Prison Legal News v. Livingston, et al., No. 11-40128 (5th Cir. 2012)
Annotate this CasePLN, a non-profit corporation, brought a 42 U.S.C. 1983 action against the TDCJ and three individual TDCJ officials (collectively, defendants) for alleged First Amendment and due process violations with TDCJ's censorship of five books PLN wished to distribute to inmates in the Texas prison system. The district court granted summary judgment to defendants. The court concluded that PLN had not presented sufficient evidence to survive summary judgment on its First Amendment claims where PLN had, at most, demonstrated that reasonable minds might differ on whether to permit certain books into a general prison population, which was very different from demonstrating that TDCJ's practices and exclusions had no reasonable relation to valid penological objectives. The court also rejected PLN's due process claim, concluding that TDCJ's procedures were reasonable. Because TDCJ had not violated PLN's due process rights, the individual defendants were entitled to qualified immunity. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court.
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