Opinion
Civil Action No. 3:94CV-230-H
December 9, 2002.
MEMORANDUM OPINION
The primary issue before the Court is whether Plaintiff, James Farris, has standing to pursue this action. Farris and three other prison inmates initially commenced this 42 U.S.C. § 1983 prisoner access to the courts case on behalf of themselves and all other Kentucky prison inmates who received enhanced sentences under Kentucky's persistent felony offender (PFO) statute based on convictions in jurisdictions other than Kentucky. The four named plaintiffs alleged that they and the other members of the class were deprived of their constitutional right of access to the courts by reason of Kentucky's failure to furnish them out-of-state legal materials for use in collaterally attacking the validity of their foreign convictions. The district court judge, at the time, certified the class, upheld plaintiffs' claims on cross-motions for summary judgment, and ordered systemic class-wide relief.
Defendants appealed the district court's decision to the Sixth Circuit. In an unpublished decision, Mitchell v. Dep't of Corrections, No. 98-6548, 2000 U.S. App. LEXIS 26160 (6th Cir. Oct. 12, 2002), the Sixth Circuit held that named plaintiff Thomas A. Mitchell lacked standing to sue, and concluded that the district court should not have certified the class because of a failure to meet the requirements of Fed.R.Civ.Pro. 23 with respect to commonality and typicality. Id. at *3. The Sixth Circuit reversed the district court's summary judgment determination and remanded the case with instructions to dismiss plaintiff Mitchell for lack of standing and to determine whether the same course should be followed as to each of the other three plaintiffs. Id. at *13. In accordance with the Sixth Circuit's opinion, on remand this Court granted Defendants' motion to decertify the class and ordered the parties to brief the standing issue as to the remaining plaintiffs. At this juncture, Farris is the only remaining plaintiff still in the Kentucky prison system, and therefore, the Court addresses only whether Farris has standing to pursue an individual right of access to the courts action against Defendants.
Of the named plaintiffs, only plaintiff Mitchell testified before the district court. The record as it related to the other named plaintiffs was too sparse to enable the Sixth Circuit to determine whether any of the remaining three plaintiffs had standing to sue on appeal.
The claims of the other two plaintiffs are now moot. Plaintiff Scotty Leppard has been paroled and plaintiff Thomas Florence has served out his time.
Farris was tried and convicted of a felony in Texas in 1970. Twenty years later, Farris pled guilty to seven felony counts in Jefferson Circuit Court, one of which was as a PFO, the sole basis of which was the 1970 Texas felony conviction. Counsel represented Farris during the 1990 proceedings. Prior to accepting Farris's plea "the Court inquired of the Defendant and his counsel whether they had any legal cause to show why judgment should not be pronounced and afforded the Defendant and his counsel the opportunity to make statements in Defendant's behalf and to present any information in mitigation of punishment." (12/20/90 Judgment of Conviction and Sentence at 2.) At that time, Farris did not attempt challenge the validity of his Texas felony conviction. Instead, he voluntarily pled guilty to all seven felonies including the PFO charge. As a result of his PFO conviction, Farris's sentence was enhanced from twenty (20) years to life imprisonment. The PFO also rendered Farris ineligible for probation, shock probation or conditional discharge. Once imprisoned, Farris decided that he wanted to collaterally attack his Texas conviction on the basis of ineffective assistance of counsel so as to undercut his PFO conviction and enhanced sentence. Farris discovered, however, that the Kentucky prison library is limited to federal law, Kentucky law, and general treatises. It does not contain materials specific to Texas. Accordingly, Farris maintains that Kentucky's prison library system is inadequate to prepare him to mount a collateral attack on the Texas conviction. In this action, Farris alleges that the lack of Texas legal materials violates his constitutional right to access the court system.
