ALDRICH v. GOVERNOR (2019)

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER PURSUANT TO RULE 1:28

The plaintiff, a prisoner at the Massachusetts Correctional Institution at Shirley (MCI-Shirley), filed the underlying complaint claiming that he and other inmates suffering from mental illness were mistreated while incarcerated. Among other things, the plaintiff sought injunctive relief in the form of an order that (1) all mentally ill inmates be released from solitary confinement, (2) a task force be created to rescreen mentally ill inmates held in solitary confinement and implement their release, (3) the defendants implement new regulations regarding the treatment of prisoners with mental illness, (4) an independent committee be formed to monitor the Department of Correction's (DOC's) treatment of prisoners with mental illness, and (5) the defendants be enjoined from retaliating against the plaintiff for “exposing prison abuses and mistreatment of mentally ill prisoners in solitary confinement.” The plaintiff also sought compensatory and punitive money damages.

The defendants, public officials who oversee the State's prison system, moved to dismiss the complaint or, in the alternative, for summary judgment. While that motion was pending, the plaintiff filed a motion for leave to amend the complaint, seeking to remove the Governor as a defendant and add the medical director of the Massachusetts Partnership for Correctional Healthcare, as a defendant.³ A Superior Court judge held a hearing on the dispositive motion, allowed the plaintiff time to supplement the record, and ultimately allowed summary judgment for the defendants in a comprehensive written decision. The judge did not specifically rule on the motion for leave to amend, but noted in his decision that his ruling “resolve[d] all claims brought by [the plaintiff] ․ Therefore, all other pending motions are moot.” On appeal, the plaintiff claims the judge erred in allowing summary judgment while his motion to amend was pending. We affirm.

Background. 1. Special management unit. We summarize the facts in the light most favorable to the plaintiff. See Ajemian v. Yahoo!, 478 Mass. 169, 171 (2017). At the time the complaint was filed, the plaintiff had been a prisoner at MCI-Shirley for approximately four and one-half years. He was a self-described “jailhouse lawyer” who assisted fellow inmates with legal issues. The plaintiff also helped coordinate prisoner self-improvement groups and often addressed prison officials regarding prisoner treatment issues. The plaintiff observed that these activities led him to be characterized as a “high profile prisoner activist.”

On April 14, 2015, the plaintiff inserted himself in a dispute between correction officers and another inmate as the officers physically restrained the inmate. When the plaintiff failed to obey an officer's command to “just stand back,” the plaintiff was sprayed with a chemical agent, physically restrained, and ultimately placed in the special management unit (SMU). The plaintiff alleged that in the SMU, prisoners remained in their cells twenty-three hours each day on weekdays and twenty-four hours each day on weekends. While incarcerated the plaintiff claims to have received mental health treatment for “major depression and paranoia, and other related mental health disorders, [and] was prescribed psychotropic medication to stabilize his mental health condition.” The complaint alleges that correction officers mistreated the plaintiff and other inmates in the SMU suffering from mental illness. The plaintiff wrote letters to the Governor and some of the defendants, complaining “about the abuses and DOC's failure to remove seriously mentally ill prisoners from solitary confinement.”

2. The legal framework. General Laws c. 127, § 39A, as then in effect,⁴ prohibits inmates with “serious mental illness” from being held in “a segregated unit for more than 30 days.” Separately, G. L. c. 127, § 17A, instructs the Commissioner of Correction (commissioner) to establish residential treatment units “as are necessary for the treatment of mentally ill inmates.” To satisfy these requirements, the DOC has established a mental health classification system that pertains to the assessment of the individual mental health needs of inmates. The classification system, set forth in 105 DOC 650 (2015), ranks the needs of an inmate on a scale of zero to five, with levels four and five indicating serious functional impairment requiring the individual not be housed in the general population. The system also contains a series of subcodes that reflect additional mental health information, such as any prescriptions an inmate is taking.

3. The plaintiff's classification. When initially incarcerated, the plaintiff was classified as not having current mental health needs (MH-0). Immediately following the April 2015 incident, and before being placed in the SMU, he was screened by a mental health professional, pursuant to G. L. c. 127, § 39 A (a), as then in effect, and put on mental health watch due to suicidal ideations. On May 13, 2015, he was designated MH-2 with no subcodes. The plaintiff acknowledged that mental health professionals regularly monitored inmates in the SMU, however, he claimed the monitoring and care were insufficient. On July 10, 2015, the plaintiff was released from the SMU after final resolution of the disciplinary proceedings stemming from the April 2015 incident. The plaintiff had been held in the SMU for a total of eighty-seven days, during which his status was reviewed every three or four days.

Discussion. The plaintiff's principal claims on appeal are that (1) the judge erred by allowing summary judgment before addressing his motion for leave to amend, and (2) a second judge erred when he allowed the medical director of the Massachusetts Partnership for Correctional Healthcare's motion to correct the record to exclude him as a party defendant. The plaintiff's brief does not claim error in the judge's application of the summary judgment standard to the substantive claims in his complaint. Accordingly, any argument on the merits of the summary judgment decision is waived. Mass. R. A. P. 16 (a) (4), as amended, 367 Mass. 921 (1975). We address the merits only insofar as they relate to the plaintiff's motion to amend the complaint.

