Francis v. Maloney , 798 F.3d 33 ( 2015 )

United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
No. 14-1320
GARETH FRANCIS,
Petitioner, Appellant,
v.
CHRISTOPHER MALONEY and CHARLES E. SAMUELS, JR.,
Respondents, Appellees.
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS
[Hon. William G. Young, U.S. District Judge]
Before
Howard, Chief Judge,
Torruella and Kayatta, Circuit Judges.
Amy L. Codagnone for petitioner.
Christine J. Wichers, Assistant United States Attorney, with
whom Carmen M. Ortiz, United States Attorney, was on brief, for
respondents.
August 19, 2015
HOWARD, Chief Judge. Although the parties present this
case as implicating a question of due process, it ultimately turns
on our inability to provide the petitioner with the relief that he
seeks. Petitioner Gareth Francis brought this 28 U.S.C. § 2241
habeas corpus petition after he was released from federal custody.
In the district court, he argued that the Bureau of Prisons ("BOP")
violated his due process rights when it failed to provide him with
an in-person hearing before revoking his good-time credits, thus
causing him to over-serve his prison sentence. The district court
rejected his constitutional contention. We instead conclude that
we are unable to provide Francis with his requested remedy, and
thus affirm.
I.
In September 2008, Francis was sentenced in the District
of Vermont to fifty-one months in prison and two years of
supervised release for making false statements in connection with
the purchase of a firearm. 18 U.S.C. § 922(a)(6). Shortly
thereafter, he was sentenced in the District of Massachusetts as
a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition. 18 U.S.C.
§ 922(g)(1). For this latter crime, the court sentenced him to
twenty-seven months in prison and two years of supervised release.
The first twenty-one months were to run concurrently with the
Vermont sentence, yielding a total incarcerative span of fifty-
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seven months. His imprisonment began with detention on July 16,
2008, and his expected release date was April 16, 2013.
While in prison, Francis earned good-time credits. 18
U.S.C. § 3624(b)(1) (allowing for fifty-four days of good-conduct
time for each year). His putative release date was therefore moved
up to October 10, 2012. With two months remaining, on August 9,
2012, the BOP transferred Francis to a residential re-entry center,
the Coolidge House. Unfortunately, Francis violated a number of
rules while he was there.
On August 21, 2012, the Coolidge House's "Center
Discipline Committee" ("CDC") issued its first violation report
regarding Francis's behavior. After a hearing, the CDC recommended
that Francis be returned to a secure BOP facility. A Discipline
Hearing Officer reviewed the matter, and imposed the recommended
punishment.
Before the BOP could effectuate that transfer for this
initial infraction, however, the CDC accused Francis of committing
five more violations. The CDC swiftly prepared a report about
each event, but it was unable to provide Francis with CDC review
hearings before the transfer occurred. While Francis was mid-
transfer (and thus in the custody of the U.S. Marshals), the CDC
attempted to conduct hearings over the telephone, but ultimately
had to hold them in absentia. After the proceedings and a
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subsequent review by a hearing officer, the BOP revoked 142-days
of Francis's total good-time credits as a disciplinary measure.
His release date was thus delayed until February 25, 2013.
After Francis returned to a secure BOP facility, a final
in-person hearing was scheduled to re-consider the 142-day
sanction. On January 7, 2013, the hearing officer expunged several
of the violations, and reinstated all but 41 days of the lost good
time. With this change, Francis's release date reverted back to
November 16, 2012. The BOP therefore immediately released Francis
from its custody. At that point, he began serving his term of
supervised release.
In late 2013, Francis filed this petition for habeas
corpus, invoking 28 U.S.C. § 2241. He sought a court order
requiring the BOP to reinstate the lost good-time credits and to
amend his prison records accordingly. Moreover, he demanded an
immediate end to his supervised release term to account for the
extra time incarcerated. Francis constructed his case around the
theory that the BOP's failure to hold an in-person hearing before
revoking good-time credits violated the due process clause. The
defendants swiftly moved to dismiss the petition or, in the
alternative, for summary judgment.
