Opinion · Court of Appeals for the First Circuit
Byron G. Smith v. Allan L. Robbins, Warden
454 F.2d 696
- Type
- Opinion
- Court
- Court of Appeals for the First Circuit
- Jurisdiction
- Federal
- Date
- 1972-01-18
- Topic
- general
How later courts describe this case
- “By contraband is meant some physical object in addition to the attorney’s letter”
Citator
UpLaw has not yet analyzed Byron G. Smith v. Allan L. Robbins, Warden. The absence of a flag is not a finding that it is good law.
- Authority status
- pending
- Cited by
- 57 opinions
SMITH v. ROBBINS,454 F.2d 696(1st Cir. 1972)
BYRON G. SMITH, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, v. ALLAN L. ROBBINS, WARDEN,
DEFENDANT-APPELLANT.
Nos. 71-1277, 71-1278.
United States Court of Appeals, First Circuit.
Heard January 5, 1972.
Decided January 18, 1972.
David J. Halperin, Portland, Me., for Byron G. Smith.
Max D. Stern, John D. Leubsdorf, Foley, Hoag Eliot, Boston, Mass., Thomas P. Kapantais, Cumberland Center, Me., and Stanley A. Bass, New York City, on the brief for Pine Tree Legal Assistance, Inc., Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, Inc., National Office for the Rights of the Indigent, amici curiae.
Before ALDRICH, Chief Judge, McENTEE and COFFIN, Circuit Judges.
[2] The prisoner responds by asking us to modify the order to bar prison officials from opening attorneys' letters at all unless they have reason to suspect that they contain contraband. If there is merit in this contention, there is certainly not enough to cause us to hold that the district court was obliged to accept it. If the prisoner is present, he can see that the letter is not being read. That is enough.
[3] However strongly the warden may feel about a possible indignity to the prison administration in a suggestion by the court that it is not to be trusted not to read the letter, this misses the point. The court does not suggest that the warden is untrustworthy. Rather, it is that a prisoner, and possibly some attorneys, may feel, if only to a small degree, that someone in the chain of command may not be trusted, and that the resulting fear may chill communications between the prisoner and his counsel. Once it is granted, as the warden now concedes, that the prisoner has a right to have the confidence between himself and his counsel totally respected, the burden must be on the warden to show a need for any act which could produce even a suspicion of intrusion. If a prisoner can see no good reason for opening a letter in his absence, it would not be unnatural for him to suspect a bad one. Inasmuch as the warden has failed to suggest any reason that seems adequate even to us, we see no reason to leave such possible apprehensions on such an important matter as right to counsel in the minds of the prisoner or his attorney.
[4] The prisoner has cross-appealed from the court's refusal to entertain his request for relief against alleged action of the warden in cutting off his earned good time for prosecuting this action. The court ruled that the prisoner cannot complain until he had first exhausted his state remedies.
[5] The obligation to exhaust state remedies is one that we always intend to respect,cf.Needel v. Scafati, 1 Cir., 1969,412 F.2d 761, cert. denied396 U.S. 861,90 S.Ct. 133,24 L.Ed.2d 113; Still v. Nichols, 1 Cir., 1969,412 F.2d 778; Grayson v. Montgomery, 1 Cir., 1970,421 F.2d 1306, although evidently not always sufficiently,cf.Connor v. Picard, 1 Cir., 1970,434 F.2d 673, rev'd 12/20/71,404 U.S. 270,92 S.Ct. 509,30 L.Ed.2d 438. However, the present situation is not an appropriate one in which to give precedence to the state courts. Direct interference with the jurisdiction of the court is the plainest sort of contempt.SeeUnited States v. Shipp, 1906,203 U.S. 563,27 S.Ct. 165,51 L.Ed. 319;cf.In re Savin, 1889,131 U.S. 267,9 S.Ct. 699,33 L.Ed. 150; Conley v. United States, 8 Cir., 1932,59 F.2d 929,936; In re Brule, D.Nev., 1895, 71 F. 943. While it is true that there is no power to punish summarily when the obstruction does not occur in close physical proximity to the court, Nye v. United States, 1941,313 U.S. 33,61 S.Ct. 810,85 L.Ed. 1172, we think it clearly within the offended court's power to order undone whatever affront has been done to it. We note in the warden's behalf that it was the district court, and not he, that raised objection to judicial inquiry into this matter.
[6] The order requiring that attorney mail may be opened in the presence of the prisoner is affirmed. The order dismissing the proceeding with respect to the prisoner's allegedly improper loss of good time is vacated, but the cross-appeal is otherwise denied.Page 716