Meador v. The Counseling and Psychotherapy Center Inc et al

Filing 45

Judge Douglas P. Woodlock: MEMORANDUM AND ORDER entered granting 35 Motion for Summary Judgment denying [32 and 20] Motions for Summary Judgment; (Woodlock, Douglas) (Main Document 45 replaced on 9/30/2014) (Lovett, Jarrett).

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS

DAVID LYNN MEADOR,

)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)

Plaintiff,

v.
THE COUNSELING AND PSYCHOTHERAPY
CENTER, INC., ET AL,
Defendants.

Civil Action No.
12-12163-DPW

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
September 30, 2014
The plaintiff, a convicted sex offender convicted in North
Dakota for failure to register, brings this action challenging
certain conditions of his probation.

The defendants are a

service provider that contracts with the State of North Dakota
to provide services for high risk sexual offenders and two of
its employees.

I will grant the motion (#35) for summary

judgment of the defendants and deny those (##32 and 20) of the
plaintiff.
The short and sufficient answer to the plaintiff’s action
is that the defendants are not state actors as required in a
civil rights action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.

It is long settled

that in carrying out and being charged to carry out in a
discretionary fashion services required under a probationary
directive, a service provider such as the defendant is not
1

transmuted into a state actor.

See generally Rendall-Baker v.

Kohn, 457 U.S. 830, 839-43 (1982).
Nor is there any substantial claim of constitutional
violation, even if the defendants - and not the State of North
Dakota - were considered to be the relevant state actor or
treated as engaged in a civil rights conspiracy.

I am of the

view that neither the use of a polygraph nor the particular form
of supervision about which the plaintiff seems most
apprehensive, the potential use of a penile plethysmograph for
monitoring, is categorically unconstitutional when considered in
the context of supervision of offenders.

Cf. Berthiaume v.

Caron, 142 F.3d 12, 17-18 (1st Cir. 1998) (questioning Almy v.
Harrington, 977 F.2d 37 (1st Cir. 1992) (Woodlock, J. for the
court)).
In any event, concerns about the propriety of conditions of
supervision are properly addressed in the first instance to the
court imposing a criminal sentence.

Absent a final

determination of the judgment of conviction favorable to the
plaintiff here, it is inappropriate to entertain what is in
essence a collateral attack on that judgment.
Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477, 486-87 (1994).

2

Cf. Heck v.

Accordingly, the defendants’ motion for summary judgment
(#35) is hereby GRANTED and the plaintiff’s motions for summary
judgment (##32 & 20) are DENIED.

/s/ Douglas P. Woodlock
DOUGLAS P. WOODLOCK
UNITED STATES DISTRICT

3