At issue now, as a threshold matter, the Court must determine whether Farris has standing to pursue this case against Defendants. It is firmly established that prisoners have a constitutional right of access to the courts. Bounds v. Smith, 430 U.S. 817, 822 (1977). This right, however, is not absolute or freestanding. See Lewis v. Casey, 518 U.S. 343, 356 (1996). An inmate cannot bring suit merely because he believes the prison library is inadequate in some manner. Id. To maintain a right to access suit, an inmate must demonstrate that the alleged shortcomings in the library or legal assistance program cause the inmate to suffer some actual injury. See Mitchell, 2000 U.S. App. LEXIS 26160 at *9-10. The inmate must show that the alleged inadequacies hinder his efforts to pursue a non-frivolous legal claim. See Lewis, 518 U.S. 356. As the Supreme Court recently pointed out, "[e]ven in forward-looking prisoner class actions to remove roadblocks to future litigation, the named plaintiff must identify a `nonfrivolous,' `arguable,' underlying claim." Christopher v. Harbury, ___ U.S. ___, 122 S.Ct. 2179, 2186, 153 L.Ed.2d 413, 424 (2002). Furthermore, the claim the inmate seeks to pursue must relate in some manner to the fact or nature of the inmate's confinement. See Thaddeus-X v. Blatter, 175 F.3d 378, 390 (6th Cir. 1990) ("A prisoner's right to access the courts extends to direct appeals, habeas corpus applications, and civil rights claims only.") "Impairment of any other litigating capacity is simply one of incidental (and perfectly constitutional) consequences of conviction and incarceration." Lewis, 518 U.S. at 355.
In the case at bar, then, the Court must determine whether Farris has a non-frivolous claim that relates directly to the fact or nature of his confinement which he is unable to present to the courts because of the allegedly inadequate prison library. Farris asserts that his claim has merit because it is based on the ineffective assistance of counsel, a well-recognized legal claim that depends on a careful review of the case history and lawyer's performance. Even assuming that the underlying claim is non-frivolous, the Court must also consider whether the claim relates directly to the nature or terms of Farris's confinement. In other words, the Court must determine whether Farris's alleged inability to pursue the Texas claim will cause him to suffer an actual injury. Whether Farris can demonstrate an actual injury is dependent on what effect, if any, a reversal of the Texas conviction would ultimately have on Farris's Kentucky prison sentence.
Kentucky bars the type of post-conviction collateral attack Farris is ultimately seeking. See Commonwealth v. Hodges, 984 S.W.2d 100 (Ky. 1998); Graham v. Commonwealth, 952 S.W.2d 206, 208 (Ky. 1997); Howard v. Com., 777 S.W.2d 888 (Ky. 1989). In Graham the Kentucky Supreme Court reaffirmed its position that a challenge to a PFO based conviction must be made by the defendant prior to a final conviction. Graham, 952 S.W.2d at 207. The Graham court upheld the following proposition from Howard insofar as it deals with guilty pleas to PFO charges:
[W]here a defendant has been convicted of one or more felonies and is subsequently tried and convicted as a persistent felon based on the earlier convictions, this jurisdiction requires him to raise any issues about the validity of those earlier convictions at the time he is tried as a persistent felon. If he does not, he is precluded from contesting the validity of the earlier convictions in subsequent post-conviction proceedings.
Howard, 777 S.W.2d at 889. Kentucky clearly bars a defendant from collaterally attacking a PFO by challenging the underlying conviction in another later proceeding.
The PFO charge to which Farris pled guilty was predicated upon his 1970 Texas felony conviction. Had Farris considered the earlier conviction to be invalid due to the ineffective assistance of counsel the time to attack it was in 1990 before he entered his guilty plea. Once he acquiesced to the charge, the validity of the Texas conviction, at least as it relates to the PFO conviction, became final and cannot now be resurrected. Farris has failed to demonstrate how his Texas challenge will impact the nature or fact of his present confinement. Even if Farris were successful in the Texas court, under Kentucky law, having failed to raise the validity of the prior conviction in the his initial proceeding, he would not be able to raise the issue in any post-conviction proceeding. For this reason, Farris cannot demonstrate that the lack of Texas specific materials in the prison library will cause him suffer any actual injury. As such, Farris does not have standing to maintain an access to the courts action.
The Court will enter an Order consistent with this Memorandum Opinion.
ORDER
In accordance with the Sixth Circuit's instructions on remand, the Court has considered the issue of whether Plaintiff, James Farris, has standing to pursue this action, and has filed a Memorandum Opinion. The Court being otherwise sufficiently advised;
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that Plaintiff's claims are DISMISSED for lack of standing.
This is a final and appealable order.