mandate before future of his retirement benefits of a loser county and secondly that the county violated mr brace's due process rights when they terminated his retirement benefits is  there a need in this case because it is an issue that is discussed and bears examination but is there a need for us to determine whether grace retained a property interest in his in his retirement benefits i think it makes all the difference your honor with all due respect when employee meets the conditions of the retirement system for receiving retirement benefits and in this case actually gens to receive the retirement benefits i submit that he has then has an in all vested property right to his retirement allotment well no for the substantive due process case it's got to be a fundamental it has to be fundamental right and we have a no other government benefit is more clearly aren't by the employee no other government benefit is more with light upon or given that public employment is not a pub fundamental right in title due process if public employment is not wouldn't we have to say a for sure that a benefit of public employment i would say that it is and that it cannot be taken away from him by the government without due process of law but especially in this day and age where we don't know what's going to happen the social security of our pensions are vital there vital for our livelihood are vital for dignity and they should and they aren't title through protection from arbitrary and discriminatory action by a government that let me spite you that position don't you also have to show that the statutory forfeiture criterion presumably to the best of their ability i mean you may think they got it wrong let's assume for argument they did get it wrong yes how is that  i think it's conscience shocking in that it was premature that it was done without any are you suggesting that there was a need to have some kind of evidence rehearing on a one on a question that prior to the sudden cutting off of his benefits he was not given an opportunity to challenge posed deprivation is there any way you can appeal to them i think to the way it was done is that the decision was tainted that they already made their decision even before he pled guilty i felt there was no way that mr priest could receive a fair decision given what transpired they had already made the decision they did not want to hear from him they never called him he had any right to a hearing or a right to review there was no interest in getting mr brace here and the right to a hearing under the local agency law would have been a pure state law matter right correct which should have been taken to state court whether it was common pleas or commonwealth court which is moot which i would presume would be the appropriate there's diction in most cases where a pension is for the party is given at least is given a hearing there is usually a hearing officer appointed and there is a right to appeal that terminations or sometimes the local agency simply conducts the hearing themselves  out of winning at a hearing that's correct but just says in the case of roche vs the state retirement or the state retirement bore health that the federal crime of false declarations to a quarter grand jury was substantially the same as perjury under pennsylvania law are that in order to commit perjury the party must act willfully and the conviction cannot be supported by the testimony of only one one witness whereas the federal crime required that the defendant act knowingly and there was no requirement that he but the the offense be proved by a number of witnesses so my argument basically is just as a federal offense of false declarations although roughly similar to the state offense of perjury are not substantially the same that the federal offense of corrupt receipt of reward although roughly similar to bribery under state law certainly could ask me anything my colleague and his that i was intending to talk about the due process issues well how about me could you start maybe with we were talking about different due process it might be available to him personally mr brace you know under under the local agency law how does a person contest this isn't by the board i think that mr brace first of all could have brought the state court actions that he brought  don't think necessarily certainly goats are arguments that it was not required in this particular instance because there were no factual issues as in doubt it was clear exactly what it occurred and there were no issues and there was no discretion on the part of the retirement board one of the things they did want to bring to the court's attention is that in the substantially the same argument that is being made into the pension forfeiture act in order to decide that i think the court is being asked to decide an issue that it has never decided before nor has the supreme court of the united states and about which the court has it that if i had an earnest split among the circuits and that issue is where we had to reach it i don't think you do and i think it can be avoided because i think the two statutes that issues are substantially the same do we have to he said yeah no i don't believe so i don't think of the due process you know if he's under due process require you to do that certainly i don't and even with respect to the property right with as to a pension i think when you're looking at a pension right you're looking at one that is created by state law state law pensions are subject to forfeiture if the office you'd let me ask your question or of that what's the book you said we were required to do this i mean that may be a little bit of an overstatement apparently your board got together and said we think that there's substantially similar and therefore we're going to do this what's the process unanimously determined that if in fact the guilty plea that he made was accepted by the court that his benefits would be terminated on a pension for perjury act because he had committed a crime substantially the same as one of the  crimes that is the only thing on the record presumably other things could have occurred but in this instance given the fact that there were no factual disputes as to what had occurred there was nothing else that was done but i think you're the course correct i don't think any decision has to be made under the substantially similar portion of the case the rights that existed whether their self interest of substantive due process or topics which i wish to discuss so i'd like to just point out a couple of things it seems to me at the panel is aware that there is a distinction when it comes to property rights in the analysis between procedur process and subset of the process clearly there is a higher standard when analyzing whether or not there is a property right under such that the due process mr brace is at a number of opportunities to provide just a court now the third circuit with any case law which would support its position that is that he had a property rights under substantive due process name he hasn't this good reason because it's just out there as the nicholas case states when courts are faced with making determinations just whether or not there's a property right under substantive due process analysis  history cautions history pouncers views harsh and restraint that's a right that perhaps the rate which is very sparingly given because it is typically typically arises in areas such as marriage plea agreement and then the decision was made which was later rescinded but the decision was made to terminate his benefits so at that point time the board had the fact that they knew that they needed they knew that  combination of that's right that's correct with regard to there are some questions with regard to the local agency laws and what remedies are available i'm afraid i don't have any specific answers for you other than to say that if there were specific remedies if there was a specific right to a hearing if there was a specific right to question examine witnesses in the local  factual discrepancies to make sure that the decision maker decision makers have all the facts they need to make the decision that was the case here well what he wanted was an opportunity to debate their interpretation of the for agency law i did contend that we were told to a hearing under the local agency law that we didn't receive it and that as a result of the county's tanakh that we were basically deprived of any right to a fair hearing