Eighth Circuit Dismisses Federal Prisoner’s Challenge to BOP Denying His Request for Expedited Transfer to Prerelease Custody
by Matt Clarke
On March 13, 2026, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit dismissed as moot a federal prisoner’s appeal of a district court’s dismissal of his habeas action under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 challenging the calculation by the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) of the time credit he was due pursuant to the First Step Act (FSA), 18 U.S.C. §§ 3624, 3632. Application of the time credits he sought would have resulted in his expedited transfer to a halfway house pursuant to 18 U.S.C. §§ 3624(g), 3632(d)(4)(C). This case became moot after the BOP transferred the prisoner to a halfway house.
While incarcerated at the Federal Prison Camp in Duluth, Minnesota, Anthony Fortner filed a pro se petition for a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to § 2241 alleging the BOP had “wrongfully refused his request to properly award and apply additional [FSA time credits] for the 543 days he was incarcerated at a Texas facility” prior to being transferred to Duluth and seeking immediate transfer to a halfway house.
The district court dismissed Fortner’s petition for lack of jurisdiction because, pursuant to Spencer v. Haynes, 774 F.3d 467 (8th Cir. 2014), a prisoner cannot use habeas corpus to challenge a sentence unless granting relief would shorten the duration of the sentence. Aided by Minneapolis attorney Ian Stuart Birrell, Fortner appealed.
The Eighth Circuit noted that whether federal habeas corpus may be used to challenge conditions of confinement has “produced unresolved conflict in the courts of appeals for more than a half a century.” In Preiser v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 475 (1973), the Supreme Court clearly held that challenges to the fact or duration of confinement could not be raised under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, which, the Preiser Court held, is not “a permissible alternative to the traditional remedy of habeas corpus.” However, the Preiser Court declined to address whether a prisoner could raise conditions of confinement claims via habeas corpus as that question had not been raised in Preiser.
The U.S. Supreme Court continued to decline to address that question despite multiple opportunities to do so in the ensuing decades. See: Ziglar v. Abbasi, 582 U.S. 120 (2017). This led to a split among the circuits, the majority of which, including the Eighth Circuit, held that conditions of confinement claims cannot be raised in a habeas action, per Kruger v. Erickson, 77 F.3d 1071 (8th Cir. 1996). The only other circuit to address the issue in the context of prerelease custody also agreed with the majority. See: Maxwell v. Thomas, 133 F.4th 453 (5th Cir. 2025).
After oral argument, the BOP moved Fortner to a halfway house and the government filed a motion to dismiss. The court held that the mootness exception for capable-of-repetition-yet-evading-review did not apply to this case because of Smith v. Hundley, 190 F.3d 852 (8th Cir. 1999). Therefore, it dismissed the appeal as moot. See: Fortner v. Eischen, 170 F.4th 655 (8th Cir. 2026).
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Related legal case
Fortner v. Eischen
| Year | 2026 |
|---|---|
| Cite | 170 F.4th 655 (8th Cir. 2026) |
| Level | Court of Appeals |