Kao v. Superintendent

The plaintiff, Thao Kao, is a prisoner at the Massachusetts Correctional Institution, Norfolk (prison). This is his appeal from a judgment in the Superior Court dismissing his civil action brought under G. L. c. 30A in which he sought judicial review of the denial of his grievance (no. 83733) as well as monetary damages. In October, 2011, a correction officer seized from the plaintiff nineteen books of postage stamps, each book containing ten stamps, as contraband and issued a disciplinary report (no. 238446).2 As required, the prison held the stamps for the next three years.3 In September,…