FOREWORD The Prisoner Civil Rights Committee of the Federal Judicial Center is pleased to make available to the federal judiciary, through the Center, this compendium of prisoner civil rights law compiled by Ila Jeanne Sensenich, U. S. Magistrate, Western District of Pennsylvania. The compendium is the product of research initiated by Magistrate Sensenich in the performance of her official duties and later expanded by her at our request for the committee's ongoing study of the problems confronting federal courts in prisoner cases. The committee's purpose is threefold: First, to evaluate the handling of prisoner conditions-of-confinement cases in order to recommend procedures that would increase judicial capacity to give prompt relief to meritorious prisoner cases. Second, to help federal judges and magistrates and staff personnel to deal effectively and efficiently with those difficult-to-handle cases. Third, to contribute to the proper apportionment of responsibility between federal and state courts with respect to such litigation. The preparation of this compendium by Magistrate Sensenich has greatly assisted the committee's work. Although this work is an individual effort, and does not purport to be an official committee document, we believe that it may serve as an effective research tool for members of the federal judiciary in an important facet of litigation; a troublesome aspect of litigation where the plaintiff usually appears without counsel, thus placing upon the court the important and sensitive task of analyzing pleadings and performing research ordinarily available to the court by means of professionally prepared pleadings and supporting memoranda. Magistrate Sensenich has selected the cases for the compendium and has interpreted them. Thus the work does not reflect an official view of the Federal Judicial Center or a committee thereof. We are distributing the compendium only for the possible value it may afford the federal judiciary as a beginning point for research. Although lengthy, the work is not presented as a comprehensive treatise on prisoner case law; the cases set forth are designed to be illustrative only. Moreover, although the committee's efforts have concentrated on conditions-of-confinement cases, Magistrate Sensenich's work covers a wider range of cases brought under the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1983, which have demanded the attention of federal judges and magistrates. The response to the committee's tentative reports in 1976 and 1977 on recommended procedures for processing prisoner cases has been gratifying. We plan to issue a final report upon the completion of our study. The committee distributes the Sensenich compendium with the hope that it may prove useful and we continue to solicit your comments and recommendations. Ruggero J. Aldisert U.S. Circuit Judge, Chairman Robert C. Belloni U.S. District Judge Robert J. Kelleher U.S. District Judge Frank J. McGarr U.S. District Judge John H. Wood U.S. District Judge Ila Jeanne Sensenich Professor Bruce S. Rogow INTRODUCTION When a state prisoner has a complaint about conditions of confinement in a state institution, the preferred method of seeking relief is to by-pass the state administrative apparatus and the state judicial system and to file a claim in the federal district court alleging a deprivation of federal constitutional rights. The federal remedy may be sought even though the prisoner was sentenced to a state institution by a state judge. The result is to place a disproportionate amount of responsibility upon the federal judiciary. Prisoner rights cases occupy a significant percentage of the time of federal courts, particularly of the United States district judges. The Administrative Office of the United States Courts has been keeping statistics on prisoner cases for the past few years. "Civil rights" cases have been tabulated separately for seven years. Those statistics show that state prisoner civil rights cases totaled 3,348 in the fiscal year ending June 30, 1972; 4,174 in 1973; 5,236 in 1974; 6,128 in 1975; 6,958 in 1976; 7,752 in 1977; and 9,730 in 1978. The numbers are large and continue to increase. Civil rights petitions from state inmates have increased by 379.3 percent since 1970. 1 But sheer numbers do not tell the complete story; for it is generally agreed that most prisoner rights cases are frivolous and ought to be dismissed under even the narrowest definition of frivolity. The Freund Report2 1. Annual Report of the Director of the Administrative Office of the United States Courts, 1978. 2. Report of the Study Group on the Caseload of the Supreme Court, 57 F.R.D. 573 (1972), popularly known as the Freund Report, named for its chairman, the distinguished Professor Paul Freund of Harvard University. |