West v. Kind et al

Filing 8

ORDER signed by Judge Pamela Pepper on 4/18/2017 DENYING 2 Plaintiff's motion for order to have the filing fee paid from the release account. (cc: all counsel; by US Mail to plaintiff) (pwm)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF WISCONSIN
______________________________________________________________________________
RUFUS WEST,
Plaintiff,
v.

Case No. 17-cv-482-pp

JOHN KIND, SCOTT ECKSTEIN,
PETE ERICKSEN, BRIAN FOSTER,
SARAH COOPER, BRAD HOMPE,
CINDY O’DONNELL, AND JOHN
AND JANE DOE,
Defendants.
______________________________________________________________________________
ORDER DENYING PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR ORDER TO HAVE FILING
FEE PAID FROM RELEASE ACCOUNT (DKT. NO. 2)
______________________________________________________________________________
The plaintiff is a Wisconsin state prisoner representing himself. He filed a
civil rights complaint alleging that the defendants violated his constitutional
rights. Dkt. No. 1. The plaintiff has also filed a motion to pay the filing fee from
his release account. Dkt. No. 2. He states that he has enough money in his
release account to pay the fee, but that he does not have funds in his regular
account to pay the fee. Id. The plaintiff did not file an institution trust account
statement along with his request.
A release account is a restricted account maintained by the Wisconsin
Department of Corrections to be used upon the prisoner’s release from custody
upon completion of his sentence. Wis. Adm. Code §DOC 309.466. While the
court may order disbursement from the release account for payment of the

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initial partial filing fee when a prisoner files a petition for leave to proceed
without prepayment of the filing fee (in forma pauperis), the Prison Litigation
Reform Act does not require the court to invade that account for payment of
the balance. See 28 U.S.C. §1915(b)(2) (The balance of payments, after the
initial payment, is to equal “twenty percent of the preceding month’s income
credited to the prisoner's account.”). “Nothing in this language can be
interpreted as congressional intent that prisoners deplete savings or release
account balances in order to pay off their filing fee debts.” Wilson v. Anderson,
2014 WL 3671878, at *3 (E.D. Wis. July 23, 2014) (quoting Carter v. Bennett,
399 F. Supp. 2d 936, 937 (W.D. Wis. 2005); see also Doty v. Doyle, 182 F.
Supp. 2d 750 (E.D. Wis. 2002).
According to the Department of Corrections website, the plaintiff’s
mandatory release/extended supervision date is March 5, 2019. Based on the
rationale for segregating funds into a release account, the plaintiff’s failure to
submit his trust account statement along with his motion, the fact that the
plaintiff’s release date is in less than two years, and absent federal statutory
authority compelling the court to grant the plaintiff’s request, the court
declines to order the plaintiff’s institution to withdraw the full filing fee from his
release account.

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The court DENIES the plaintiff’s motion for order to have filing fee paid
from release account. Dkt. No. 2.
Dated at Milwaukee, Wisconsin this 18th day of April, 2017.

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