affirming dismissal, summary judgment posture, stating “Breshears’s access-to-the-courts claim has been and remains speculative.”
How later courts described this case
- affirming dismissal, summary judgment posture, stating “Breshears’s access-to-the-courts claim has been and remains speculative.”
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
United States Court of Appeals
Fifth Circuit
F I L E D
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS October 5, 2005
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
Charles R. Fulbruge III
Clerk
No. 04-41749
Summary Calendar
JASON MATTHEW BRESHEARS
Plaintiff - Appellant
v.
SAMMY BROWN, Lieutenant of Field Force; JOSEPH
RANDOLPH, Captain; JOSEPH CASAL, Senior Warden
Defendants - Appellees
- - - - - - - - - -
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Texas
USDC No. 6:03-CV-47
- - - - - - - - - -
Before KING, Chief Judge, and WIENER and DeMOSS, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:*
Jason Matthew Breshears, a Texas prisoner (# 635072),
appeals from the district court’s order granting the defendants’
motion for summary judgment in his 42 U.S.C. § 1983 civil rights
action. The district court concluded that no genuine issue of
material fact remained as to Breshears’s claims that his Eighth
Amendment rights were violated when he was forced to work in
dirty clothes and in cold weather on the “hoe” squad, that the
defendants retaliated against him for filing grievances and
complaints by transferring him from a boiler-room job back to the
hoe squad, and that the defendants violated his First Amendment
*
Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that
this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except
under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR. R. 47.5.4.
No. 04-41479
-2-
right of access to the courts by stealing the original complaint
and exhibits he filed in this action.
This court reviews de novo a district court’s order granting
a party’s summary-judgment motion. Whittaker v. BellSouth
Telecomm., Inc., 206 F.3d 532, 534 (5th Cir. 2000). Summary
judgment is proper if the pleadings, depositions, answers to
interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with any
affidavits filed in support of the motion, show that there is no
genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party
is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. FED. R. CIV. P.
56(c). The moving party bears the burden of showing the district
court that there is an absence of evidence to support the
nonmoving party’s case. Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317,
325 (1986). If the moving party meets the initial burden of
showing that there is no genuine issue, the burden shifts to the
nonmovant to set forth specific facts showing the existence of a
genuine issue for trial. Rule 56(e).
Breshears has argued that the defendants retaliated against
him by reassigning him to the hoe squad in early November 2002,
only days after he had been transferred to a more desirable job
in the boiler room. He has asserted that this retaliation had
been motivated by the grievances and complaints he had filed
against two correctional officials, Captain Randolph and
Lieutenant Brown, during the previous several months as they
oversaw his work on the hoe squad. Breshears had maintained
that, only weeks before the alleged retaliation incident, his
No. 04-41479
-3-
complaints had caused Brown, who is black, to be reprimanded for
calling Breshears and other white inmates “[K]lansmen.”
“To state a valid claim for retaliation under section 1983,
a prisoner must allege (1) a specific constitutional right,
(2) the defendant’s intent to retaliate against the prisoner for
his or her exercise of that right, (3) a retaliatory adverse act,
and (4) causation.” Jones v. Greninger, 188 F.3d 322, 324-25
(5th Cir. 1999). “The law of this circuit is clearly established
. . . that a prison official may not retaliate against . . . an
inmate . . . for complaining to a supervisor about a guard’s
misconduct.” Woods v. Smith, 60 F.3d 1161, 1164 (5th Cir. 1995);
Jackson v. Cain, 864 F.2d 1235, 1248 (5th Cir. 1989).
The district court did not err in concluding that no genuine
issue of material fact remained as to whether Breshears had shown
retaliatory intent on the part of Captain Randolph and Warden
Casal, the defendants who were responsible for transferring him
from the boiler room back to the hoe squad. No evidence
indicated that Brown had a direct role in this reassignment. The
defendants have argued that Breshears was reassigned to the hoe
squad because of security concerns. They produced summary-
judgment evidence showing that the Texas Department of Criminal
Justice had reevaluated its offender-classification and job-
assignment policies and procedures after the well-publicized
escape of seven inmates from Connolly Unit in 2000. Their
evidence also showed that Breshears had escaped from a detention
facility and that he appeared to have had connections to white-
supremacist groups. Although these incidents involving Breshears
No. 04-41479
-4-
had occurred eight or more years prior to 2002, there appears to
have been a reasonable penological reason for the assignment of
Breshears to the hoe squad in 2001. Breshears’s days-long
assignment to the boiler room on October 31, 2002, appears to
have been triggered only by a boiler-room supervisor’s request
for more workers and Breshears’s having asked Casal, who started
as warden only in September 2002, to assign him to such job
because he had held a boiler-room job in the past.
Breshears also has asserted that the defendants violated his
right of access to the courts by stealing his original complaint
and exhibits in this action. Prisoners have a constitutionally
protected right of access to the courts. Bounds v. Smith, 430
U.S. 817, 821 (1977). Although the exact contours of this right
are somewhat obscure, the Supreme Court has not extended the
right to encompass more than the ability to prepare and transmit
a necessary legal document to a court. Brewer v. Wilkinson, 3
F.3d 816, 821 (5th Cir. 1993). A prisoner must show an actual
injury to prevail on an access-to-the-courts claim. Lewis v.
Casey, 518 U.S. 343, 351 (1996). The examples of prejudice cited
in Lewis include the dismissal of a complaint that fails to
satisfy a technical requirement because of inadequate prison
legal resources. Id.
Breshears’s access-to-the-courts claim has been and remains
speculative. It is based primarily on the affidavit of a fellow
inmate who, at an unspecified time, allegedly saw defendant Brown
in the prison mailroom reading inmate mail. Breshears also has
not shown an “actual injury” to this claim, because he re-filed a
No. 04-41479
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complaint and many of the same evidentiary materials within three
months of the alleged theft. His contention that his memory
regarding the incidents of his complaint has faded involves
speculation as to what material facts he may have forgotten. No
genuine issue of material fact remained as to this claim.
Breshears has effectively abandoned any Eighth Amendment
claims regarding his work in the fields, as he has failed to
brief such claims in this appeal. See Murphy v. Collins, 26 F.3d
541, 542 n.1 (5th Cir. 1994); FED. R. APP. P. 28(a)(9).
Breshears has not demonstrated that the district court
abused its discretion in refusing to require the defendants to
respond to his discovery requests. See King v. Dogan, 31 F.3d
344, 346 (5th Cir. 1994); Tarver v. City of Edna, 410 F.3d 745,
752 (5th Cir. 2005).
The judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED.