§ 25-3401.Prisoner; civil actions; in forma pauperis litigation; limitation; finding by court that action was frivolous.

Section 25-3401 addresses a narrow category of lawsuits: civil actions, including appeals, that seek money damages, an injunction, or a declaratory judgment and that relate to a prisoner’s conditions of confinement — meaning custody, transportation, incarceration, or supervision. The section defines that category carefully and excludes motions for postconviction relief and habeas corpus petitions, which follow their own separate paths.

Once a prisoner has filed three or more such civil actions, commenced after July 19, 2012, that a Nebraska court or a federal court hearing a Nebraska case has found frivolous — meaning wholly without merit or rational argument in law or evidence — that prisoner cannot proceed in forma pauperis on any further civil action of that kind without first getting the court’s permission. The one built-in exception: a court must still let the prisoner proceed without prepaying costs if it determines the prisoner faces danger of serious bodily injury.

The mechanism that creates a “strike” lives in the same section. A court may include a finding in its final order or judgment that a particular civil action was frivolous, and that finding has to appear in the case record, which is what lets later courts track whether a prisoner has crossed the three-action threshold. The section carves out one category entirely: it does not apply to judicial review of disciplinary procedures in adult correctional institutions under the sections governing the Department of Correctional Services’ disciplinary process.