THE STATE EX REL. RUSSELL, APPELLANT, v. OHIO DEPARTMENT OF REHABILITATION AND CORRECTION, APPELLEE.
No. 2020-0386
Supreme Court of Ohio
October 8, 2020
Slip Opinion No. 2020-Ohio-4788
Submitted August 4, 2020. APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Pickaway County, No. 19CA39.
NOTICE
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in an advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports. Readers are requested to promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 65 South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or other formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be made before the opinion is published.
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as State ex rel. Russell v. Ohio Dept. of Rehab. & Corr., Slip Opinion No. 2020-Ohio-4788.]
Mandamus—Inmate failed to comply with filing requirements of
{¶ 1} Appellant, Mark R. Russell, a prison inmate, filed a petition for a writ of mandamus seeking to compel appellee, Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (“DRC”), to conduct a hearing concerning an alleged use-of-force incident. The petition was dismissed because Russell did not comply with
Background
{¶ 2} Russell initially filed his petition in the Tenth District Court of Appeals, alleging
{¶ 3} DRC moved to dismiss the petition, first arguing that the Tenth District lacked jurisdiction over Russell’s petition because the Pickaway Correctional Institution is not located within the court’s territorial boundaries. DRC also argued that Russell had failed to set forth in his affidavit of indigency the balance of his inmate account for each of the preceding six months, as required by
{¶ 4} On receiving the case, the Fourth District ordered DRC to file a response to Russell’s petition. DRC filed another motion to dismiss, this time arguing that Russell has no clear legal right to a hearing and that he had failed to adequately describe the civil actions he had filed in the previous five years, as required by
{¶ 5} Russell has appealed to this court as of right.
Analysis
{¶ 6} On appeal, Russell does not dispute that he failed to comply with
{¶ 7} The Fourth District was right to dismiss Russell’s petition for failing to comply with
(1) [a] brief description of the nature of the civil action or appeal;
(2) [t]he case name, case number, and the court in which the civil action or appeal was brought;
(3) [t]he name of each party to the civil action or appeal; [and]
(4) [t]he outcome of the civil action or appeal, including whether the court dismissed the civil action or appeal as frivolous or malicious under state or federal law or rule of court, whether the court made an award against the inmate or the
inmate’s counsel of record for frivolous conduct under section 2323.51 of the Revised Code, another statute, or a rule of court, and, if the court so dismissed the action or appeal or made an award of that nature, the date of the final order affirming the dismissal or award.
{¶ 8} Along with his petition, Russell filed an affidavit listing six civil actions he had filed within the previous five years, but he did not identify the courts in which the cases were brought, the names of all the parties, or the outcomes of the cases. “The requirements of
Judgment affirmed.
O’CONNOR, C.J., and KENNEDY, FRENCH, FISCHER, DEWINE, DONNELLY, and STEWART, JJ., concur.
Mark R. Russell, pro se.
Dave Yost, Attorney General, and George Horváth, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.