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Nature of Suit Code: 555
Nature of Suit: Prisoner - Prison Condition
Cause of Action: 

---

In the 

United States Court of Appeals 

For the Seventh Circuit ____________________

No. 14‐1746

PATRICK J. WERNER,

Plaintiff‐Appellant,

v.

EDWARD F. WALL, et al.,

Defendants‐Appellees.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Eastern District of Wisconsin.

No. 2:12‐cv‐00096‐CNC — Charles N. Clevert, Jr., Judge.

____________________

ARGUED APRIL 6, 2016 — DECIDED SEPTEMBER 1, 2016

____________________

Before FLAUM, RIPPLE, and HAMILTON, Circuit Judges.

RIPPLE, Circuit Judge. In 1999, Patrick Werner was con‐

victed of multiple sex offenses in Wisconsin state court. The

state trial court sentenced him to ten years of imprisonment

and to ten consecutive years of probation. Because Mr. Wer‐

ner had been convicted of more than one sex offense, he was

a Special Bulletin Notification (“SBN”) sex offender under

Wisconsin law. After a denial of parole in late 2009, Mr. Wer‐

ner’s release was deferred until his mandatory release date of

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2 No. 14‐1746

March 21, 2010. At that time, Mr. Werner and his probation

agents were unable to secure an approved residence as re‐

quired by his rules of supervision. Consequently, the Wiscon‐

sin Department of Corrections (“DOC”) Division of Commu‐

nity Corrections detained him pursuant to Administrative Di‐

rective No. 02‐10 (“AD 02‐10” or “the directive”), which set

out a procedure addressing release‐eligible SBN sex offenders

who lacked an approved residence. Under AD 02‐10, persons

who had reached their mandatory release date but could not

secure housing that was approved under their rules of super‐

vision were detained in the county jail during the night but

permitted to seek appropriate housing during certain hours

of the day. Authorities employed this arrangement to prevent

a violation of the rules of supervision. Officials detained

Mr. Werner under this arrangement sporadically between

March 16, 2010, and July 1, 2011, when he finally located and

moved into an approved residence.

Mr. Werner brought this action pro se in the district court

under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. He claimed that his continued deten‐

tion beyond his mandatory release date was unlawful and

named as defendants various DOC officials and several of his

probation agents. In an initial screening order, the district

court permitted Mr. Werner to proceed on the individual‐ca‐

pacity claims under the Eighth Amendment and the Due Pro‐

cess Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. It also permitted

him to maintain an official‐capacity claim for injunctive relief

on the ground that AD 02‐10 violated the Due Process and Ex

Post Facto Clauses. The district court ultimately granted sum‐

mary judgment in favor of the defendants on all of Mr. Wer‐

ner’s claims. It concluded that his Eighth and Fourteenth

Amendment claims were barred by qualified immunity and

that his official capacity challenge to the directive as a policy

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No. 14‐1746 3

was moot. Mr. Werner timely appealed the district court’s de‐

cision with respect to his individual‐capacity claims. In due

course, we recruited counsel and requested additional brief‐

ing.  

After the benefit of briefing and oral argument, we agree

with the district court that the defendants in this case are en‐

titled to qualified immunity. We therefore affirm the district

court’s judgment with respect to each of Mr. Werner’s claims.

I

BACKGROUND

A.

In 1999, the Circuit Court of Brown County, Wisconsin,

convicted Mr. Werner of second‐degree sexual assault of a

child and of attempted child enticement. The court sentenced

him to ten years in prison with ten consecutive years of pro‐

bation. After his parole was denied in late 2009, Mr. Werner’s

release was deferred until his mandatory release date of

March 21, 2010. Wisconsin law requires that any person con‐

victed of a sex offense and then released to parole or extended

supervision be placed initially in the county where the person

resided on the date of the offense, the county where the per‐

son was convicted, or a sex offender treatment facility. Wis.

Stat. § 301.03(20)(a). Mr. Werner was convicted in Brown

County, and the Division of Community Corrections sought

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to place him there.1 Because of Mr. Werner’s multiple sex of‐

fense convictions, he also was designated an SBN sex of‐

fender. This designation required the Division of Community

Corrections to provide notice of his placement in Brown

County to law enforcement officials in that community. See id.

§ 301.46(2m)(am).  

Wisconsin law provided still more restrictions. At the time

of Mr. Werner’s mandatory release date in 2010, the rules of

supervision for all sex offenders required them to obtain and

to maintain an approved residence; they were not permitted

to be homeless because of the risk of recidivism. Mr. Werner’s

Standard Sex Offender Rules consequently provided, in rele‐

vant part:

5. You shall not reside nor “stay” overnight in

any place other than a pre‐approved residence

without prior agent approval. “Overnight” is

defined as the daily period of time between the

hours of 8 p.m. and 8 a.m. unless redefined by

your agent in advance.  

...

                                                 

1 Although the statute provides multiple placement options, see Wis. Stat.

§ 301.03(20)(a), the record indicates, and the district court found, that the

Division of Community Corrections had to place Mr. Werner in Brown

County, the county of his conviction. It is not clear why this was the case.

However, Mr. Werner does not argue that he could have been released

somewhere other than Brown County.  

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No. 14‐1746 5

11. You shall fully comply with all sex offender

registry requirements as applicable and di‐

rected by your agent and/or required by stat‐

ute.[2]

SBN sex offenders in particular were required to “provide a

specific, verifiable address prior to release from a correctional

institution ... subject to the department’s approval.”3In deter‐

mining whether to approve a proposed residence, agents

were required to consider, among other things, the “[p]rox‐

imity to the SBN offender’s victim(s), elementary or second‐

ary schools, parks and licensed or certified day care provid‐

ers.”4  

There were still more restrictions, imposed by a combina‐

tion of department rules and community ordinances. Among

the thirty‐nine Rules of Community Supervision, the first

stated:

1. You shall avoid all conduct which is in viola‐

tion of federal or state statute, municipal or

county ordinances, tribal law or which is not in

the best interest of the public welfare or your re‐

habilitation.[5]

                                                 

2 R.90‐3.  

3 R.93‐2 at 1.

4 Id.

5 R.90‐2 at 1.  

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Brown County had over a dozen ordinances in place that re‐

stricted where registered sex offenders could reside.6Both the

Standard Sex Offender Rules and the Rules of Community Su‐

pervision provided that a violation of any rule would subject

the offender to possible revocation of his or her probation, pa‐

role, or extended supervision. Therefore,residing in any place

forbidden by local ordinance constituted a violation of these

rules and subjected Mr. Werner to possible revocation of his

probation.  

Wisconsin authorities had wrestled with the problem cre‐

ated by the confluence of these provisions for quite a while

before Mr. Werner’s situation came to the fore. In 2002, nearly

a decade before Mr. Werner’s mandatory release date, the Di‐

vision of Community Corrections had fashioned an adminis‐

trative scheme to address this dilemma in releasing convicted

sex offenders to communities with restrictive sex offender or‐

dinances. Responding to several Wisconsin Court of Appeals

decisions requiring that sex offenders be released on their

mandatory release date regardless of whether they had ap‐

proved housing, the Division of Community Corrections

promulgated AD 02‐10, which detailed the department’s

“Procedures for SBN Offenders Lacking Approved Resi‐

dences.”7 Relying explicitly on the DOC’s existing authority

to “take[] into custody and detain[]” an offender on super‐

vised release “[t]o prevent a possible violation,” Wis. Admin.

                                                 

6 During the summary judgment stage in the district court, the defendants

submitted a document containing a very general description of these or‐

dinances. See R.93‐1.

