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Fear Alone Doesn't Violate Eighth Amendment: No Immunity for Retaliation
Loaded on Nov. 15, 1997
published in Prison Legal News
November, 1997, page 20
The court of appeals for the seventh circuit held that a prisoner's fear of being attacked, by itself, does not violate the eighth amendment. The court also held that prison officials who retaliate against prisoners who complain about prison conditions are not entitled to qualified immunity. John Babcock, a federal …
Filed under:
Transfers,
Gang Policies,
Retaliation for Filing Grievances,
Retaliatory Transfers,
Crime/Demographics,
Informants,
Failure to Protect (General),
Eighth Amendment,
Damages,
Qualified Immunity.
Locations:
Illinois,
Indiana.
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More from this issue:
- Private Transportation Firms Take Prisoners for a Ride, by Alex Friedmann
- Escaped Prisoner Rides into Sunset
- Tensions Rise in Ohio Prisons
- From the Editor, by Paul Wright
- Notes from the Unrepenitentiary, by Laura Whitehorn
- Oklahoma Pulls Out of TX Rent-A-Jail
- DOJ to Probe Texas Rent-A-Jail
- 'Training Video' Reveals Beatings in Texas Rent-A-Jail
- ACLU and PLN Challenge Washington DOC Censorship
- Alive Today! Death Row Calling U.S.A.
- Texas Parole Case Reversed
- PLN Editor Settles Retaliation Suit
- Ohio Prison Doctor Liable in Asthma Death
- Detention and Corrections CaseLaw Catalog, by Paul Wright
- Criminal Practice Handbook, by Paul Wright
- Restoring Justice, by Dan Pens
- Civil Disabilities of Convicted Felon: A State-by-State Survey, by Jon Marc Taylor
- Texas Mandatory Release Statute Creates Liberty Interest
- A Matter of Fact
- NM Prisoners Refuse to Break Rocks
- BOP Sentence Reductions Cannot Be Denied Retroactively
- Former Prison Security Chief Convicted, by Julia Lutsky
- Attention Foreign Nationals, by A.I.C.A.P.
- Prisoner Literacy Obscure & Outdated, by Laura Whitehorn
- Sewing Our Own Destruction, by Ray Luc Levasseur
- Prisoner Calls Big Business in CA, by D.R.
- Trailers for Tana, by Art Longworth
- Electronic Guards of the Future?, by B.S.
- Exiled From Idaho, by D.M.
- Media Allowed Access to CA Executions
- PLRA Exhaustion Requirement Jurisdictional
- 3rd Cir. Applies 'Imminent Danger' Exception to PLRA 3 Strikes
- Factual Findings Required in 8th Amendment Suit
- Attica Justice -- Served 26 Years Later
- Fear Alone Doesn't Violate Eighth Amendment: No Immunity for Retaliation
- Pepper Spray Uprising in Arkansas
- Washington Officials Liable for Seizing Court Tape
- Fourth Amendment Forbids Taping of Jail Confession to Clergy
- News in Brief
More from these topics:
- Eleventh Circuit Upholds Most of Relief Ordered in Class-Action Lawsuit Challenging Unconstitutionally Inadequate Mental Health Care in Alabama Prisons, Oct. 1, 2026. Eighth Amendment, Staffing, Injunctions (PLRA), Failure to Treat (Mental Illness), Suicides.
- Fourth Circuit Upholds Denial of Qualified Immunity to Jail Supervisors Who Ignored Detainee’s Cranial Abscesses, Oct. 1, 2026. Failure to Treat, Infections, Qualified Immunity, Fourteenth Amendment, rights, Deliberate Indifference.
- South Carolina Supreme Court Reverses Class Action Status in Prisoners’ Sexual Assault Lawsuit, Oct. 1, 2026. Sexual Assault, Failure to Protect (General), Class Certification, Prison Rape Elimination Act, Appealable Issues/Orders.
- Sixth Circuit: Qualified Immunity Granted to Guard in Delayed Treatment for Prisoner who Suffered Heart Attack, Oct. 1, 2026. Pain, Cardiovascular, Failure to Treat, Qualified Immunity, Deliberate Indifference.
- Ninth Circuit Rules Favorably for Washington Prisoner Whose Writing Submission Was Censored, Oct. 1, 2026. Retaliation, Qualified Immunity, Mail Regulations, Censorship, First Amendment, rights.
- San Francisco Jail Survey Exposes Abuse, Malnutrition and Constitutional Violations, Oct. 1, 2026. Failure to Protect (General), Food, Guard Brutality/Beatings, Attorney Visits, Pretrial Detention and Detainees.
- Eighth Circuit Reverses District Court’s Denial of Motion to Dismiss Some Defendants from Lawsuit Over Missouri Prisoner’s Suicide, Oct. 1, 2026. Qualified Immunity, Sovereign Immunity, Failure to Protect (Wrongful Death), Suicides, Deliberate Indifference.
- $4,000 Awarded to Ohio Prisoner for Denied Records Requests, Oct. 1, 2026. Damages, Retroactivity, Public Records Act, Statutory Construction/Interpretation.
- Second Circuit Affirms Denial of Qualified Immunity but Clarifies that 14th Amendment ‘Objective Reasonableness’ Is Standard of Review for Pretrial Detainee’s Claim of Sexual Abuse, Oct. 1, 2026. Staff-Prisoner Assault, Qualified Immunity, Fourteenth Amendment, rights, Pretrial Detention and Detainees, Wrongful Use of Force.
- Disabled Prisoners in New York Aren’t Receiving Entitled Accommodations, Oct. 1, 2026. Disabled Prisoners, Retaliation for Filing Grievances, Failure to Treat, Americans with Disabilities Act.

