JACKSON, MS - A jury should determine whether Mississippi corrections officials retaliated against an inmate for communicating with the news media and a family his thoughts about the suicide of a fellow prisoners, a federal appeals court has ruled.

Clinton L. Cressionnie's lawsuit had been tossed out by a federal judge in Mississippi. The judge said Cressionnie did not have a claim against corrections officials.

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday said Cressionnie had claimed his constitutional rights were violated when he was placed in isolation for using another prisoner's identification number to place a telephone call to his sister.

Using another inmate's ID number is in violation of corrections policy, but Cressionnie said the violation was never pursued until he wrote to the attorney and family of Patrick Presley, an inmate who committed suicide in December 2003.

According to the court record, Cressionnie suggested in the letters that Presley's death was related to a new prisoner classification system at the state prison in Parchman that resulted in some prisoners, including Presley, being placed in isolation for extended periods of time.

Presley was the son of the late Lee County Sheriff Harold Presley. Corrections officials said he was distraught over a "Dear John" letter he had received from his wife.

Cressionnie said the contents of his letters to Presley's family and attorney appeared in a newspaper article as coming from an anonymous prisoner. It was after the story appeared, Cressionnie claimed, that corrections officials retaliated by resurrecting the unauthorized telephone use violation and placed him in isolation.

"Cressionnie has a constitutional right to correspond with the general public and to contact the press," the 5th Circuit said.

The 5th Circuit said with the chronology of events alleged by Cressionnie, there were questions about whether corrections officials did retaliate against Cressionnie for the letters. Those questions should be decided at trial, the court said.

Tuesday's ruling was issued by a panel of three 5th Circuit judges: Patrick E. Higginbotham, Fortunato Benavides and James Dennis.