Frank Hale Bennett v. Dallas Allen, and the People of the State of California

Bennett appeals from an order of the District Court dismissing his complaint, which requested declaratory and injunctive relief pursuant to the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1983 . Our jurisdiction is founded upon 28 U.S.C. §§ 1291 , 1294.

Bennett is presently in California penal custody, serving a sentence imposed following his plea of guilty to a charge of solicitation to commit a felony. This plea occurred after Bennett had made an earlier plea of not guilty to a charge of conspiracy to commit murder.

Bennett’s complaint, brought in propria persona, presented two principal charges: (1) That he was entrapped into committing the crime of soliciting murder and (2) that his plea of guilty was a product of coercion in that it was made pursuant to the representation of his counsel that he would receive a lesser sentence than that which was in fact imposed. The named defendants included Bennett’s former attorney, a private individual who had acted as a police informant, two judges, a district attorney, a deputy district attorney, two sheriffs, two deputy sheriffs, the Superintendent of the California Correctional Institution at Tehachapi, the Adult Authority of California, and the…