United States Eighth Circuit

Dismissal of prisoner's federal equal protection and retaliation claims, and state law claims, is affirmed as: 1) telling admittedly noisy inmates to "shut up" on one occasion did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment, even if equally noisy inmates of another race were not equally chastised; 2) a claim of racially discriminatory work assignments failed as plaintiff did not prove they were motivated by race; 3) retaliation claims were properly dismissed because insufficient evidence supported a finding that plaintiff's work assignments would chill an inmate of ordinary firmness from filing grievances, and no evidence of retaliation in relation to a prior grievance existed; and 4) state law claims were properly dismissed on the merits.

Appellate Information

• Decided 05/11/2007
• Published 05/11/2007

Judges

• LOKEN, Chief Judge., Before LOKEN, Chief Judge, JOHN R. GIBSON and MURPHY, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Eighth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Clayborne S. Stone, argued, Little Rock, Arkansas, for appellant.


• For Appellees:
  
• Asheton M. Carter, argued, Little Rock, Arkansas, for appellee.