7 R.93‐2 at 1.

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No. 14‐1746 7

Code DOC § 328.22(2)(d) (2002),8

AD 02–10 set out the follow‐

ing:

Approved Residence Requirement

An approved residence is a standard require‐

ment of supervision for all sex offenders. Special

Bulletin Notification (SBN) offenders must pro‐

vide a specific, verifiable address prior to re‐

lease from a correctional institution. The pro‐

posed residence is subject to the department’s

approval. ...  

...

Lack of Approved Residence After Release

Wisconsin law requires the Department of Cor‐

rections to release offenders on their mandatory

release dates. The decisions of the Court of Ap‐

peals in State ex rel. Woods v. Morgan, 224 Wis 2d,

534, 591 N.W.2d 922 (Ct. App. 1999) and State ex

rel. Olson v. Litscher, 233 Wis.2d 685, 608,

N.W.2d 425 (Ct. App. 2000) require that prison‐

ers be released upon reaching mandatory re‐

lease, whether or not an approved residence has

been found.

If, upon release, a SBN offender does not have a

residence, which the department has approved,

the offender shall be directed to secure an ap‐

proved residence by the end of the workday.

                                                 

8 This provision is now located at Wisconsin Administrative Code DOC

§ 328.27(2)(d).

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The SBN offender shall be permitted to con‐

duct an “unfettered” search for housing. This

means the SBN offender shall be permitted to

leave the presence of DOC staff to search for

housing. In order to accomplish this, the agent

shall require the SBN offender to be accompa‐

nied by an approved chaperone. The SBN of‐

fender shall also be required to provide an itin‐

erary, prior to leaving the agent’s presence, and

to keep a log of movements, appointments and

personal contacts. The SBN offender shall wear

an [electromagnetic pulse (“EMP”)] transmitter

at all times. The chaperone shall be provided

with a cellular phone and an EMP “scanner.”

The SBN offender is not required to remain in

the physical presence of the chaperone at all

times during the search for housing. However,

the SBN offender will be required to remain

within range of the EMP scanner. The chaper‐

one must also be provided a copy of the SBN of‐

fender’s rules and must agree to neither assist

nor encourage the SBN offender to violate any

rule. The chaperone will have no authority to

detain or impede the SBN offender.

If the SBN offender does not secure an approved

residence by 5:00 p.m. and the department has

no alternative housing resources in the com‐

munity of release, the SBN offender may be de‐

tained in the county jail, to prevent a violation,

pursuant to Wis. Admin. Code DOC

328.22(2)(d). The SBN offender shall be released

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No. 14‐1746 9

from custody the next workday, to continue to

search for an approved residence. The require‐

ments for the search remain the same: EMP,

provide a written itinerary, keep a log of move‐

ments and be accompanied by an approved

chaperone. If any requirement is unmet, the

SBN offender shall remain in custody, until all

requirements can be met.

...

Procedures Upon Locating Residence

When an appropriate residence has been lo‐

cated, the agent will notify local law enforce‐

ment, who shall have the opportunity to notify

the community before the SBN offender estab‐

lishes residence.[9]

  

B.

Mr. Werner was assigned three different probation agents

during the time period he was under the supervision of the

Division of Community Corrections. Although he was still in‐

carcerated, Agent Amanda Martin received Mr. Werner’s file

on November 12, 2009, the day before his parole was denied

and his release deferred. On December 1, 2009, Agent Martin

discussed with Mr. Werner his housing and employment op‐

tions. She described Brown County’s sex offender ordinances,

the procedures set out in AD 02‐10 should he be unable to se‐

cure an approved residence before his mandatory release

                                                 

9 R.93‐2 at 1–2 (emphases in original).

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10 No. 14‐1746

date, and the global positioning satellite (“GPS”) tracker that

Mr. Werner would be required to carry on release. Over the

next several months, while Mr. Werner still was incarcerated,

Agent Martin investigated numerous potential residences

proposed by Mr. Werner, his social worker, and his mother;

however, she determined that she could not approve any of

these proposed residences. Agent Martin also arranged a

chaperone, pursuant to AD 02‐10, with whom Mr. Werner

could search for housing for four hours per weekday.  

On March 4, 2010, Agent Martin and her supervisor, Lori

Richgels, met with law enforcement officials to discuss

Mr. Werner’s release plan and to determine the appropriate

level of community notification. On March 16, 2010, five days

before his mandatory release date, Mr. Werner was trans‐

ferred from a state penitentiary to the Division of Community

Corrections office in Green Bay. Agent Martin completed the

intake process with Mr. Werner, which included reviewing

the process for mandatory GPS monitoring, the sex offender

registry requirements, and the procedure for sex offender

housing searches. Mr. Werner reviewed and signed his Rules

of Community Supervision and Standard Sex Offender Rules,

as well as paperwork concerning the chaperone service. Be‐

cause Mr. Werner had not secured an approved residence and

the department had no alternative housing resources in the

community, AD 02‐10 applied and Mr. Werner was booked

into the Brown County Jail to prevent a probation violation.

For the next several months, Mr. Werner, with the assistance

of Agent Martin, sought appropriate housing under the pro‐

cedures outlined in AD 02–10.  

In October 2010, Mr. Werner violated his supervision rules

by possessing contraband and making threatening comments

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to his pod mates at the Brown County Jail. He agreed to an

Alternative to Revocation (“ATR”), under which he would

spend ninety days at a state penitentiary; he began serving the

ATR on December 1, 2010. Soon after, Agent Robert Fusfeld

replaced Agent Martin as Mr. Werner’s probation agent.

Mr. Werner was released back to the Division of Community

Corrections office in Green Bay on March 1, 2011. For the next

several months, he continued to search for approvable hous‐

ing under AD 02‐10. On June 1, 2011, Mr. Werner located a

tentative residence in Bellevue, Wisconsin. Agent Fusfeld in‐

vestigated the residence, approved it, and began arrange‐

ments for Mr. Werner’s release.  

On June 22, 2011, Agent Erin Murto replaced Agent

Fusfeld; she continued to arrange for Mr. Wernerto move into

the residence in Bellevue that Agent Fusfeld had approved.

Mr. Werner moved into the residence on July 1, 2011. How‐

ever, in November 2011, Mr. Werner again violated the terms

of his supervision. His probation was revoked on April 23,

2012, and he was ordered by an Administrative Law Judge

(“ALJ”) to return to prison for two years, four months, and

three days.10  

On November 16, 2012, Mr. Werner again was released,

this time to a transitional living program in Green Bay.11 On

                                                 

10 See Wis. Admin. Code HA § 2.05 (outlining Wisconsin’s revocation pro‐

cess).

11 According to the record, Mr. Werner had requested initially that he be

placed at the transitional living program in Green Bay upon his manda‐

tory release date in March 2010. At the time, however, the transitional liv‐

ing program was too close to a park under the applicable sex offender or‐

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February 15, 2013, however, Mr. Werner violated the rules of

his supervision by, among other things, sending a sexually

explicit message to a sixteen‐year‐old girl. According to the

State, Mr. Werner’s probation was revoked, and he is cur‐

rently incarcerated at a state penitentiary. The parties also in‐

form us that AD 02‐10 was replaced in March 2015 by AD

15‐12, under which SBN sex offenders lacking approved resi‐

dences are no longer held in jail until they can secure an ap‐

proved residence.  

C.

On January 31, 2012, Mr. Werner brought this action pro

se in the United States District Court for the Eastern District

of Wisconsin under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging that he was un‐

lawfully detained from March 16, 2010, until July 1, 2011.12

                                                 

dinance. Mr. Werner requested an exemption from the Green Bay Sex Of‐

fender Residence Board but was denied. In August 2012, Green Bay re‐

vised its ordinance to permit sex offenders to move directly to a transi‐

tional living program without the Board’s prior approval. This cleared the

way for Mr. Werner to be placed there in November 2012, which took him

out of the purview of AD 02‐10.

