Walker v. Baldwin

Ct. of Appeals found that plaintiff-prisoner had waived his issue on appeal regarding propriety of Dist. Ct.'s grant of defendants-prison officials’ motion for summary judgment on plaintiff’s Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) claim, where plaintiff asserted that defendants improperly forced him to cut his dreadlocks, where plaintiff informed defendant that his Rastafarian religion precluded him from cutting his hair. Plaintiff conceded that his proposed injunctive relief under RLUIPA was moot, and informed Dist. Ct. in footnote in his response to summary judgment motion that he was no longer pursuing RLUIPA claim because the Act does not give him a monetary remedy. As such, Ct. of Appeals found that defendant had waived any RLUIPA claim on appeal. Fact that Dist. Ct. had previously dismissed monetary claim under RLUIPA prior to plaintiff’s response to motion for summary judgment does not require different result, since plaintiff could have raised RLUIPA claim on appeal had he not expressly waived it in his response and did nothing to preserve said issue or qualify his waiver statement.