Hart v. Artus

KEITH HART and SEAN RYAN, Plaintiffs, v. DALE ARTUS, Superintendent of Attica Correctional Facility, STUART ECKARD, J. DONOHUE, Offender Rehabilitation Coordinator of Attica Correctional Facility, ANTHONY ANNUCCI, Acting Commissioner of the NYSDOCCS, JOSEPH BELLNIER, Deputy Commissioner of the NYSDOCCS, and DON VENETTOZZI, Director of Special Housing and Inmate Discipline of the NYSDOCCS, all individually and in their official capacities, Defendants.

No. 6:16-CV-6808 CJS

United States District Court, W.D. New York

July 15, 2021

DECISION AND ORDER

CHARLES J. SIRAGUSA, United States District Judge.

INTRODUCTION

Plaintiffs are prison inmates in the custody of the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (“DOCCS”) who bring this action under 42 U.S.C § 1983 to challenge the constitutionality of their continued long-term confinement in “Central Office Administrative Segregation” (“Central Office Ad Seg”). The Complaint contends that Plaintiffs and other Central Office Ad Seg inmates are kept indefinitely in the Special Housing Unit (“SHU”) with no realistic chance of release, resulting in violations of their federal constitutional rights to due process and humane living conditions. Now before the Court are two applications by Defendants: A motion (ECF No. 33) to partially dismiss the Complaint pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6); and, a motion (ECF No. 34) to strike affidavits filed by Plaintiffs in opposition to the motion to dismiss. For the reasons discussed below, the motion to strike is denied and the motion to dismiss is granted in part and denied in part.

BACKGROUND

Plaintiffs Keith Hart (“Hart”) and Sean Ryan (“Ryan”) have each been in the custody of the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (“DOCCS”) for several decades.^[1] Both were initially placed in DOCCS custody after being convicted of separate and unrelated murders and robberies. Ryan subsequently was convicted of an additional murder (as well as arson) while in DOCCS custody after he killed a co-defendant who had testified against him at trial.^[2] Ryan was also convicted of additional criminal conduct while in DOCCS custody, including an assault on DOCCS staff.^[3] Hart is presently serving an aggregate sentence of 42 years to life, while Ryan is serving an aggregate sentence of 70 years to life.^[4]

Hart and Ryan have each been involved in several attempted or completed escapes from custody. In 1979, Ryan escaped from the Rikers Island.^[5] In 1983, Hart escaped from Elmira Correctional Facility (“Elmira”) by cutting through window bars. In 1988, Hart again attempted an escape this time from Green Haven Correctional Facility (“Green Haven”), by partially sawing through the bars of his cell window, while possessing ropes, hacksaw blades, a grappling hook, a flashlight, duct tape and travel directions.^[6]Finally, in November 1994, both Ryan and Hart, along with two other inmates, escaped from Shawangunk Correctional Facility (“Shawankgunk”). After each completed escape, Plaintiffs were quickly re-captured.

Following the 1994 escape from Shawangunk, both Ryan and Hart served lengthy administrative disciplinary sentences for the escape in the SH U.Specifically, Hart served a 15-year SHU sentence while Ryan served an 11 %-year SHU sentence. The general conditions of such confinement were evidently typical of SHU confinement in New York State prisons, in which

the prisoner is[ ] placed in a solitary confinement cell, kept in his cell for 23 hours a day, permitted to exercise in the prison yard for one hour a day, limited to two showers a week, and denied various privileges available to general population prisoners, such as the opportunity to work and obtain out-of-cell schooling. Visitors are permitted, but the frequency and duration is less than in general population. The number of books allowed in the cell is also limited.

Vance v. State of New York Dep't of Corr., No. 918CV0748MADATB, 2018 WL 6047828, at *5 (N.D.N.Y. Nov. 19, 2018) (quoting Palmer v. Richards, 364 F.3d 60, 66 n.3 (2d Cir. 2004, with internal quotation marks and alterations omitted). Although, Plaintiffs emphasize in this action that SHU confinement also involves other deprivations such as lack of access to religious services; lack of adequate access to law library services; lack of rehabilitative programs; lack of privacy when discussing religious and medical matters; meals that are unappetizing and/or nutritionally inadequate; subpar medical care; and confinement in close proximity to mentally-ill prisoners^[7] serving disciplinary sentences who generate constant deafening noise and sickening odors.^[8]

