Kenney v. Commissioner of Correction

This case concerns the basis on which the defense of laches may bar an inmate’s complaint challenging prison disciplinary proceedings resulting in the forfeiture of good time credits. 2 The plaintiff, an inmate at the Massachusetts Correctional Institution, Cedar Junction, filed a pro se complaint in the Superior Court in August, 1983, against the Commissioner of Correction and prison superintendent challenging eleven disciplinary proceedings which occurred between 1977 and 1979. As a result of those disciplinary proceedings, punishment was ordered against the plaintiff amounting to a total…