12 As our recitation of the facts makes clear, large portions of Mr. Werner’s

detention over this period of time were authorized independently of AD

02‐10. For example, when Mr. Werner violated his terms of supervision in

October 2010, the DOC’s authority to detain him would have derived ei‐

ther from Wisconsin Administrative Code DOC § 328.22(2)(a), which per‐

mits detention “[f]or investigation of an alleged violation,” or from DOC

§ 328.22(2)(b), which permits detention “[a]fter an alleged violation ... to

determine whether to commence revocation proceedings.” Mr. Werner

also served a ninety‐day Alternative to Revocation sentence from Decem‐

ber 1, 2010, until March 1, 2011. Because we hold that the defendants in

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Mr. Werner sought monetary damages and injunctive relief.

He named as individual defendants: DOC Secretary Gary

Hamblin; Division of Community Corrections Regional Chief

Rose Snyder‐Spaar; Division of Community Corrections Ad‐

ministrator Denise Symdon; Division of Community Correc‐

tions Field Supervisors Thomas Wickeham and Lori Richgels;

and Agents Martin, Fusfeld, and Murto (collectively, “the de‐

fendants”).

In a screening order, the district court allowed Mr. Wer‐

ner’s Eighth Amendment and due process claims, based on

his continued detention beyond his mandatory release date,

to proceed against Agents Martin, Fusfeld, and Murto, and

Supervisors Wickeham and Richgels. The district court also

allowed him to go forward with official‐capacity claims for

injunctive relief against all of the named defendants13on the

ground that AD 02‐10 violated the Due Process and Ex Post

Facto Clauses of the Constitution. The defendants moved for

summary judgment on each of these claims. Mr. Werner also

moved for summary judgment, but the district court denied

his motion on procedural grounds. Several months later,

Mr. Werner filed a number of documents that the court ulti‐

mately construed as a motion for summary judgment and a

response in opposition to the defendants’ motion.  

                                                 

this case are shielded from civil liability, we need not determine precisely

the time period that Mr. Werner was held under the challenged directive.

13 On October 27, 2012, Edward Wall succeeded Hamblin as DOC Secre‐

tary. Because Mr. Werner had sued Hamblin, a public officer, in his official

capacity, the district court granted the defendants’ motion to substitute

Secretary Wall as a party under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 25(d).

R.119 at 1.

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14 No. 14‐1746

On March 27, 2014, the district court granted summary

judgment in favor of the defendants. The court concluded that

Mr. Werner’s Eighth Amendment and due process claims for

damages against the individual defendants were barred by

qualified immunity because it was not clearly established at

the time that AD 02‐10 violated the constitutional rights of

SBN sex offenders. It further held that Mr. Werner’s official‐

capacity claims that AD 02‐10 was unconstitutional were

moot because he no longer was subject to the directive.

Acting pro se, Mr. Werner timely appealed the court’s

judgment, and we recruited counsel to assist him.14 We or‐

dered the parties to address at least the following issues:  

(1) Do the facts alleged by Werner (including his

detention in county jail beyond his release date)

state a claim under the Eighth Amendment or

the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth

Amendment?  

(2) If Werner has stated a constitutional claim

for damages, are the defendants entitled to

qualified immunity for detaining Werner in

county jail after his release date?[15]

                                                 

14 The court expresses its appreciation to counsel and his law firm for their

excellent representation of their client.

15 Dkt.52.

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II

DISCUSSION

The district court granted summary judgment on Mr. Wer‐

ner’s Eighth Amendment16 and due process claims because it

concluded that the defendants were entitled to the protections

of qualified immunity.17 “We review a district court’s grant of

summary judgment based on qualified immunity de novo, ac‐

cepting all facts and inferences in the light most favorable to

the non‐moving party.” Zimmerman v. Doran, 807 F.3d 178,

182 (7th Cir. 2015). Qualified immunity shields government

officials from civil “liability ‘insofar as their conduct does not

violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of

which a reasonable person would have known.’” Purvis v.

Oest, 614 F.3d 713, 720 (7th Cir. 2010) (quoting Harlow v. Fitz‐

gerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982)). In determining whether qual‐

ified immunity applies, “we must address two questions: [1]

whether the plaintiff’s allegations make out a deprivation of

a constitutional right, and [2] whether the right was clearly

established at the time of defendant’s alleged misconduct.”

McAllister v. Price, 615 F.3d 877, 881 (7th Cir. 2010).  

At one time, the Supreme Court required categorically

that we conduct these two inquiries sequentially in order to

avoid stagnation in the development of constitutional law. See

                                                 

16 The Eighth Amendment applies here to Wisconsin through the Four‐

teenth Amendment. Robinson v. California, 370 U.S. 660, 666 (1962).

17 Mr. Werner concedes that his official‐capacity claims for injunctive re‐

lief on the ground that AD 02‐10 as a policy is unconstitutional are now

moot because the directive is no longer in effect. We therefore do not ad‐

dress them. Mr. Werner’s individual claims for damages, of course, are

not affected by this development.

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Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 201 (2001). Under this framework,

we had to determine “first if the alleged facts described a legal

violation, and only if they did, mov[e] on to the question

whether the law was clearly established.” Mordi v. Zeigler, 770

F.3d 1161, 1165 (7th Cir. 2014). The Court relaxed this “rigid

order of battle” in Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223 (2009). It

held that “the district courts and the courts of appeals should

be permitted to exercise their sound discretion in deciding

which of the two prongs of the qualified immunity analysis

should be addressed first in light of the circumstances in the

particular case at hand.” Id. at 236.18

In some situations, adherence to the traditional two‐step

approach is appropriate. See id. (recognizing that it is “often

beneficial” to follow “the Saucier protocol”). Nevertheless, the

circumstances of the present case make it advisable to avail

ourselves of the latitude now afforded us. Id. at 241 (“Adher‐

ence to Saucier’s two‐step protocol departs from the general

rule of constitutional avoidance and runs counter to the older,

wiser judicial counsel not to pass on questions of constitution‐

ality unless such adjudication is unavoidable.” (alteration

omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted)).19 Indeed, there

are several reasons that counsel that we not address defini‐

tively the constitutional issue. First, the underlying adminis‐

                                                 

18 See also Mullenix v. Luna, 136 S. Ct. 305, 308 (2015) (exercising this dis‐

cretion); City and Cty. of S.F. v. Sheehan, 135 S. Ct. 1765, 1775 (2015) (same);

Mordi v. Zeigler, 770 F.3d 1161, 1165 (7th Cir. 2014) (same).

19 See also Reichle v. Howards, 132 S. Ct. 2088, 2093 (2012) (“[Pearson’s] ap‐

proach comports with our usual reluctance to decide constitutional ques‐

tions unnecessarily.”).

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No. 14‐1746 17

trative directive is no longer operable. Secondly, the appro‐

priate analysis for claims of detained individuals not subject

to sentences of incarceration is a difficult question, and it is

easy for an intermediate appellate tribunal to lose its footing

on the shifting sands of present‐day case authority. For a long

time, we have recognized that the treatment of a detained per‐

son not serving a sentence of incarceration is governed by the

Due Process Clause,20 but we often have borrowed Eighth

Amendment standards as a rule of decision.21 We also have

recognized, of course, that a person serving a sentence of pro‐

bation or parole has a limited liberty interest in his freedom

that cannot be curtailed without the procedural protections of

notice and hearing. See Gagnon v. Scarpelli, 411 U.S. 778, 782

(1973); Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U.S. 471, 482 (1972). Yet, when

confronted with the failure to release a person because of an

error in the computation of his sentence, we have relied on

                                                 

20 See Rice ex rel. Rice v. Corr. Med. Servs., 675 F.3d 650, 664 (7th Cir. 2012)

(holding that “[b]ecause Rice was a pretrial detainee, it is the due process

clause of the Fourteenth Amendment rather than the Eighth Amend‐

ment’s proscription against cruel and unusual punishment which is the

source of [his] right”); see also Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 535 (1979)

(“[C]onditions or restrictions of pretrial detention ... implicate only the

protection against deprivation of liberty without due process of law.”).