Although leave to amend should be “freely given when justice so requires,” Mass. R. Civ. P. 15 (a), 365 Mass. 761 (1974), such leave may be denied where amending the complaint would be futile. Dzung Duy Nguyen v. Massachusetts Inst. of Tech., 479 Mass. 436, 461 (2018). An amendment to a complaint is futile if the amended claims would still have been properly dismissed. See North Am. Expositions Co. Ltd. Partnership v. Corcoran, 452 Mass. 852, 871-872 (2009) (denial of motion to amend not abuse of discretion when amendment did not address complaint's fatal flaw). Here, the only variation between the plaintiff's amended complaint and the original complaint was the removal of the Governor as a defendant and the addition of the medical director of the Massachusetts Partnership for Correctional Healthcare as a defendant. The material substantive allegations did not change. In assessing futility, we review the summary judgment record de novo to determine if “all material facts have been established and the moving party [was] entitled to a judgment as a matter of law” (quotations omitted). DeWolfe v. Hingham Ctr., Ltd., 464 Mass. 795, 799 (2013).

First, the undisputed facts in the summary judgment record show that the plaintiff was not diagnosed with a “serious mental illness,” so his confinement in the SMU did not violate G. L. c. 127, § 39A, as the plaintiff claimed.⁵ Moreover, although an inmate may not be held in the SMU on “awaiting action status” for longer than ninety days without a hearing, LaChance v. Commissioner of Correction, 463 Mass. 767, 777 (2012), the disciplinary action against the plaintiff was timely, as his initial hearing occurred within one month of his placement in the SMU, and he was released from the SMU after eighty-seven days.

Next, although G. L. c. 127, § 17A, directs the commissioner to establish residential treatment units, it does not require that every State correctional facility have one. Rather, the commissioner may, in the exercise of his or her discretion, allocate prison resources “as are necessary for the treatment of mentally ill inmates.” G. L. c. 127, § 17A (a). See Haverty v. Commissioner of Correction, 440 Mass. 1, 6 (2003) (commissioner has discretion to determine priorities and allocate resources accordingly).

The plaintiff's various claims regarding rehabilitation programs, good time credits, and transfers have no merit as the plaintiff has no enforceable right to these programs or benefits, which are subject to the commissioner's discretion. See Jackson v. Commissioner of Correction, 388 Mass. 700, 703 (1983) (“under Massachusetts law the decision to transfer a prisoner by the Commissioner is a simple exercise of his administrative discretion made numerous times for varied reasons”); Commonwealth v. DeWeldon, 80 Mass. App. Ct. 626, 632-633 (2011) (“A prisoner does not have any entitlement to earned good time until the commissioner acts”); Ladetto v. Commissioner of Correction, 7 Mass. App. Ct. 1, 2-3 (1979) (absent statutory grant, prisoners have no right to particular rehabilitative program). The plaintiff has not shown that the commissioner abused his discretion in denying access to any programs. See id.

Finally, given the clear evidence of “legitimate penological reasons for imposing the disciplinary sanctions against him,” the plaintiff's assertion that he was disciplined after exercising his rights under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution was insufficient to establish a retaliation claim. Puleio v. Commissioner of Correction, 52 Mass. App. Ct. 302, 310 (2001). “While the chronology of events can in some circumstances defeat a motion to dismiss, it cannot create a triable issue when the defendants have produced evidence of a legitimate purpose that would have prompted the [disciplinary action] in the absence of the [protected activity].” Sabree v. Conley, 62 Mass. App. Ct. 901, 904 (2004).

For all of these reasons, we discern no abuse of discretion in the judge's failure to address the motion to amend the complaint because the proposed amendment to the complaint would have been futile.⁶ ,⁷

Judgment affirmed.

Orders denying postjudgment motions affirmed.

FOOTNOTES

3.   The Massachusetts Partnership for Correctional Healthcare is a private company employed by the Commonwealth to provide medical and mental health services to inmates.

4.   Significant amendments were made to portions of G. L. c. 127 that went into effect on December 31, 2018. We cite to the earlier statutes that were in effect at the relevant time.

5.   The plaintiff also contends he was held in “solitary confinement” for more than fifteen days, in violation of G. L. c. 127, § 40, as then in effect (and subsequently repealed). See St. 2018, c. 69, § 94. Moreover, the SMU is not “solitary confinement” as that term was previously defined. See Torres v. Commissioner of Correction, 427 Mass. 611, 613, 617, cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1017 (1998).

6.   For the same reasons that we conclude plaintiff's proposed amendment to the complaint would have been futile, the judge did not err in allowing the medical director of the Massachusetts Partnership for Correctional Healthcare's motion to correct the record.

7.   “Other points, relied on by the [plaintiff], but not discussed in this [memorandum and order], have not been overlooked. We find nothing in them that requires discussion.” Commonwealth v. Domanski, 332 Mass. 66, 78 (1954). For example, we discern no abuse of discretion in the judge's denial of the plaintiff's motion for sanctions against Attorney Puddister or in the denial of the motions for reconsideration.