The district court bifurcated its consideration of the
desired remedies. First, it converted Francis's request to
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terminate his supervised release term to a motion to vacate or
amend the sentence, see 28 U.S.C. § 2255. The court indicated
that it was willing to account for the time Francis over-served
when deciding that converted motion. But, because Francis had a
forthcoming revocation hearing (to address an unrelated, alleged
violation of the conditions of his release), the court postponed
ruling on that converted motion. At that later hearing, the court
found Francis in violation, terminated the remainder of his
sentence, and imposed a new two-year term of supervised release.
Other than a very brief statement at oral argument before us,
Francis fails to offer even a perfunctory argument respecting this
part of the case, and we thus bypass further discussion of it.
See Mills v. U.S. Bank, NA, 753 F.3d 47, 55 (1st Cir. 2014).
Meanwhile, Francis also persisted in the district court
with a request that his good-time credits be reinstated and that
his release date be amended to reflect that change. The district
court concluded that while Francis had over-served his sentence,
no due process violation occurred. The court therefore entered
judgment for the defendants. A timely appeal -- centered on this
second request -- followed.
II.
We review the denial of a habeas petition de novo,
Nadeau v. Matesanz, 289 F.3d 13, 15 (1st Cir. 2002), and can affirm
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for any reason apparent in the record, cf. Jones v. Secord, 684
F.3d 1, 5 (1st Cir. 2012).
There are two lenses through which we can view Francis's
petition. First, we can analyze it as it was literally presented
to us: a retroactive challenge to the execution of an incarcerative
sentence (that is, a request to change the end date of a previously
completed prison term). Alternatively, we could consider it as a
protest to the execution of Francis's supervised release term (that
is, a request to alter the start date of that feature of the
sentence). We address each plausible theory in turn.
i.
Francis presents this case to us as a retroactive attempt
to reinstate his good-time credits and to amend his records.
Section 2241, however, erects an insurmountable barrier.1 That
habeas provision establishes a mechanism for a federal inmate who
is "in custody" to challenge the execution of (rather than the
imposition of) his or her sentence. See 28 U.S.C § 2241(c)(3)("The
writ of habeas corpus shall not extend to a prisoner unless . . .
1 In the habeas context, we are particularly cognizant of
the basis that the petitioner invokes, since the habeas scheme is
not interchangeable with other regimes. See, e.g., González-
Fuentes v. Molina, 607 F.3d 864, 872-74 (1st Cir. 2010). For
instance, we have consistently emphasized distinctions between
habeas and civil rights statutes, and have noted that a litigant
must invoke the correct one to proceed. Id.; see also Preiser v.
Rodríguez, 411 U.S. 475, 489-90 (1973).
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[h]e [or she] is in custody in violation of the Constitution or
laws or treaties of the United States."); see also Thompson
v. United States, 536 F.2d 459, 460-61 (1st Cir. 1976).
For example, an individual may invoke § 2241 to dispute
a parole board's action, to challenge placement (or lack thereof)
in a community confinement center, or to contest one's imprisonment
in a specific facility. Id.; see also Muniz v. Sabol, 517 F.3d
29, 33-34 (1st Cir. 2008) (collecting cases). This section has
also traditionally been available to inmates challenging the
revocation of good-time credits. See, e.g., Littlefield v. Caton,
856 F.2d 344 (1st Cir. 1988). We assume, without deciding, that
this remains true despite recent dicta in Pepper v. United States.
131 S. Ct. 1229, 1248 n.14 (2011) ("An award of good time credits
by the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) does not affect the length of a
court-imposed sentence; rather, it is an administrative reward
. . . Such credits may be revoked at any time before the date of
a prisoner's release."); see also Cardona v. Bledsoe, 681 F.3d
533, 537 n.8 (3d Cir. 2012) ("Indeed, the Supreme Court's recent
opinion in [Pepper] calls into question whether an inmate can even
bring a habeas claim for an actual loss of good time credits."
(emphasis in original)).