21 See Rice, 675 F.3d at 664 (noting that “courts still look to Eighth Amend‐

ment case law in addressing the claims of pretrial detainees, given that the

protections of the Fourteenth Amendment’s due process clause are at least

as broad as those that the Eighth Amendment affords to convicted prison‐

ers, and the Supreme Court has not yet determined just how much addi‐

tional protection the Fourteenth Amendment gives to pretrial detainees”

(citations omitted)).

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the principles of the Eighth Amendment. See Campbell v. Pe‐

ters, 256 F.3d 695 (7th Cir. 2001);22 Burke v. Johnston, 452 F.3d

665 (7th Cir. 2006).23 But cf. Armato v. Grounds, 766 F.3d 713

(7th Cir. 2014) (analyzing a similar problem under both

                                                 

22 In Campbell v. Peters, 256 F.3d 695 (7th Cir. 2001), Campbell had been

convicted of residential burglary and sentenced to a prison term and a

consecutive term of mandatory supervised release (“MSR”). Id. at 697.

While serving the MSR term, Campbell was arrested and convicted of un‐

lawful use of a weapon by a felon and sentenced to a two‐year prison term;

his burglary MSR was revoked. Id. Upon returning to prison, Campbell

committed several offenses thatresulted in revocation of the good conduct

credits he had earned while serving his burglary prison term. Id. at 697–

98. When Campbell eventually was released, he filed a § 1983 action claim‐

ing that his good conduct credits had been revoked improperly under Il‐

linois law, and, therefore, that he had been wrongfully detained beyond

his proper release date in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amend‐

ments. Id. at 699. As a general matter, we agreed with Campbell’s premise

that, “if through deliberate indifference to the requirements of state law

the correctional officials kept him imprisoned too long, his Eighth Amend‐

ment rights were violated.” Id. at 700. Nevertheless, we held that the de‐

fendants were entitled to qualified immunity because “it was not apparent

[at the time] that this kind of state law mistake rose to the level of an Eighth

Amendment violation.” Id. at 701. We did not consider the merits of

Campbell’s due process claim. Id. at 702.

23 In Burke v. Johnston, 452 F.3d 665 (7th Cir. 2006), Burke, who was incar‐

cerated, brought a § 1983 action claiming that Wisconsin’s deliberate in‐

difference to his requests for credit for time he had spent in jail resulted in

an unconstitutional prolonging of his incarceration. Id. at 668. Relying on

Campbell, “we agree[d] that incarceration after the time specified in a sen‐

tence has expired violates the Eighth Amendment if it is the product of

deliberate indifference.” Id. at 669. Ultimately, however, we remanded the

case without deciding whether Burke had prevailed on such a claim. Id. at

670.

Case: 14-1746 Document: 73 Filed: 09/01/2016 Pages: 39
No. 14‐1746 19

Eighth Amendment and procedural due process principles).24

Other circuits have employed a variety of approaches invok‐

ing Eighth Amendment and due process protections.25 Re‐

cently, however, the Supreme Court held that the treatment

                                                 

24 In Armato v. Grounds, 766 F.3d 713 (7th Cir. 2014), we rejected a consti‐

tutional challenge brought under circumstances that were somewhat sim‐

ilar to the present case. At issue in Armato was Illinois’ “turnaround prac‐

tice” of walking parole‐eligible inmates who lacked approved housing to

the prison gate, turning them around, and returning them to custody. See

Crayton v. Duncan, No. 15‐CV‐399‐NJR, 2015 WL 2207191, at *4 n.2 (S.D.

Ill. May 8, 2015) (describing turnaround practice); Brown v. Randle, No. 11

C 50193, 2014 WL 2533213, at *1 (N.D. Ill. June 5, 2014); Murdock v. Walker,

No. 08 C 1142, 2014 WL 916992, at *3–4 (N.D. Ill. Mar. 10, 2014). Armato

had been convicted of a sex offense in Illinois and sentenced to a prison

term but not to a term of MSR. 766 F.3d at 716. When he became eligible

for release, the administrator in charge of his file was under the impres‐

sion that state law required that his sentence include an MSR. Id. at 717.

She further believed “that when a previously‐convicted sex offender is re‐

leased from custody, he is subject to strict MSR conditions such as elec‐

tronic monitoring and a suitable host location approved by the IDOC.” Id.

Because no such housing could be located, the administrator decided that

Armato could not be released. Id. She then contacted several of her supe‐

riors, who told her that “the appropriate line of action would be to ‘violate

[Armato] at the door,’” a reference to the turnaround practice. Id. at 718 &

n.2 (alteration in original). In the meantime, another prison official con‐

tacted the Illinois Office of the Attorney General (“AG’s Office”) to request

an amended sentencing order that included an MSR term. Id. at 718. Ulti‐

mately, the AG’s Office decided not to seek an amended order, and Ar‐

mato was released. Id. at 719.

Armato then brought an action in federal court under § 1983, claiming

that his continued detention violated his Eighth Amendment and due pro‐

cess rights. Id. We held first that Armato’s Eighth Amendment claim failed

on the merits because he had not shown that his detention was the result

of deliberate indifference. Id. at 721. We also rejected Armato’s Fourteenth

Amendment claim, which we treated as a procedural due process claim.

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20 No. 14‐1746

of a pretrial prisoneris governed by the substantive standards

of the Due Process Clause. See Kingsley v. Hendrickson, 135

S. Ct. 2466, 2473 (2015). This conclusion seems compatible

with the Court’s earlier holding in McNeil v. Director, Patuxent

Institution, 407 U.S. 245 (1972), that the continued detention of

a person beyond the expiration of their prison sentence “vio‐

lates his rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.” Id. at 246.

But cf. Baker v. McCollan, 443 U.S. 137, 145 (1979) (holding that

“a detention of three days over a New Year’s weekend does

not and could not amount to” a “deprivation of liberty with‐

out due process of law”).  

                                                 

Id. at 721–22. We held that such a claim failed because “the processes un‐

dertaken by the defendants were sufficient to address Armato’s situation

and justify his prolonged detention.” Id. at 722. The defendants had con‐

tacted the AG’s Office to pursue an amendment to Armato’s sentence,

and, in any event, “Armato had numerous sufficient remedies available to

him in the state court including a writ of habeas corpus, a writ of manda‐

mus ... , and a claim of false imprisonment.” Id.  

25 See Scott v. Baldwin, 720 F.3d 1034, 1036 (8th Cir. 2013) (“Incarceration

beyond the termination of one’s sentence may state a claim under the due

process clause and the eighth amendment.” (internal quotation marks

omitted)); Sample v. Diecks, 885 F.2d 1099, 1107–18 (3d Cir. 1989) (analyzing

under both Eighth Amendment and procedural guarantees of Fourteenth

Amendment); Haygood v. Younger, 769 F.2d 1350, 1354–59 (9th Cir. 1985)

(same). Other courts, however, have expressed a preference to analyze

such claims under only the Due Process Clause. See Jones v. City of Jackson,

203 F.3d 875, 880 (5th Cir. 2000) (holding that plaintiff had failed to state

an Eighth Amendment claim because he was “complaining about the fact

of his incarceration rather than its conditions,” but recognizing a substan‐

tive claim under Due Process Clause); Shorts v. Bartholomew, 255 F.App’x

46, 51 (6th Cir. 2007) (“[W]hen a prisoner’s sentence has expired, he is en‐

titled to release. ... This liberty interest is most often attributed to the Due

Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.”).

