The Akron Legal News

Transfers to privately owned prisons do not entitle inmates to release

ANNIE YAMSON
Special to the Legal News
Published: August 6, 2015

The 11th District Court of Appeals recently ruled that a transfer to a private prison does not result in a vacated sentence for a felony offender.

The ruling stemmed from a petition for habeas corpus filed by Maurice Freeman who sought his immediate release from the Lake Erie Correctional Institution in Ashtabula County.

The respondent, Warden Brigham Sloan, moved the court of appeals to dismiss the habeas petition on the basis that Freeman’s factual allegations were insufficient to establish he was entitled to release.

“For the following reasons, the dismissal of the habeas corpus petition is justified,” Judge Thomas Wright wrote on behalf of the court of appeals’ three-judge panel.

Freeman’s incarceration is predicated upon his convictions in two separate criminal cases on one count of aggravated murder, two counts of murder and two counts of having a weapon under disability.

Freeman served 12 years of his multiple prison terms at the Lorain County Correctional Institution until he was transferred to the Lake Erie facility, a privately owned and operated prison run by the Corrections Corporations of America.

Under his habeas claim, Freeman argued that his incarceration at the Lake Erie prison is illegal because he is being held by a private entity and not the state.

In support of his claim, Freeman noted that the two trial courts in his underlying cases expressly ordered him to serve his prison terms “at a state institution.”

In a counterargument, the warden maintained that a writ of habeas corpus will “only lie when the prisoner has served his maximum sentence or the sentencing judgments are declared void for lack of jurisdiction.”

“As a general proposition, a writ of habeas corpus can be issued only when the petitioner has demonstrated that he is entitled to be released immediately,” Wright wrote. “In considering this requirement in a prior habeas corpus action in which a prisoner contested the propriety of his confinement at the Lake Erie prison, this court has expressly held that this type of action cannot be used to challenge the legality of a privately operated penitentiary.”

As an example, Wright cited Lacy v. Sloan (2014-Ohio-1348) in which the petitioner challenged his incarceration at Lake Erie stating that it was illegal because the prison was operated by “persons” who were not “governmental.”

“Petitioner’s issues essentially challenge the locus of his confinement, not the validity of his confinement,” the court of appeals held in the Lacy case. “The issues fail to allege, let alone establish, that petitioner is entitled to immediate release from confinement.”

Wright wrote that the Lacy holding controlled the court’s judgment in Freeman’s case.

“Unless a prisoner can prove that he has completed his maximum sentence, his entitlement to immediate release can only be established by showing that the sentencing court in the criminal action lacked the jurisdiction to try and convict him,” Wright wrote.

The court of appeals noted that Freeman was sentenced to 20 years to life on his most serious charge, therefore, he has not yet served his maximum sentence.

“Moreover, his habeas corpus petition does not contain any allegation that either of the trial courts in the underlying actions lacked jurisdiction to proceed,” Wright wrote. “Accordingly, Freeman has failed to allege sufficient facts to establish the basic requirements for the writ, i.e., the right to be released immediately.”

In a final note, Wright pointed out that even if the reviewing court presumed, for the sake of argument, that Freeman could only be held in a state-operated prison, he would only be entitled to a transfer and not immediate release from confinement.

“It is the judgment and order of this court that (Freeman’s) habeas corpus claim is hereby dismissed in its entirety,” Wright concluded.

Judges Cynthia Westcott Rice and Colleen Mary O’Toole concurred.

The case is cited State ex rel. Freeman v. Sloan, 2015-Ohio-2813.

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