Under this theory, the § 2241 petition here cannot move
forward for a simple reason: the petition was moot at the moment
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it was filed. That is, Francis lost his ability to invoke § 2241
with respect to his prison sentence once he was released from that
incarceration. While it is true that an individual serving a
supervised release term satisfies the "in custody" requirement (or
at least we have said as much for § 2255 purposes), Jackson v.
Coalter, 337 F.3d 74, 78-79 (1st Cir. 2003), a petition under
§ 2241 must still target conditions that will have a
contemporaneous or prospective impact on one's sentence, see Ford
v. Bender, 768 F.3d 15, 29 (1st Cir. 2014) (stating that "[a]
prisoner's challenge to prison conditions or policies is generally
rendered moot by his transfer or release," and that "[a]ny
declaratory or injunctive relief ordered in the inmate's favor in
such situations would have no practical impact on the inmate's
rights and would not redress in any way the injury he [or she]
originally asserted. (quoting Incumma v. Ozmint, 507 F.3d 281, 287
(4th Cir. 2007))). Here, Francis's requested remedy will have no
such effect.
Although we have only dealt with an analogous case in an
unpublished opinion, that decision provides an anchoring point for
our analysis. See First Cir. Local R. 32.3(a)(2)(explaining when
an unpublished opinion has persuasive value). In Simon v. United
States, a § 2241 petitioner argued that the government unlawfully
withheld 120 days of his good-time credits. No. 95-1330, 1995 WL
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709643 (1st Cir. Dec. 4, 1995). By the time Simon's appeal reached
us, however, the government had released the petitioner from
custody. Accordingly, we concluded that the case was moot because
"there [was] no longer any available relief that [could] be
judicially awarded." Id. at *1. See also Muniz, 517 F.3d at 34
n.9 (noting that a petitioner's § 2241 challenge was likely moot
because it appeared that he had been released).
Our opinion in Simon, in turn, cites two analogous
decisions from other circuits. The first, Fendler v. United States
Bureau of Prisons, involved an inmate who challenged a parole
board's consideration of the severity of his offense and thus
denied him an earlier release. 846 F.2d 550, 555 (9th Cir. 1988).
The Ninth Circuit dismissed the case as moot, because the
individual had been released from custody by the time it heard the
case. Id. It determined that there was no continuing controversy
since the challenged action only impacted the length of his
sentence, which was no longer at issue.
The second case, Bailey v. Southerland, dealt with an
individual who, like Francis, challenged the revocation of his
good-time credits. 821 F.2d 277, 278 (5th Cir. 1987). Bailey
also sought to have his disciplinary record expunged. The Fifth
Circuit found that the case had become moot upon his release
because he faced no adverse consequences if the status quo remained
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unchanged. Id. Indeed, the good-time credits (and associated
disciplinary record) only affected Bailey's sentence until the
point of release and was simply irrelevant after that time. Id.
Even more recently, the Third and Eighth Circuits have
adopted this same approach. The Third Circuit, in Scott v.
Schuykill FCI, held that a former inmate's § 2241 challenge to a
disciplinary proceeding was moot because he had been released from
custody and thus "his good time credits ceased to have any effect."
298 Fed. App'x 202, 204 (3d Cir. 2008). Similarly, the Eighth
Circuit found an analogous challenge moot because an individual
who has been released from prison suffers no adverse or collateral
consequences from the revocation of good-time credits. James v.
Outlaw, 142 Fed. App'x 274, 275 (8th Cir. 2005).
The logic underpinning these cases comports with the "in
custody" requirement of § 2241 and the mootness doctrine more
generally. See Decker v. Nw. Envt'l. Def. Ctr., 133 S. Ct. 1326,
1335 (2013). It is only during the course of one's incarceration
that one can meaningfully change the conditions of that very
confinement. With respect to good-time credits specifically, the
goal is necessarily to reinstate the lost time and thus reduce the
length of a sentence being served. Achieving that goal is no
longer possible.
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For Francis, a petitioner who did not file this case
until after he was released, reinstating his credits or altering
his release date remedies nothing. Nor is there any indication
that he will suffer any adverse or collateral consequences without
retroactive relief. See James, 142 Fed. App'x 274 at 275. Because
there is no longer any possible remedy that we can provide, § 2241
simply does not present a viable vehicle for his constitutional
claim.
ii.