Case: 14-1746 Document: 73 Filed: 09/01/2016 Pages: 39
No. 14‐1746 21

Another consideration further convinces us that we

should not attempt to reconcile these governing principles

here. Mr. Werner has presented the due process argument to

us solely as a matter of procedural due process, but we think

that Kingsley, McNeil, and Baker suggest that substantive due

process principles are implicated here. Rather than resolve

definitively that question in a case in which counsel has not

squarely raised the issue, we believe the proper course is to

focus on the second prong of the qualified immunity inquiry

and to determine whether the contours of the right involved

were clearly established at the time of the defendants’ ac‐

tions.26

A clearly established right is one that “is sufficiently clear

that any reasonable official would understand that his or her

actions violate that right, meaning that existing precedent

                                                 

26 In addition to his claims against those defendants personally involved

in his detention, Mr. Werner contends that his individual‐capacity claims

against the administrators responsible for AD 02‐10, Secretary Hamblin

(now Secretary Wall) and Division of Community Corrections Regional

Chief Snyder‐Spaar, were dismissed improperly during screening. In Chil‐

dress v. Walker, 787 F.3d 433 (7th Cir. 2015), we held that “[i]n the case of

those responsible for setting policy, liability willresult from the institution

of a policy that, when enforced, causes a constitutional deprivation.” Id. at

440 (internal quotation marks omitted). A plaintiff therefore states a claim

for relief against prison administrators responsible for a policy where the

plaintiff “alleges that prison administrators knew of th[e] practice and

knew that th[e] practice put at least some recently released prisoners in

jeopardy of losing their freedom, but nevertheless did not alter, change, or

otherwise intervene to prevent the harm.” Id. We thus consider Mr. Wer‐

ner’s claims as they apply to both the defendants personally involved in

his detention under AD 02‐10 and also those responsible for creating the

directive.

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22 No. 14‐1746

must have placed the statutory or constitutional question be‐

yond debate.” Zimmerman, 807 F.3d at 182 (citing Mullenix v.

Luna, 136 S. Ct. 305, 308 (2015)). “Put simply, qualified im‐

munity protects ‘all but the plainly incompetent or those who

knowingly violate the law.’” Mullenix, 136 S. Ct. at 308 (quot‐

ing Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341 (1986)). The Supreme

Court also has held that, in this context, legal rights cannot be

defined at a high level of generality. See, e.g., id. (“The dispos‐

itive question is whether the violative nature of particular con‐

duct is clearly established. This inquiry must be undertaken

in light of the specific context of the case, not as a broad general

proposition.” (first emphasis in original) (citation omitted) (in‐

ternal quotation marks omitted)). For the reasons set forth be‐

low, we conclude that a reasonable official would not have

known that detaining Mr. Werner pursuant to AD 02‐10 was

legally impermissible.

In conducting the clearly established inquiry, our first task

is to consider controlling Supreme Court and Seventh Circuit

precedent. Abbott v. Sangamon Cty., 705 F.3d 706, 731 (7th Cir.

2013). Our earlier discussion makes evident that the prece‐

dent of the Supreme Court and of our court certainly did not

provide adequate guidance to permit the defendants to un‐

derstand their responsibilities in the face of the tangle of over‐

lapping laws and regulations that Wisconsin had created.27

We therefore must “cast a wider net” and look to whether “all

relevant case law” demonstrates “such a clear trend ... that

we can say with fair assurance that the recognition of the right

by a controlling precedent was merely a question of time.” Id.

                                                 

27 See supra notes 20–24 and accompanying text.

Case: 14-1746 Document: 73 Filed: 09/01/2016 Pages: 39
No. 14‐1746 23

(internal quotation marks omitted).28 In this respect, Mr. Wer‐

ner identifies a line of Wisconsin state court decisions. In State

ex rel. Olson v. Litscher, 608 N.W.2d 425 (Wis. Ct. App. 2000),

Olson was serving a prison sentence for sexual assault and

reached his mandatory release date on March 2, 1999; the

DOC, however, had not located a residence for him. Id. at 426–

27. Consequently, Olson was transferred from a state peniten‐

tiary to a minimum security facility, at which point he filed a

petition for habeas relief on the ground “that his continued

incarceration past his statutorily mandated release date was

an unlawful restraint of his personal liberty.” Id. at 427. Ac‐

knowledging that the issue was a constitutional one dealing

                                                 

28 We are not alone in looking to trends in the decisional law of other ju‐

risdictions once we are satisfied that controlling precedent in our own cir‐

cuit does not clearly establish a particular legal right. See, e.g., Cox v. Glanz,

800 F.3d 1231, 1247 (10th Cir. 2015) (looking to “clearly established weight

of authority from other courts” (internal quotation marks omitted)); Mor‐

gan v. Swanson, 659 F.3d 359, 372 (5th Cir. 2011) (considering whether there

is “a robust consensus of persuasive authority” (internal quotation marks

omitted)); Bame v. Dillard, 637 F.3d 380, 384 (D.C. Cir. 2011) (looking to

“cases from other courts exhibiting a consensus view” (internal quotation

marks omitted)); Wilson v. City of Bos., 421 F.3d 45, 56 (1st Cir. 2005) (look‐

ing to “all available case law, including both federal cases outside our own

circuit, and state court decisions of the state wherein the officers operated”

(citations omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted)); Turner v. Ark. Ins.

Dep’t, 297 F.3d 751, 755 (8th Cir. 2002) (taking “a broad view of the concept

of clearly established law” that “look[s] to all available decisional law, in‐

cluding decisions from other courts, federal and state, when there is no

binding precedent in this circuit” (internal quotation marks omitted));

Trulock v. Freeh, 275 F.3d 391, 407 (4th Cir. 2001) (asking whether there is a

“consensus of cases of persuasive authority from other jurisdictions”) (in‐

ternal quotation marks omitted)).  

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24 No. 14‐1746

with personal liberty, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals con‐

cluded that the continued detention of Olson beyond his man‐

datory release date was not authorized: Wisconsin law pro‐

vided that “each inmate is entitled to mandatory release on

parole ... at two‐thirds of the sentence.” Id. (quoting Wis. Stat.

§ 302.11(1)). Although the court “realize[d] that it is difficult

for the DOC to find a neighborhood that will accept a paroled

sex offender in its midst,” the above statutory language con‐

vinced the court that “[w]hether or not a place has been found

for an inmate, he or she must be released on his or her man‐

datory release date.” Id. at 427–28. The court noted in closing

that there may be “a way for the state to more closely monitor

sex offenders for a time between mandatory release and

placement”; however, this was not the court’s responsibility

to determine. Id. at 428.29  

                                                 

29 State ex rel. Olson v. Litscher, 608 N.W.2d 425 (Wis. Ct. App. 2000), came

on the heels of a very similar decision by the Wisconsin Court of Appeals

in State ex rel. Woods v. Morgan, 591 N.W.2d 922 (Wis. Ct. App. 1999).