After Plaintiffs' disciplinary SHU sentences were completed, DOCCS Central Office determined that Plaintiffs should remain in the SHU, pursuant to DOCCS' Central Office Ad Seg policy. In that regard, while Central Office Ad Seg is characterized by DOCCS as a non-punitive type of confinement, it involves placement of inmates into SHU solitary-confinement cells alongside inmates who are serving disciplinary sentences in SHU. For the most part, conditions of confinement for Central Office Ad Seg inmates in SHU are the same as those for inmates serving disciplinary sentences in SHU, though inmates serving disciplinary sentences typically remain in SHU for much shorter periods. Inmates serving disciplinary sentences in SHU also have a definite date upon which their SHU sentences will end, whereas the term of SHU confinement for Central Office Ad Seg inmates is open-ended. Additionally, Plaintiffs allege that inmates serving disciplinary sentences in SHU have some additional privileges that Ad Seg inmates do not have, such as access to the commissary and the use of computer tablets for legal research.^[9]

According to Plaintiffs, “the Central Office Ad Seg recommendation is usually written by a member of the Inspector General's Office and [ ] will allege that the prisoner escaped previously [or] committed an act of violence or some other form of misconduct considered serious” enough that they need to be isolated from inmates and staff.^[10] The general procedure involved in placing and maintaining an inmate in Central Office Ad Seg was recently explained by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit as follows:

In the DOCCS system, there are two relevant reasons for prison administrators to send an inmate to the SHU-Disciplinary Segregation and Administrative Segregation (“Ad Seg”). Disciplinary Segregation, as its name suggests, is designed to discipline an inmate found guilty of a “Tier III” violation, the most serious of three infraction levels in the DOCCS system. N.Y. Comp. Codes R & Regs. tit. 7, §§ 270.2, 270.3(a)(3), 301.2. A Disciplinary Segregation term lasts “for a designated period of time as specified by the hearing officer.” Id. § 301.2(a). Once that time elapses, the statute does not empower DOCCS to punish the inmate doubly for the same infraction by imposing further Disciplinary Segregation. See id.

Ad Seg serves a different purpose. As relevant here, Ad Seg removes an inmate from the general population when he “pose[s] a threat to the safety and security of the [prison] facility.” Id. § 301.4(b). Given the importance of that purpose, Ad Seg is flexible and accords DOCCS officials substantial discretion in deciding whether to impose an Ad Seg term. Ad Seg terms are open-ended and do not require that DOCCS predetermine when it will release an inmate-“[a]t any time when deemed appropriate [by DOCCS], an inmate may be evaluated and recommended for return to general population.” Id. § 301.4(e)

There is, however, a constitutional ceiling on that flexibility: To ensure that a state prison facility does not use Ad Seg as a pretext to commit an inmate to the SHU indefinitely, the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment mandates that prison officials periodically review whether an inmate continues to pose a threat to the facility. Hewitt v. Helms, 459 U.S. 460, 477 n.9, 103 S.Ct. 864, 74 L.Ed.2d 675 (1983), abrogated in part on other grounds by Sandin v. Conner, 515 U.S. 472, 115 S.Ct. 2293, 132 L.Ed.2d 418 (1995). New York effectuates that mandate by providing an inmate with an initial hearing within fourteen days of his confinement in Ad Seg, see N.Y. Comp. Codes R. & Regs. tit. 7, §§ 254.6, 301.4(a), and with reviews conducted pursuant to section 301.4(d) of the DOCCS regulatory code (“section 301.4(d) reviews”) every sixty days until he is returned to the general population, see id. § 301.4(d).

Section 301.4(d) review . . . is a three-step process. First, a committee commonly referred to as the “Facility Committee, ” consisting of “a representative of the facility executive staff, a security supervisor, and a member of the guidance and counseling staff, ” convenes to review the inmate's institutional record. Id. § 301.4(d)(1). The Facility Committee prepares and submits to the superintendent of the prison a report outlining “(i) reasons why the inmate was initially determined to be appropriate for [Ad Seg]; (ii) information on the inmate's subsequent behavior and attitude; and (iii) any other factors that [the committee] believe[s] may favor retaining the inmate in or releasing the inmate from [Ad Seg]” and recommending whether to continue the inmate's SHU term. Id.

Second, the superintendent forwards the Facility Committee's report and any written response that the inmate submits to a “Central Office Committee” located at DOCCS headquarters in Albany, New York, for “Central Office Review.” The Central Office Committee, “consisting of a representative from the office of facility operations, a member of [the DOCCS] inspector general's staff, and an attorney from the office of counsel, ” reviews the Facility Committee's report,

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