Robert Kern v. Scott Francik

364 F. App'x 292

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
• Decided: February 4, 2010
• Docket: 09-1710
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

PER CURIAM.

Iowa inmate Robert Lee Kern appeals the district court’s 1 adverse grant of summary judgment in his 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action alleging retaliatory transfer. Reviewing de novo, see Anderson v. Larson, 327 F.3d 762, 767 (8th Cir.2003) (standard of review), we agree with the district court that the summary judgment record did not support a claim of retaliatory transfer, see Sisneros v. Nix, 95 F.3d 749, 752 (8th Cir.1996) (“In a retaliatory transfer case, ‘the burden is on the prisoner to prove that but for an unconstitutional, retaliatory motive the transfer would not have occurred.’ ” (citation omitted)). Additionally, we find no merit to Kern’s appellate arguments that his counsel was ineffective, see Watson v. Moss, 619 F.2d 775, 776 (8th Cir.1980) (per curiam) (no right to effective assistance of counsel in civil case), and that he was not afforded sufficient discovery, see Pony Computer, Inc. v. Equus Computer Sys. of Mo., 162 F.3d 991, 996 (8th Cir.1998) (where plaintiff moved to compel but failed to explain how additional discovery would provide support for any of its claims, district court did not abuse its discretion in granting summary judgment on record without further discovery). Accordingly, we affirm. See 8th Cir. R. 47B.

1 . The Honorable James E. Gritzner, United States District Judge for the Southern District of Iowa.