Steven Vogt v. John Wetzel

PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

____________

No. 18-2622

____________

STEVEN DAVID VOGT,

Appellant

v.

JOHN E. WETZEL, Secretary of the Department of

Corrections (Official & Individual Capacity); JOHN/JANE

DOE (Mailroom Employee at S.C.I. Fayette)

(Official & Individual Capacity)

____________

On Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Western District of Pennsylvania

(D.C. No. 2-17-cv-01407)

District Judge: Honorable Arthur J. Schwab

____________

Argued on March 24, 2021

Before: HARDIMAN, GREENAWAY, JR., and BIBAS,

Circuit Judges.

(Filed: August 9, 2021)

Jordan Alston-Harmon

Kamilyn Choi [argued]

(Admitted Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 46.3)

Yale Law School Advanced Appellate Litigation Project

127 Wall Street

New Haven, CT 06511

Tadhg Dooley

David R. Roth

Pro bono counsel

Wiggin & Dana LLP

265 Church Street, P.O. Box 1832

New Haven, CT 06508-1832

Pro Bono Counsel for Appellant

Josh Shapiro, Attorney General

J. Bart DeLone, Chief Deputy Attorney General

Daniel B. Mullen, Deputy Attorney General [argued]

Kemal A. Mericli

Office of Attorney General

1251 Waterfront Place

Mezzanine Level

Pittsburgh, PA 15222

Counsel for Appellees

___________

OPINION OF THE COURT

____________

2

HARDIMAN, Circuit Judge.

Steven Vogt appeals the District Court’s order

dismissing his complaint for failure to state a claim. A

Pennsylvania inmate, Vogt alleged his constitutional rights to

due process and access to the courts were violated when prison

officials rejected his incoming mail without notifying him of

the rejection. We agree with Vogt that the Court’s evaluation

of his due process claim was erroneous. In doing so, we join

several of our sister courts and hold that, under the Supreme

Court’s decision in Procunier v. Martinez, 416 U.S. 396

(1974), prisons must notify inmates when their incoming mail

is rejected. Thus, we will vacate and remand the case for

further proceedings.

I

Three decades ago, Vogt and Arthur McClearn were

part of a group who took Francis Landry to a quarry. There, the

group forced Landry off a cliff into the water before rolling a

“huge rock” in behind him. App. 79. Landry suffered blunt

force trauma and drowned. Vogt and McClearn were arrested

shortly afterward. McClearn pleaded guilty to third-degree

murder. Vogt went to trial, where McClearn’s testimony linked

him to Landry’s death. The jury convicted Vogt of several

crimes, including first-degree murder. As a result, he was

sentenced to life without parole.

Not long before McClearn died, he sent a letter to Vogt

dated October 23, 2016, in which he recanted his trial

testimony. See App. 28. Explaining he was “ready to tell the

truth,” McClearn said his testimony was a lie. Id. McClearn

wrote that he had a different partner in crime that night; Vogt

was “passed out in the car” and “did not go to the quarry.” Id.

3

So according to the letter—and contrary to McClearn’s

testimony at trial—Vogt did not have “anything to do with”

Landry’s murder. Id.

McClearn’s letter never made it to Vogt that fall. The

prison’s policy is to reject mail lacking a return address, so it

rejected the letter. Some six months later, Vogt contacted a

United States Postal Service reclamation center looking for a

different mailing. The Post Office returned several items, one

of which was McClearn’s letter. But by that time, McClearn

had been dead for about five months.

After he obtained the letter in the spring, Vogt filed a

grievance about the rejection. But the prison denied it as

untimely because he filed it well after the previous fall’s

rejection. After his appeal of that decision failed, Vogt

petitioned under Pennsylvania’s Post Conviction Relief Act,

42 PA. CONS. STAT. § 9541 (PCRA). There, he challenged his

guilty verdict and argued the letter supported his actual

innocence. The state court dismissed his petition as untimely.

Vogt then filed his five-page pro se complaint against

Secretary of Corrections John Wetzel and an unknown prison

mailroom employee. He claimed the rejection without notice

violated his right to procedural due process. And he claimed

his First Amendment right to access the courts was violated

because the rejected mail contained McClearn’s recantation.

On those bases, he sought compensatory and punitive damages

under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.

