Filed: Aug. 15, 2017
Latest Update: Mar. 03, 2020
Summary: ALD-312 NOT PRECEDENTIAL UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT _ No. 17-2029 _ JAY BONANZA BRILEY, Appellant v. WARDEN FORT DIX FCI _ On Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey (D.C. Civil No. 1-16-cv-05571) District Judge: Honorable Renee M. Bumb _ Submitted for Possible Dismissal Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B) or Summary Action Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 27.4 and I.O.P. 10.6 July 20, 2017 Before: MCKEE, JORDAN and RESTREPO, Circuit J
Summary: ALD-312 NOT PRECEDENTIAL UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT _ No. 17-2029 _ JAY BONANZA BRILEY, Appellant v. WARDEN FORT DIX FCI _ On Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey (D.C. Civil No. 1-16-cv-05571) District Judge: Honorable Renee M. Bumb _ Submitted for Possible Dismissal Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B) or Summary Action Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 27.4 and I.O.P. 10.6 July 20, 2017 Before: MCKEE, JORDAN and RESTREPO, Circuit Ju..
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ALD-312 NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
___________
No. 17-2029
___________
JAY BONANZA BRILEY,
Appellant
v.
WARDEN FORT DIX FCI
____________________________________
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the District of New Jersey
(D.C. Civil No. 1-16-cv-05571)
District Judge: Honorable Renee M. Bumb
____________________________________
Submitted for Possible Dismissal Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B) or
Summary Action Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 27.4 and I.O.P. 10.6
July 20, 2017
Before: MCKEE, JORDAN and RESTREPO, Circuit Judges
(Opinion filed: August 15, 2017)
_________
OPINION*
_________
PER CURIAM
Jay Bonanza Briley, a federal prisoner currently incarcerated at FCI Fort Dix,
*
This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not
constitute binding precedent.
appeals the judgment of the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey.
We will summarily affirm.
I.
In 2013, following a jury trial in the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of Virginia, Briley was convicted of three counts of assaulting, obstructing, and
impeding a federal officer; and one count of disorderly conduct – obscene acts. Briley
was sentenced to a seventy-eight month period of incarceration, followed by three years
of supervised release.
In September 2014, while incarcerated at FCI Loretto, Briley filed a habeas
petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 in the Western District of Pennsylvania, alleging that the
Federal Bureau of Prisons (“BOP”) improperly applied a Greater Security Management
Variable (“MGTV”) to his security classification, and seeking an order that would allow
him to serve his sentence on home confinement or at a federal prison camp. The District
Court dismissed Briley’s § 2241 petition for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Briley
appealed and, on January 14, 2016, this Court affirmed the District Court’s decision,
holding that “Briley’s challenge to his custody classification is not cognizable in a § 2241
petition because he does not challenge the basic fact or duration of his imprisonment.”
Briley v. Att’y Gen. U.S., 632 F. App’x 84, 84 (3d Cir. 2016). Briley subsequently filed
a number of unsuccessful post-conviction motions.
In September 2016, Briley filed the instant § 2241 petition, alleging that the BOP
staff at FCI Fort Dix improperly renewed a MGTV and later improperly applied a Public
2
Safety Factor (“PSF”) to his security classification, precluding him from transferring to a
minimum-security prison camp. Briley seeks immediate release to a residential reentry
center (“RRC”), and participation in the Veteran Outreach Treatment Program and the
Veterans Reentry Program.1 He further requests one year’s early release based on his
Residential Drug Abuse Program (“RDAP”) treatment.2
By order entered on April 21, 2017, the District Court dismissed Briley’s § 2241
motion because the claims challenging the BOP’s renewal of a MGTV and assignment of
a PSF were not cognizable under federal habeas review, and the claims for RRC
placement and early release for RDAP treatment were unexhausted. Briley appeals.
II.
1
Briley named as defendants: Attorney General Loretta Lynch, FCI Fort Dix Warden
Ortiz, and FCI Fort Dix Unit Managers Robinson and Olsen. The District Court properly
dismissed from the action all defendants with the exception of Warden Ortiz because the
proper respondent to a petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 is the petitioner’s immediate
custodian. See Rumsfeld v. Padilla,
542 U.S. 426, 434-35 (2004).
2
Briley also sought money damages based on his deprivation of transfer to a camp. By
order entered on September 23, 2016, the District Court determined that Briley’s § 2241
petition could proceed, but that he must file a separate civil rights action, after exhausting
his administrative remedies, to seek money damages for a constitutional violation. Briley
also submitted an application for a writ of habeas corpus ad testificandum, asking that he
be brought before the District Court to present his case. The District Court denied
Briley’s application because an evidentiary hearing was unnecessary as his petition did
not turn on disputed factual issues. See, e.g., Kos Pharm., Inc. v. Andrx Corp.,
369 F.3d
700, 719 n.16 (3d Cir. 2004) (holding “where the motion turns on a disputed factual
issue, an evidentiary hearing is ordinarily required”).
3
We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and exercise plenary review
over the District Court’s dismissal order. See Cradle v. United States ex rel. Miner,
290
F.3d 536, 538 (3d Cir. 2002) (per curiam). Because Briley has been granted in forma
pauperis status pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915, we review this appeal for possible dismissal
pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B). We may summarily affirm under Third Circuit
LAR 27.4 and I.O.P. 10.6 if the appeal lacks substantial merit.
We agree with the District Court that, like the claims in his previous § 2241
petition, Briley’s instant claims – that the BOP staff improperly renewed a MGTV and
improperly applied a PSF to his security classification – are not cognizable in a § 2241
petition because he does not challenge the basic fact or duration of his imprisonment.
See Preiser v. Rodriguez,
411 U.S. 475, 484 (1973). Nor does Briley’s claim challenge
the “execution” of his sentence within the narrow scope described in Woodall v. Fed.
Bureau of Prisons,
432 F.3d 235, 241 (3d Cir. 2005). In Woodall, we held that a district
court has jurisdiction under § 2241 to consider a federal prisoner’s challenge to the
failure to transfer him to a community corrections center (“CCC”) because “[c]arrying
out a sentence through detention in a CCC is very different than carrying out a sentence
in an ordinary penal institution.”
Id. at 243. Specifically, we determined that Woodall
sought “more than a simple transfer,” observing that his claims “crossed[ed] the line
beyond a challenge to, for example, a garden variety prison transfer.”
Id. Briley’s claim
that he was denied transfer to a minimum-security prison camp is much more akin to the
“garden variety” transfers that are excluded from the scope of § 2241.
4
Briley also seeks immediate RRC placement, participation in the Veteran
Outreach Treatment Program and Veterans Reentry Program, and one year’s early release
based on RDAP treatment. While this Court has allowed a habeas petitioner to challenge
a BOP decision denying transfer to a half-way house or RRC, see
Woodall, 432 F.3d at
243-44, Briley has failed to exhaust available administrative remedies for these claims,
see Moscato v. Fed. Bureau of Prisons,
98 F.3d 757, 760-62 (3d Cir. 1996) (holding
federal inmate must first exhaust administrative remedies before seeking habeas relief
pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2241). Briley concedes that he failed to exhaust administrative
remedies, and seeks an abeyance of the petition. We agree with the District Court that an
abeyance is inappropriate here as it frustrates the purpose of “conserv[ing] judicial
resources” when an agency may grant the relief sought through the administrative
process.
Id. at 761-62.
III.
For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that there is no substantial question
presented by this appeal, and will thus summarily affirm the judgment of the District
Court.
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