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| Ruling: Inmate can't sue prison officials |
| By standardspeaker.com - PETER E. BORTNER |
| Published: 05/07/2012 |
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PA -- A three-judge Commonwealth Court panel has refused to allow a state prison inmate to pursue a lawsuit in Schuylkill County Court involving the alleged taking of his trial transcripts. In a six-page opinion made available last week in Pottsville, the panel ruled that Willie Stokes has no claim against seven employees and officers of the state Department of Corrections because they are immune from being sued. "Stokes argues that the trial court erred in holding that the defendants were entitled to immunity," Judge Mary Hannah Leavitt wrote in the opinion. "We disagree." The panel thereby upheld the Jan. 27, 2011, ruling of Schuylkill County Judge Charles M. Miller, who also had concluded that Stokes could not sue the prison officials. Stokes had filed the lawsuit on Nov. 8, 2010, alleging the prison officials - only two of whom, Department of Corrections Secretary Jeffrey Beard and prison Superintendent John Kerestes, he identified fully - had confiscated his trial transcripts from the cell of fellow inmate Steve Austin and then refused to return them to him. He had sought unspecified monetary damages of more than $35,000, plus punitive damages, and demanded a jury trial in the case. However, the panel agreed with Miller that the defendants all were immune from being sued. Under state law, governments and their employees acting within the scope of their duties cannot be sued unless the government has given its express consent by specifically waiving its sovereign immunity, Leavitt wrote. Read More. |
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