED to the district court

to determine whether Collazo-Le n's right to procedural due

process was violated.4

4 Collazo-Le n's attorney argues that she did not know that on
May 23, 1994, the magistrate judge was going to hold a hearing on
the merits of the habeas corpus petition. Rather, she "believed
that the only issue to be considered [at the hearing] was
releasing petitioner from sanctions until proceedings relating to
due process and constitutional issues could be presented in more
detail by all parties." Response to Magistrate's Report and
Recommendation (Docket No. 11) at 2. This appears to be a
reasonable conclusion given the magistrate judge's Order to Show
Cause (Docket No. 7). That Order provides, in part:

The Warden, Metropolitan Correctional
Facility, Guaynabo, is ordered to show
cause in my courtroom on Monday, May 23,
1994, at 10:00 a.m., why petitioner

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should not be released from disciplinary
confinement pending resolution of the
2241 motion now before the court.
Petitioner and respondent are granted
until May 26, 1994, to file memoranda of
law on the only other issue before the
court, whether a pretrial detainee can be
administratively punished during such
detention without the benefit of even a
cursory hearing to determine his
innocence or guilt of such charges.

On May 23, 1994, the magistrate judge held the hearing and
filed his recommended decision in the matter including the merits
of the procedural due process violation. The recommended
decision was docketed on May 24, 1994. The implication from
counsel's argument is that she was not prepared at the hearing to
present all evidence on the issue of the procedural due process
violation. The district court, as noted above in the text, did
not address this issue. On remand the district court should
extend a de novo review to this aspect of the magistrate judge's

decision.

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