Woods had been convicted of, among other crimes, sexual assault, and he

was incarcerated at a state penitentiary. Id. at 923 & n.2. When Woods

reached his mandatory release date, he was transferred from the peniten‐

tiary to a minimum security facility. Id. at 923. Several days later, “Woods

made sexual overtures to [another] inmate.” Id. As a result, his parole was

revoked, and he was transferred back to the penitentiary. Id. Woods then

filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in state court, contending that

his right to due process of law had been violated. Id. He argued that alt‐

hough he had been transferred from the penitentiary to the minimum se‐

curity facility at the end of his sentence, he remained a prisoner and there‐

fore “was subject to prison inmate rules ... , not probation and parole reg‐

ulations.” Id. at 924. Thus, he argued, his conduct should “have carried an

administrative sanction or a loss of prison privileges, not revocation of pa‐

role.” Id. The Wisconsin Court of Appeals granted Woods’s petition, con‐

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No. 14‐1746 25

The Wisconsin Court of Appeals again considered this is‐

sue in Allen v. Guerrero, 688 N.W.2d 673 (Wis. Ct. App. 2004),

this time in the context of the Eighth Amendment. Allen, who

had been convicted of sexual assault, reached his mandatory

release date on January 4, 2000, but was unable to secure ap‐

propriate housing. Id. at 675–76. Instead of releasing Allen to

parole as required under Wis. Stat. § 302.11(1), he was trans‐

ferred to a minimum security facility and placed under the

supervision of parole agents. Id. at 676. Several months later,

the parole agents placed Allen on a “parole hold pending a

parole revocation hearing,” arrested him, and sent him back

to the state penitentiary. Id.30 An ALJ, however, concluded

that Allen could not have violated his parole because he had

never become a parolee. Id. Allen remained in custody, and

the DOC initiated a second parole‐revocation proceeding;

again, an ALJ held that revocation was inappropriate. Id. Al‐

len petitioned for habeas relief, which was granted, and he

was released to parole. Id.  

Allen then brought a § 1983 action claiming that his con‐

tinued incarceration beyond his mandatory release date vio‐

lated the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments, and the de‐

fendant prison officials raised qualified immunity as an af‐

firmative defense. Id. Relying in large part on our decision in

Campbell, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals held that Allen had

                                                 

cluding that because both the penitentiary and the minimum security fa‐

cility were state prisons, his status as a prisoner did not change when he

was initially transferred. Id. at 925. Because Woods never had attained pa‐

rolee status, his parole could not be revoked. Id.

30 The court’s opinion does not make clear why the agents initiated the

parole hold and revocation.  

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26 No. 14‐1746

made out an Eighth Amendment claim because the defend‐

ant’s commencement of a second parole‐revocation hearing

instead of releasing him on parole demonstrated “that they

were deliberately indifferent to his plight.” Id. at 678 (altera‐

tions omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted). Proceeding

to the second prong of the qualified immunity analysis, the

court explained that, after Olson, Wisconsin state law was

clear that “Allen was entitled to release on parole upon reach‐

ing his [mandatory release] date.” Id. at 679. Thus, “no rea‐

sonable public official could have believed that [Allen’s] con‐

tinued detention was constitutionally permissible.” Id. at 680.  

These cases, however, do not comprise a full picture of

Wisconsin’s legal landscape. In 2005, just one year after the

Wisconsin Court of Appeals decided Allen, and long before

the application of the directive here, the Wisconsin Supreme

Court decided State ex. rel. Riesch v. Schwarz, 692 N.W.2d 219

(Wis. 2005). Riesch was serving an eight‐year sentence for sex‐

ual assault; his mandatory release date was July 21, 1998. Id.

at 220. Riesch’s parole supervision rules, which he refused to

sign, “required [him] to avoid unlawful activity and conduct

that was not in the best interest of the public or his rehabilita‐

tion.” Id. at 221. Riesch’s parole agent also decided that, be‐

cause of the nature of his offense, Riesch “needed to reside at

an approved halfway house or residence”; again, Riesch re‐

fused to cooperate. Id. When Riesch reached his mandatory

release date, the DOC initiated a parole hold and transferred

him from state prison to a county jail. Id. A week later,

Riesch’s parole agent initiated a revocation proceeding, and

an ALJ revoked his parole. Id.

Riesch then filed a petition for writ of certiorari, in which

he claimed, relying on Olson, that the revocation of his parole

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No. 14‐1746 27

was unlawful because he was not released from physical cus‐

tody upon his mandatory release date and therefore was not

a parolee. Id. at 222–23. The Wisconsin Supreme Court disa‐

greed. It held that Riesch’s case was distinguishable from Ol‐

son because Riesch, in refusing to cooperate, had “violated the

conditions of his parole immediately and simultaneously

with his mandatory release date.” Id. at 223. Importantly, the

court also wrote:

The holding Riesch seeks today is a bright‐line

rule that elevates form over substance. He con‐

tends that inmates must always be released

from physical custody before any revocation is

commenced, regardless of whether they have

signed parole rules, complied with parole rules,

or cooperated with their agent. In essence, he is

asking for a ritual where the DOC releases un‐

cooperative inmates just outside the prison

walls on their mandatory release dates before

subsequently placing parole holds upon them.

...  

In the end, we are mindful that the DOC is not

free to hold inmates indefinitely for such prob‐

lems as failure to find suitable housing on its

part. Olson, 233 Wis.2d at 690, 608 N.W.2d 425.

However, we also recognize that the DOC has

substantial discretionary authority to develop

the rules and conditions for release. Macemon I,

208 Wis.2d at 597, 561 N.W.2d 779. Where in‐

mates violate these terms immediately and simulta‐

neously with their scheduled mandatory release

Case: 14-1746 Document: 73 Filed: 09/01/2016 Pages: 39
28 No. 14‐1746

dates, the DOC should be able to maintain continu‐

ous custody, even though that person’s status

changes from prisoner serving a sentence to a

parolee detained on a parole hold.  

Id. at 225–26 (emphasis added) (footnote omitted).

The Wisconsin Supreme Court’s reasoning in Riesch con‐

firms that Olson and Allen had not put the precise situation

addressed by AD 02‐10 “beyond debate” in Wisconsin. Ash‐

croft v. al‐Kidd, 563 U.S. 731, 741 (2011). Riesch marked the first

time that a Wisconsin court had focused on the inherent con‐

flict between a sex offender’s right to timely release to super‐

vision and the rules and restrictions governing that release.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court’s treatment of this dilemma

demonstrates that “the right’s contours were [not] sufficiently

definite that” the defendants in this case would have been on

notice that AD 02‐10’s procedure was unlawful. City and Cty.

of S.F. v. Sheehan, 135 S. Ct. 1765, 1774 (2015) (internal quota‐

tion marks omitted).  

Riesch made clear that the DOC’s inability to locate appro‐

priate housing does not afford it a blank check to detain in‐

definitely an individual set for release from imprisonment.

However, the Wisconsin Supreme Court was cognizant of the

practical difficulties that can arise when release itself conflicts

with the “substantial discretionary authority” that DOC has

“to develop the rules and conditions for releas[ing]” a person

to supervision. 692 N.W.2d at 225. Rather than prohibit abso‐

lutely the DOC from detaining individuals caught in this pre‐

dicament, Riesch endorsed a narrow exception: “Where in‐

mates violate these terms immediately and simultaneously

with their scheduled mandatory release dates, the DOC

should be able to maintain continuous custody.” Id.  

Case: 14-1746 Document: 73 Filed: 09/01/2016 Pages: 39
No. 14‐1746 29

Riesch therefore can be read plausibly as acknowledging

that, under Wisconsin law, the DOC may “maintain continu‐

ous custody” in the unique circumstance where release from

imprisonment to a lesser level of restraint would violate the

terms of release due to an inability to make practical arrange‐

ments for the implementation of that lesser restraint. Id. Here,

although Mr. Werner’s probation violation was not, in strict

terms, “immediate[] and simultaneous[],” it was, as a practi‐

cal matter, an imminent certainty. Id. And although his infrac‐

tion was not, like Riesch’s, the product of his recalcitrance, re‐

leasing Mr. Werner to probation equally would have “ele‐

vate[d] form over substance” to require “a ritual where the

DOC releases [noncompliant] inmates just outside the prison

walls on their mandatory release dates before subsequently”

detaining them. Id. To be sure, the length of deferral of release

from imprisonment in this case may well have been a fairly

aggressive reading of Riesch.