Wetzel moved to dismiss. He argued security interests

justified the prison’s mail policy. Vogt responded in a

fourteen-page brief that cited Procunier and contended

Wetzel’s motion “misse[d] the point.” Dist. Ct. Dkt. No. 13, at

4

6. At its core, Vogt’s allegation was “not that [the letter] was

refused, but that it was refused without requ[is]ite notice.” Id.

While the motion to dismiss was pending before the

District Court, the state court vacated and remanded the order

dismissing Vogt’s PCRA petition. Three months later, the

Magistrate Judge recommended the District Court dismiss

Vogt’s due process claims with prejudice. She also

recommended dismissing his access claim without prejudice

because it was not ripe for review. Despite Vogt’s reliance on

Procunier, the Magistrate Judge’s Report and

Recommendation (R&R) did not discuss the case. Still without

counsel, Vogt objected to the R&R, reiterating his reliance on

Procunier. The District Court adopted the R&R without

addressing his objections. Vogt filed this timely appeal.

II

The District Court had jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C.

§ 1331, and we have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. Our

review is plenary. Castleberry v. STI Grp., 863 F.3d 259, 262–

63 (3d Cir. 2017).

We construe Vogt’s pro se filings liberally. Mala v.

Crown Bay Marina, Inc., 704 F.3d 239, 244–45 (3d Cir. 2013).

This means we remain flexible, especially “when dealing with

imprisoned pro se litigants” like Vogt. Id. at 244. And we

“apply the relevant legal principle even when the complaint has

failed to name it.” Id. Yet “pro se litigants still must allege

sufficient facts in their complaints to support a claim.” Id. at

245. And “they cannot flout procedural rules—they must abide

by the same rules that apply to all other litigants.” Id.

5

III

We begin with Vogt’s first contention, that the District

Court erred in dismissing his Fourteenth Amendment due

process claim.

A

Vogt acknowledges that the Pennsylvania Department

of Corrections’ policy is to reject incoming mail lacking a

return address. DC-ADM 803 § 1.A.4(b), at 1-3 (effective

October 29, 2015), ECF No. 116; Vogt Br. 9. But he argues the

Supreme Court’s decision in Procunier v. Martinez means the

letter’s rejection without notice violated his procedural due

process rights. Vogt Br. 16–18. In essence, to prevail on that

argument Vogt’s complaint must be read to allege a liberty

interest in corresponding by mail.

Wetzel argues that Vogt’s complaint did not assert “any

liberty interest whatsoever[] for due process purposes.” Wetzel

Br. 41. So he claims Vogt forfeited that argument. Wetzel Br.

40. To the contrary, Vogt contends he alleged a due process

claim based on rejection without notice, and that courts must

apply the applicable law, even if a pro se litigant failed to

mention it by name. Reply Br. 8. We agree with Vogt.

Vogt has consistently maintained that his claim relies on

Supreme Court precedent articulating his due process right.

And he pinpointed the legal misstep made by Wetzel and the

District Court. In his own opposition to the motion to dismiss,

he stated:

[N]otice is required by the constitution when a

letter addressed to . . . a prisoner is rejected . . . .

6

See Procunier v. Martinez, 416 U.S. 396[, 417–

19] (1976) . . . . Due Process Protections require

an inmate be notified of the rejection of a letter

written by or addressed to him. . . . The

[Secretary] argues that there are valid security

related reasons for refusing mail with no return

address. This misses the point. The violation

complained of is not that it was refused, but that

it was refused without requ[is]ite notice.

Dist. Ct. Dkt. No. 13, at 6 (cleaned up). In summary, Vogt

alleged he was deprived of an “individual interest

encompassed within the 14th Amendment’s protections” and

that no prison procedures “provide[d] due process of law.” Id.

Although Vogt did not precisely articulate the

applicable legal category, he alleged sufficient facts to support

a Fourteenth Amendment procedural due process claim. Vogt

alleged the prison rejected his mail without notice. And he

demanded damages because that rejection violated his due

process right under the Fourteenth Amendment. App. 23.

In short, the failure of Vogt’s pro se complaint to

mention the word “liberty” did not forfeit his Fourteenth

Amendment due process claim. He alleged his right to

procedural due process was violated when the prison rejected

his mail without notice. The bottom line is that his allegation

was enough.

B

We now turn to the merits of Vogt’s procedural due

process claim. States may not deprive “any person” of their

liberty “without due process of law.” U.S. CONS. amend. XIV

7

§ 1. One such liberty, even for prisoners like Vogt, is the

freedom to correspond by mail. Procunier, 416 U.S. at 418.