Although it may simply represent the flip side of the
same coin, Francis's petition could also be interpreted as an
attack on the execution of his supervised release sentence. In
other words, rather than requesting an amendment to the end date
of his custodial sentence, he wants to back-date the start of his
supervised release. But for the due process violation, the
argument runs, his supervised release would have started in late
2012. He thus seeks an order stating that his release date was
the day he should have been released (rather than the date he was
physically released from custody), and that his supervised release
therefore started at that earlier time.
To the extent that this claim is not mooted as a result
of the district court's imposition of a new two-year supervised
release term -- a sentence, we reiterate, that the court imposed
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after expressing a willingness to account for the 52 days that
Francis over-served in prison -- the requested remedy is, in any
event, foreclosed by Supreme Court precedent.2
In United States v. Johnson, an inmate serving a prison
sentence as a result of multiple felony convictions, was successful
in having two of his convictions expunged. 529 U.S. 53 (2000).
As a result, he had over-served his revised sentence and was
subsequently released from custody to begin a term of supervised
release. Id. at 55. The Supreme Court addressed the question of
whether the extra time served could be credited to the supervised
release term; i.e., whether the date when the plaintiff was
supposed to have been released could serve as the start of the
period of supervised release. Id. at 54. Emphasizing the plain
language of the statute governing supervised release, 18 U.S.C.
§ 3624(e), the Court concluded that the meaning of the phrase "is
released from imprisonment" is clear: it signifies the date that
the individual is actually released from prison. Johnson, 529
U.S. at 56-59. Thus, the Court concluded that it could not change
that date to account for the excess time incarcerated. Id.
2 There is a strong argument that this claim is also now moot
since Francis is no longer serving the initial supervised release
term. However, Francis could theoretically argue that this second
supervised release term also needs to be amended on account of the
initial alleged error. For that reason, we consider the claim.
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Instead, the petitioner could only seek redress through a petition
to modify or terminate the sentence in the district court under 18
U.S.C. § 3583(e). Id. at 66.
Johnson binds us. Even taking Francis's complaint as
true, and even assuming that the facts it alleged constituted a
due process violation, we would still be unable to provide him
with the relief that he seeks.3 That is, Francis requests an order
back-dating his release from confinement. But, Johnson says that
such a remedy contravenes the plain language of the statute and
that the date Francis's supervised release began must, as a matter
of statutory law, remain the day he was physically released from
incarceration. There are thus no facts Francis could assert, or
constitutional claim that he could muster, which would entitle him
to the specific remedy he now requests under § 2241. Cf. Minneci
v. Pollard, 132 S. Ct. 617, 612 (2012) (noting in the Bivens context
that dismissal is appropriate where no remedy exists even if the
facts, taken as true, make out a constitutional violation).
Although Johnson makes plain that Francis may have other
avenues to obtain a shorter supervised release term -- such as
through a motion to modify or terminate his sentence -- he has not
3 In any event, we are dubious of Francis's constitutional
claim as it appears that the BOP, in this case, provided sufficient
process to Francis as required under Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S.
539 (1974).
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pursued those avenues below or on appeal. Nor, it must be noted,
do his bare invocations of 28 U.S.C. § 1331 (original question
jurisdiction), and 28 U.S.C. § 1343(4)(providing jurisdiction "to
recover damages or to secure equitable or other relief under any
Act of Congress providing for the protection of civil rights,
including the right to vote"), provide an alternative basis for us
to act. See Am. Sci. & Eng'g, Inc. v. Califano, 571 F.2d 58, 63
n.8 (1st Cir. 1978) ("As with § 1331, that jurisdictional provision
[28 U.S.C. § 1343] only comes into play where a cause of action
exists.") Accordingly, since Francis has failed to present a
petition upon which any relief could be granted, the case cannot
move forward.
III.
In sum, the district court correctly denied Francis's
§ 2241 habeas petition. As such, we AFFIRM.
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