31 However, given the lack of clar‐

ity with respect to Riesch’s outer limits, “we cannot say that

only someone plainly incompetent or who knowingly vio‐

late[s] the law would have ... acted as [the defendants] did.”

                                                 

31 We note that Mr. Werner did have at least one alternative remedy avail‐

able to him throughout his detention under AD 02‐10. Under Wisconsin

Administrative Code DOC § 328.11 (now DOC § 328.12), Mr. Werner was

allowed to seek review of any “decision which affects [him] personally.”

Id. DOC § 328.11(3). Although this review process would not have permit‐

ted Mr. Werner to challenge the lawfulness of his detention directly, id.

DOC § 328.11(4)(b), it would have allowed him to challenge any of the

housing disapprovals underlying his detention, see Metcalf v. Donalds, No.

10‐C‐0615, 2012 WL 2050823, at *6 & n.1 (E.D. Wis. June 7, 2012) (noting

that the plaintiff “could have used the complaint process established by §

DOC 328.11 to challenge the decisions concerning his housing options”).

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30 No. 14‐1746

Mullenix, 136 S. Ct. at 310 (first alteration in original) (internal

quotation marks omitted).

Because clearly established law at the time would not have

notified the defendants in this case that the procedures set

forth in AD 02‐10 were unlawful, we conclude that they are

entitled to qualified immunity on Mr. Werner’s claims.

Conclusion

For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the judgment of the

district court.

AFFIRMED

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No. 14‐1746   31

HAMILTON, Circuit Judge, dissenting in part. I respectfully

dissent from my colleagues’ decision to grant qualified im‐

munity to the policy‐making defendants, Hamblin, Snyder

Spaar, and Symdon. They adopted and enforced Administra‐

tive Directive 02‐10. That policy was unconstitutional as ap‐

plied to someone like Werner, who had reached his manda‐

tory release date and who, through no fault of his own, was

unable to find housing that satisfied both local laws and state

parole officials. Pursuant to that policy, Werner spent 54

weeks in a county jail when that custody was clearly not au‐

thorized by state law. Werner was deprived of his liberty with‐

out due process of law.

This case presents an extreme version of a pervasive prob‐

lem in the criminal justice system. Recidivism is a serious

problem with many sex offenders. State and local govern‐

ments have enacted numerous restrictions on the activities,

employment, and housing of released sex offenders. Those re‐

strictions can make it difficult, and in some cases literally im‐

possible, for released offenders to live and work in compli‐

ance with all the laws that apply to them. See generally, e.g.,

Doe v. Snyder, — F.3d —, 2016 WL 4473231 (6th Cir. Aug. 25,

2016) (describing restrictions under Michigan law). In this

case, the problem was housing. Brown County, Wisconsin,

had, we are told, about fourteen separate ordinances restrict‐

ing released sex offenders.

For more than a year neither Werner nor anyone helping

him could find lawful and suitable housing for him. Werner

was kept in custody pursuant to the policy that the defend‐

ants adopted and enforced. That policy was unconstitutional

and contrary to state law even when it was issued in 2002.

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32 No. 14‐1746

To extend qualified immunity to these defendants,

though, the majority errs by relying upon a more recent deci‐

sion by the Wisconsin Supreme Court, State ex rel. Riesch v.

Schwarz, 692 N.W.2d 219 (Wis. 2005). As explained below, the

state court in Riesch took care to distinguish its decision from

cases like Werner’s, in which offenders who reach their re‐

lease dates are cooperative with efforts to supervise them.

Plaintiff Werner committed serious crimes and was pun‐

ished severely for them. As a plaintiff, he is singularly unsym‐

pathetic. He earned his designation as a “Special Bulletin No‐

tification” offender by committing multiple sex offenses

against children. Both during and after the period in question

here, he has repeatedly violated the law. He is now back in

prison after another crime. Nevertheless, the legal issues in

his case extend beyond Mr. Werner and his crimes.

Under the state law governing his conviction and punish‐

ment, when Werner reached his mandatory release date, he

was entitled to be released from custody, subject to conditions

of parole. As the majority opinion recounts, he was not re‐

leased but was instead locked up in a county jail. He was kept

in jail 148 out of 168 hours each week. The remaining 20 hours

he was allowed to leave the jail with a chaperone to accom‐

plish the nearly impossible job of finding housing that would

comply with all the local laws applicable to convicted sex of‐

fenders and with the state’s conditions of parole. More than a

year after his initial “release” to the county jail, he finally

found housing that satisfied all the criteria.

Werner’s continued custody in the county jail—and “cus‐

tody” is the only way to describe those 148 hours per week—

was not authorized by state law or by a court judgment after

Case: 14-1746 Document: 73 Filed: 09/01/2016 Pages: 39
No. 14‐1746 33

due process of law. He was quite simply deprived of his lib‐

erty without due process of law. Executive branch officials are

not authorized to lock people up indefinitely without prior

court authorization. The ability to seek a writ of habeas cor‐

pus later does not mean the initial deprivation occurs with

due process of law. And even a parolee, whose liberty is con‐

ditional and constrained, cannot have his parole revoked and

his liberty taken away without due process of law. Morrissey

v. Brewer, 408 U.S. 471 (1972); see also Atkins v. Chicago, 631

F.3d 823, 833–34 (7th Cir. 2011) (Hamilton, J., concurring in

judgment).

I recognize that the combination of local laws in Brown

County and the needs of effective parole supervision placed

the defendants at all levels of the Wisconsin parole system in

a tough spot. If they had faced Werner’s situation without

guidance from state law, a defense of qualified immunity

would have more merit. But the slate was not clean. Similar

problems had arisen before. The state courts had squarely re‐

jected the solution of keeping offenders like Werner in cus‐

tody past their mandatory release dates.

First came State ex rel. Woods v. Morgan, 591 N.W.2d 922

(Wis. App. 1999). Woods was a prisoner who reached his

mandatory release date. Instead of being released, he was

transferred to another correctional center. Four days later, he

made sexual overtures toward an inmate at that new facility,

and his parole was revoked. Woods petitioned for a writ of

habeas corpus. He argued that he could not have his parole

properly revoked because he had never actually been paroled.

The Wisconsin Court of Appeals agreed, relying on the fact

that Woods had been transferred to a different state prison.

He was still deemed a prisoner, not a parolee, even though he

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34 No. 14‐1746

had been held past his mandatory release date. Id. at 925. In

other words, continued confinement in a state prison was not

authorized for a parolee. There was no indication in the rec‐

ord why Woods had not been released on his mandatory re‐

lease date.

The next year came State ex rel. Olson v. Litscher, 608

N.W.2d 425 (Wis. App. 2000), which is the decision most in‐

structive for this case. Like plaintiff Werner, Olson reached his

release date, but he was not released because the Department

of Corrections was unable to locate a suitable residence for

him on parole. He was instead transferred to another state

correctional facility. The court held that the State had “no au‐

thority to hold an inmate in custody beyond his or her man‐

datory release date, regardless of whether departmental ef‐

forts have secured a residence for the inmate. Id. at 426. The

court explained: “We realize that it is difficult for the DOC to

find a neighborhood that will accept a paroled sex offender in

its midst. But there is no gray area in the statute—it is crystal

clear. Our job is to apply the statute as it is written. Whether or

not a place has been found for an inmate, he or she must be released

on his or her mandatory release date.” Id. at 427–28 (emphasis

added).

