McMillan v. Warden Jusino @ FCI Dublin

Background

Sharon Kaye McMillan, a federal prisoner at Federal Correctional Institution Dublin, filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2241. She paid the filing fee. McMillan was convicted in the District of South Dakota in 2011 and sentenced to 210 months. She is incarcerated in the Northern District of California.

McMillan argued that the prison should be closed and sought release to a halfway house or home confinement. She cited several illnesses and injuries and alleged the presence of asbestos, mold, and other substances at the facility. She also raised inadequate-medical-care claims without specifically identifying what care was inadequate or denied. In addition, she stated that she faced a risk of sexual assault by correctional officers and transgender inmates.

Court’s analysis

The court explained that federal law provides two principal types of relief for complaints related to imprisonment: habeas corpus and a civil-rights action. Habeas corpus is the proper vehicle for a claim challenging the fact or duration of a conviction or sentence. A civil-rights action is generally the proper vehicle for a constitutional challenge to prison conditions that does not necessarily lead to immediate or faster release.

The court relied on the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Pinson v. Carvajal. That decision asks whether, based on the petition’s allegations, release is legally required regardless of the relief requested. The court stated that Pinson held that unsafe-condition claims based on a prison’s failure to follow health protocols could be addressed through a civil-rights action when the petitioner did not show that no set of prison conditions could cure the alleged violations.

The court found McMillan’s petition similar. It held that she had not alleged facts sufficient to show that release was legally required or that relief short of release would be inadequate to cure the alleged constitutional violations. As a result, the court concluded that it lacked jurisdiction to consider the habeas petition.

Disposition

The court dismissed the petition without prejudice for lack of jurisdiction. It declined to recharacterize the petition as a civil-rights complaint because doing so would subject the case to the procedural and substantive requirements of the Prison Litigation Reform Act, which McMillan had not addressed, and to a higher filing fee.

The Clerk of Court was ordered to send McMillan a blank civil-rights form and an application to proceed without paying the usual filing fee. The court stated that McMillan may seek release through a compassionate-release motion in the District of South Dakota, assuming she satisfies applicable exhaustion requirements, and could potentially bring a civil-rights action in this district concerning prison conditions and alleged inadequate medical care. The court also noted an existing class action concerning alleged sexual misconduct by FCI Dublin officials, but took no position on whether that action could prevent McMillan from bringing an individual civil-rights case based on the same alleged misconduct.