stating that an informal, nonadversary, evidentiary review is sufficient for an inmate representing a security threat and who may be confined to administrative segregation when the inmate (1) receives some notice of the charges against him,' and (2) has an opportunity to present his views to the prison official charged with deciding whether to transfer him to administrative segregation
How later courts described this case
- stating that an informal, nonadversary, evidentiary review is sufficient for an inmate representing a security threat and who may be confined to administrative segregation when the inmate (1) receives some notice of the charges against him,' and (2) has an opportunity to present his views to the prison official charged with deciding whether to transfer him to administrative segregation
- holding that, to confer a liberty interest in continuing to reside in the general prison population, a regulation must use “language of an unmistakably mandatory character ... and [require] that administrative segregation will not occur absent specified substantive predicates — viz., ‘the need for control,’ or ‘the threat of a serious disturbance’ ” (emphasis added)
- holding that an inmate being considered for transfer to administrative segregation is entitled to “some notice of the charges against him and an opportunity to present his views to the prison official charged with deciding whether to transfer him to administrative segregation”
- finding that no interest arising from the Due Process Clause itself was impacted when an inmate was moved to more restrictive quarters (administrative segregation), which caused a denial of access to vocational, educational, recreational, and rehabilitative programs
Written by the judges who cited it.
Later courts went against this
Reported overruled — as noted by 2 later courts — not on the Supreme Court's list
It is unclear why Hewitt should govern the liberty interest analysis in the mental health context when it is no longer good law even on its own facts.
2 citing opinionsunconfirmed confidenceReported overruled on other grounds by Buckhannon Board & Care Home, Inc. v. West Virginia Dept. of Health and Human Resources, 532 U.S. 598 (2001) — not on the Supreme Court's list
459 U.S. 460, 474, 103 S. Ct. 864, 74 L. Ed. 2d 675 (1983), overruled on other grounds by Buckhannon Board & Care Home, Inc. v. West Virginia Dept. of Health & Human Resources, 532 U.S. 598, 121 S. Ct. 1835, 149 L. Ed. 2d 855 (2001).
Reported abrogated in part, on other grounds by Sandin v. Conner, 515 U.S. 472 (1995) — not on the Supreme Court's list
459 U.S. 460, 467 (1983), overruled on other grounds by Sandin v. Conner, 515 U.S. 472, 480-84
Supreme Court of the United StatesJun 19, 1995127 citing opinionsother groundsin partunconfirmed confidenceRead it
Distinguished
Distinguished by Green v. Schmelzle, 210 F. Supp. 3d 454 (2016)
Hewitt v. Helms, 459 U.S. 460, 103 S.Ct. 864, 74 L.Ed.2d 675 (1983), is inapplicable because Plaintiff does not claim administrative segregation from the general prison population in violation of his Due Process rights.
The opinion
Justice Blackmun,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
The Court’s prior cases of course recognize that a valid criminal conviction and sentence extinguish a defendant’s otherwise protected right to be free from confinement. E. g., Connecticut Board of Pardons v. Dumschat, 452 U. S. 458, 464 (1981); Vitek v. Jones, 445 U. S. 480, 493 (1980); Greenholtz v. Nebraska Penal Inmates, 442 U. S. 1, 7 (1979); Meachum v. Fano, 427 U. S. 215, 224 (1976). Although prison inmates retain a residuum of liberty, see Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U. S. 539, 555-556 (1974), this liberty is not infringed by conditions of confinement that are “within the normal limits or range of custody which the conviction has authorized the State to impose.” Meachum v. Fano, 427 U. S., at 225 ; see Montanye v. Haymes, 427 U. S. 236, 242 (1976); Vitek v. Jones, 445 U. S., at 493 . In Meachum and Montanye , we held that certain prison transfers were “within the normal limits or range of custody” even though conditions of confinement were more severe in the prisons to which the inmates were transferred. Because I believe that a transfer to administrative segregation within a prison likewise is within the normal range of custody, I agree with the Court that respondent has not been deprived of “an interest independently protected by the Due Process Clause,” ante, at 468.
I also agree that the Pennsylvania statutes and prison regulations at issue in this case created an entitlement not to *479 be placed in administrative segregation without due process. These statutes and regulations are similar to the ones at issue in Hughes v. Rowe, 449 U. S. 5 (1980), and Wright v. Enomoto, 462 F. Supp. 397 (ND Cal. 1976), summarily aff’d, 434 U. S. 1052 (1978), and our dispositions of those cases made clear that a liberty interest was created. We also found a state-created liberty interest in Greenholtz, swpra, even though the statutes at issue there permitted parole decisions to be based on partially subjective and predictive criteria. In cases in which we have declined to find a state-created liberty interest, we have noted that state law permitted prison transfers to be made “for whatever reason or for no reason at all,” Meachum v. Fano, 427 U. S., at 228 ; that state law “impose[d] no conditions on the discretionary power to transfer,” Montanye v. Haymes, 427 U. S., at 243 ; or that state law gave a Board of Pardons “unfettered discretion,” Dumschat, 452 U. S., at 466 . This is not such a case.
Having found a state-created liberty interest, I cannot agree with the Court that the procedures used here comported with due process. Accordingly, I join Parts II and III of Justice Stevens’ dissenting opinion.