Because that liberty interest was first recognized by the

Supreme Court in Procunier, we look there.

The suit in Procunier challenged California’s prison

mail censorship policy. Id. at 398. A three-judge district court

decided the policy violated procedural due process. See id. at

400. It also held the policy violated free speech. Id. On appeal,

the Supreme Court affirmed both holdings. Id. at 415, 419. Our

focus is on the Court’s due process analysis.

Most relevant here, the Court held the interest “in

uncensored communication by letter . . . is plainly a liberty

interest.” Id. at 418 (cleaned up). So prisons must provide

“minimum procedural safeguards” when they “censor or

withhold delivery of a particular letter.” Id. at 417. Notice and

a reasonable chance to challenge the original official’s decision

satisfy due process. Id. at 418–19.

Just as the Supreme Court did in Procunier, so too have

we kept the free speech and due process analyses distinct. In

Nasir v. Morgan, an inmate challenged a prison censorship

policy, alleging it violated his and his correspondent’s free

speech and due process rights. 350 F.3d 366, 368 (3d Cir.

2003). We held that the prison’s censorship policy did not

violate the First Amendment. Id. at 369–76. But we did not

reach the merits of the due process claim because the inmate

lacked standing to sue on his correspondent’s behalf. See id. at

376. More to the point, the fact that we analyzed the due

process claim after we decided the First Amendment issue

shows the two inquiries are distinct.

8

But in Vogt’s case, the District Court collapsed the two

inquiries. It held Vogt did not have a protected liberty interest

for due process purposes because the policy did not violate the

First Amendment. That was error because Vogt has a liberty

interest in communicating by mail.

Wetzel resists this conclusion. In essence, he contends

Procunier applies to censorship cases, while here we consider

a content-neutral rejection policy. The trouble with this

argument is Procunier identified a liberty interest in

corresponding by mail. 416 U.S. at 418. And just as a

censorship policy constrains correspondence by mail, so too

does a rejection policy. Indeed, all the circuit courts that have

addressed the issue to date have interpreted Procunier’s due

process holding as we do today. See Frost v. Symington,

197 F.3d 348, 353–54 (9th Cir. 1999) (censoring pornographic

magazines); Bonner v. Outlaw, 552 F.3d 673, 678 (8th Cir.

2009) (withholding packages); Perry v. Sec’y Fla. Dep’t of

Corr., 664 F.3d 1359, 1368 (11th Cir. 2011) (rejecting pen pal

solicitations); Miller v. Downey, 915 F.3d 460, 465–66 (7th

Cir. 2019) (refusing a legal newspaper as contraband). For

these reasons, we hold that Vogt alleged the state deprived him

of a liberty interest under Procunier. Because Procunier

requires “minimum procedural safeguards,” 416 U.S. at 417,

the District Court on remand can determine whether they were

satisfied.

IV

We conclude by addressing briefly Vogt’s other

arguments on appeal. First, we note the parties’ concessions

have narrowed the case. Because we hold Vogt has a liberty

interest under Procunier, we need not address whether he has

a property interest. Oral Argument, at 8:20–8:44 (Vogt’s

9

concession). Second, since we are remanding Vogt’s due

process claim, it is appropriate to stay his access to the courts

claim while his PCRA case is ongoing. Id. at 27:41–28:26

(Wetzel’s concession). And so all that remains is Vogt’s free

speech argument. Although the R&R focused on whether the

policy violated Vogt’s free speech rights, it is unclear whether

he alleged a free speech claim. In any case, that issue is best

left for resolution by the District Court on remand.

* * *

A host of compelling interests can justify prison mail

regulations. But prisoners like Vogt have a liberty interest in

corresponding by mail. So when the prison rejected his letter,

notification was required. Consistent with these principles,

Vogt stated a claim that his right to procedural due process was

violated because he alleged McClearn’s letter was rejected

without notice. On that basis, we will vacate the District

Court’s order dismissing Vogt’s Fourteenth Amendment

procedural due process claim. On remand, the District Court

can adjudicate it at summary judgment or trial, as appropriate.

And we will vacate the District Court’s order dismissing

Vogt’s access to the courts claim as unripe with instructions to

stay that claim while the PCRA litigation proceeds.

10