Kenneth Williams v. Odoc

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
• Decided: April 18, 2022
• Docket: 19-35404
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS APR 18 2022 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

KENNETH GREGORY WILLIAMS, No. 19-35404

Plaintiff-Appellant, D.C. No. 6:17-cv-01695-AA

v. MEMORANDUM* OREGON DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS; RICK COURSEY, Superintendent at Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution (EOCI); LEONARD WILLIAMSON, Inspector General at ODOC; MICHAEL F. GOWER, Assistant Administrator at ODOC; MICHAEL POPE, Correctional Officer at ODOC; DAVID POWELL, Disciplinary Hearings Officer at EOCI,

Defendants-Appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Oregon Ann L. Aiken, District Judge, Presiding

Submitted April 11, 2022**

Before: McKEOWN, CHRISTEN, and BRESS, Circuit Judges.

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. ** The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2). Oregon state prisoner Kenneth Gregory Williams appeals pro se from the

district court’s summary judgment in his 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action alleging due

process and Eighth Amendment violations. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C.

§ 1291. We review de novo. Toguchi v. Chung, 391 F.3d 1051, 1056 (9th Cir.

2004). We affirm.

The district court properly granted summary judgment on Williams’s due

process claim because Williams failed to raise a genuine dispute of material fact as

to whether the discipline imposed infringed on a protected liberty interest, or

whether the discipline lacked any evidentiary basis. See Sandin v. Conner, 515

U.S. 472, 483-85 (1995) (a prisoner has no federal or state protected liberty interest

when the sanction imposed neither invariably extends the length of his sentence

nor imposes an “atypical and significant hardship on the inmate in relation to the

ordinary incidents of prison life”); Burnsworth v. Gunderson, 179 F.3d 771, 775

(9th Cir. 1999) (no due process violation unless “a conviction was totally

unsupported by evidence”).

The district court properly granted summary judgment on Williams’s Eighth

Amendment claim because Williams failed to raise a genuine dispute of material

fact as to whether defendants’ conduct deprived him of “the minimal civilized

measure of life’s necessities.” Lemire v. Cal. Dep’t of Corr. & Rehab., 726 F.3d

1062, 1074 (9th Cir. 2013) (internal quotation marks omitted).

2 19-35404 We reject as without merit Williams’s contentions that the discovery process

was unfair.

AFFIRMED.

3 19-35404