FindLaw > Criminal Law Summaries > Shaw v. Murphy

Prisoners’ Rights – Legal Correspondence

Case: Shaw v. Murphy

Issue: Whether inmate-to-inmate correspondence that includes legal assistance is entitled to greater protection under the First Amendment than inmate-to-inmate correspondence that does not contain legal assistance.

Facts: Respondent Kevin Murphy was incarcerated in Montana State Prison where he served as an “inmate law clerk” by providing legal assistance to fellow inmates. Upon learning that fellow inmate Tracy had been charged with assaulting Correctional Officer Glen Galle, Murphy decided to assist Tracy with his defense. The prison refused Murphy’s assignment to the case, however, because prison rules prohibited high-security inmates such as Murphy from meeting with maximum-security inmates such as Tracy. Although prison officials provided Tracy with another legal clerk, Murphy nonetheless investigated the alleged assault. Following his investigation, Murphy wrote Tracy a letter offering legal advice and leveling charges of wrongdoing against Officer Galle that might have been significant to Tracy’s defense. In accordance with prison policy, prison officials intercepted and reviewed the letter. Based upon the accusations Murphy had made against Officer Galle, Murphy was cited for insolence, interference with due process hearings, and conduct that interferes with the security and orderly operation of the institution. After a hearing, Murphy was found guilty of the first two prohibitions and was sanctioned with a suspended sentence and demerits that potentially affected his custody level.

Murphy filed an action in United States District Court, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The complaint alleged that the prison’s disciplinary hearing violated due process, inmates’ rights to access to courts, and Murphy’s own First Amendment rights, including the right to provide legal assistance to other inmates. The District Court granted summary judgment for the State. On the First Amendment claim, the District Court found that, under the test established in Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78 (1987), [“[W]hen a prison regulation impinges on inmates’ constitutional rights, the regulation is valid if it is reasonably related to legitimate penological interests”] the prison regulations regarding inmate correspondence were reasonably related to the objectives of prison order and safety and prisoner rehabilitation, and were therefor constitutional. The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed. “It premised its analysis on the proposition that ‘inmates have a First Amendment right to assist other inmates with their legal claims.’” The Ninth Circuit applied the Court’s Turner decision, “but it did so only against the backdrop of this First Amendment right.” It held that Murphy’s First Amendment right to assist Tracy with the latter’s legal claims “affected the balance of the prisoner’s interests against the government’s interests.” The Ninth Circuit concluded that the balance tipped in favor of Murphy and thus upheld his First Amendment claim.

Holding: Prisoners possess no First Amendment right to provide legal advice that enhances the protection otherwise available under Turner.

Reasoning: The Court, in a unanimous opinion by Justice Thomas, held that inmate-to-inmate correspondence that included legal assistance received no greater First Amendment protection than correspondence without any legal assistance. The Court stressed that it was not being “asked to decide whether prisoners have any First Amendment rights when they send legal correspondence to one another.” In fact, Turner itself was premised in part on the notion that prisoners have limited First Amendment rights. Prisoners clearly retain certain constitutional rights while incarcerated, although those rights are often limited in scope due to the penological needs of the prison system.

Reflecting the realization that “courts are particularly ‘ill equipped’ to deal with [the problems of prisons in America],” the Court in Turner had adopted a deferential standard for review of a prisoner’s constitutional claims: “[W]hen a prison regulation impinges on inmates’ constitutional rights, the regulation is valid if it is reasonably related to legitimate penological interests.” Under this standard, four factors are relevant. “First and foremost, ‘there must be a valid, rational connection between the prison regulation and the legitimate and neutral interest put forward to justify it.’” The three other factors that a court must consider are, “the existence of alternative means of exercising the right available to the inmates; the impact [that] accommodation of the asserted constitutional right will have on guards and other inmates, and on the allocation of prison resources generally; and, the absence of ready alternatives available to the prison for achieving the governmental objectives.”

Since “Turner provides the test for evaluating prisoners’ First Amendment challenges, the issue before us is whether Turner permits an increase in constitutional protection whenever a prisoner’s communication includes legal advice. We conclude that it does not.” To permit increased constitutional protection based upon the content of a particular kind of communication requires an assessment of that content’s value. “But the Turner test, by its terms, simply does not accommodate valuations of content.” Under Turner, prison officials remain the primary arbiters of problems in prison. If courts were to start enhancing constitutional protection based on the contents of particular communications, courts would be assuming a much greater role in decisions affecting prison administration. “Seeking to avoid ‘unnecessarily perpetuating the involvement of federal courts in affairs of prison administration,’” the Court rejected the Ninth Circuit’s alteration of the Turner analysis. Finally, even if it were to provide content-based special protection to certain kinds of speech, the Court held that it would not do so for inmate-to-inmate correspondence that contains legal advice, reasoning that an increase of First Amendment protection for inmate legal advice “would undermine prison officials’ ability to address the ‘complex and intractable’ problems of prison administration.”

Other Opinions: In a concurring opinion, Justice Ginsburg made two observations. First, Murphy did not challenge the prison’s right to intercept and review prisoner-to-prisoner correspondence. Second, Murphy’s § 1983 challenge to the prison rules under which he was disciplined, as being vague and overbroad, was not addressed by the Ninth Circuit. The Court’s remand to the Ninth Circuit, therefore, should not impede Murphy from reasserting that claim.

Comment: The question of whether the particular prison regulations in question, as applied to Murphy, were “reasonably related to legitimate penological concerns” under the Turner test was not addressed by the Court. That matter was left to the lower courts upon remand.