As with Woods, “there was no indication that Olson had

done anything to warrant continuous custody at that time.”

Riesch, 692 N.W.2d at 224 (summarizing Olson). The State even

conceded that Olson had been entitled to release, and no stat‐

ute or administrative rule authorized the State to detain him

past that time.  

Then, to bring the point even closer to this civil case for

damages, in Allen v. Guerrero, 688 N.W.2d 673 (Wis. App.

2004), another inmate was held past his mandatory release

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No. 14‐1746 35

date. The State and Allen had been unable to find suitable

housing for him by his mandatory release date. Correctional

officials moved Allen to a minimum security prison under the

supervision of parole agents. State officials twice tried to re‐

voke this unusual form of “parole,” and twice the courts or‐

dered his release. Allen spent all of 2000 in continuous state

custody past his mandatory release date of January 4, 2000.

He was not released until January 2001.

Allen then sued the state correctional officials in state

court under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 alleging violation of his due pro‐

cess and Eighth Amendment rights. The Wisconsin Court of

Appeals held not only that Allen had stated a claim for viola‐

tion of his constitutional rights but that the violation was so

clearly established that defendants were not entitled to quali‐

fied immunity: “We agree with Allen that Woods and Olson

clearly established” that Allen was entitled to release on pa‐

role on his mandatory release date. 688 N.W.2d at 679.

The Allen court then rejected a further qualified immunity

argument that is echoed in this case. The argument is that be‐

cause some cases found unauthorized continued custody vi‐

olated the Eighth Amendment while others found it violated

the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, the

controlling law was not “clearly established.” The Wisconsin

Court of Appeals correctly found in Allen that the unlawful‐

ness of the continued custody was clearly established in 2000

despite doctrinal arguments about whether it violated one or

both amendments. The application of two basic liberties does

not weaken the case. It strengthens it. The Allen court con‐

cluded, as we should, “that no reasonable public official could

have believed that such continued detention was constitution‐

ally permissible.” Id. at 681.

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36 No. 14‐1746

The qualified immunity presents an unusual wrinkle here.

Qualified immunity doctrine often indulges in the legal fic‐

tion of assuming that official defendants are aware of appli‐

cable court decisions. Here, there was no fiction at all. The pol‐

icy‐making defendants issued AD 02‐10 after both Woods and

Olson had been decided. The policy even cited both decisions,

yet purported to authorize continued custody in the teeth of

those decisions.

To avoid reversing the judgment for the policy‐making de‐

fendants, the majority invokes qualified immunity based on

the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s 2005 decision in Riesch, 692

N.W.2d 219, or, more precisely, based on what the majority

generously calls “a fairly aggressive reading” of Riesch. A

qualified immunity defense is supposed to be based upon ob‐

jectively reasonable interpretations of existing law. E.g., Hafer

v. Melo, 502 U.S. 21, 25 (1991); Kentucky v. Graham, 473 U.S. 159,

166‐67 (1985); Harrell v. Cook, 169 F.3d 428, 431 (7th Cir. 1999).

Using Riesch as a qualified immunity lifeline for the policy‐

making defendants is not objectively reasonable. The majority

first overlooks the critical distinction drawn by the Riesch

court itself and then attributes to the Wisconsin Supreme

Court in Riesch an internal contradiction and confusion that

simply are not present. In fact, Riesch expressly agreed with

Woods and Olson and took care to distinguish Riesch’s case on

grounds that apply directly here. It is no surprise that neither

the district court nor the defendants, in their brief to this court

or in letters to plaintiff, relied on Riesch to justify qualified im‐

munity.

Like Werner, Riesch was a sex offender who was nearing

his mandatory release date. Unlike Werner, though, Riesch

did not cooperate with the release and supervision process.

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No. 14‐1746 37

He announced that he would not participate in the sex of‐

fender treatment program that was required as a condition of

parole. He refused to provide medical information or his sig‐

nature on his fingerprint record. His behavior was such that

the assigned parole agent was unwilling to meet with him un‐

less he were shackled, and he refused. Riesch had his parole

revoked without ever actually leaving state custody. In his

challenge to the revocation, he relied on Woods and Olson to

argue that he had never actually been paroled, so that his pa‐

role could not be revoked and he should be released.  

The Wisconsin Supreme Court affirmed the denial of re‐

lief, but on narrow grounds that distinguished both Woods

and Olson on grounds that apply directly here. The Riesch

court explained: “Woods and Olson are unlike the present case

because the inmates in those cases did nothing to warrant their

continued detention at the time of their mandatory release date. In

contrast, the inmate in the Macemon cases, like Riesch, vio‐

lated the conditions of his parole immediately and simultane‐

ously with his mandatory release date.” 692 N.W.2d at 223

(emphasis added). The Riesch court went on to explain the dif‐

ference with Olson:

In Olson, the inmate petitioned the court of ap‐

peals for writ of habeas corpus after he was de‐

tained past his mandatory release date. Olson

had been transferred from one correctional fa‐

cility to another on his release date because the

DOC was unable to locate a suitable residence

for him. Again [as in Woods], there was no indi‐

cation that Olson had done anything to warrant

the continuous custody at that time. Accord‐

ingly, the State conceded that he was entitled to

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38 No. 14‐1746

release when he reached his mandatory release

date and that no statute or administrative rule

authorized the DOC to detain him past that

point. The court of appeals agreed. Olson, 233

Wis.2d 685, ¶ 1, 608 N.W.2d 425.

692 N.W.2d at 224. The Riesch court continued: “Unlike the in‐

mates in Woods and Olson, Riesch engaged in conduct that

warranted custody at the time of his mandatory release date,”

by refusing to cooperate with his social worker in arranging

for a suitable residence. Id. Riesch was not entitled to relief

because he had “stubbornly refused to cooperate with the de‐

partment’s efforts to implement a suitable supervision plan,”

and he was “totally rejecting active supervision.” Id., quoting

administrative decision.

The Riesch court concluded:

In the end, we are mindful that the DOC is not

free to hold inmates indefinitely for such prob‐

lems as failure to find suitable housing on its

part. Olson, 233 Wis.2d at 690. However, we also

recognize that the DOC has substantial discre‐

tionary authority to develop the rules and con‐

ditions for release. Macemon. Where inmates vi‐

olate these terms immediately and simultane‐

ously with their scheduled mandatory release

dates, the DOC should be able to maintain con‐

tinuous custody, even though that person’s sta‐

tus changes from a prisoner serving a sentence

to a parolee detained on a parole hold.  

Id. at 225. The Riesch court rejected a highly formalistic rule

advocated by Riesch, but it did not disagree with Woods or

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No. 14‐1746 39

Olson, nor did it purport to authorize the continued custody

of a parolee who was not deliberately violating the terms of

his parole.

Yet the defendants’ policy, AD 02‐10, purported to author‐

ize exactly such continued custody. At least after Woods, Ol‐

son, and Allen, and certainly in light of the distinction drawn

in Riesch, reasonable policy‐making officials could not have

believed that they were authorized to keep offenders like

Werner in jail after their mandatory release dates. Instead,

they doggedly stuck to the policy, even telling Werner that

“Case law upholds the procedures” of AD 02‐10, without

identifying the case law. Dkt. 113‐1, at 82 (Feb. 16, 2010 letter

from defendant Snyder Spaar to plaintiff Werner).

The policy‐making defendants should have known that

AD 02‐10 would result in unconstitutional deprivations of lib‐

erty in cases like Werner’s, where the parolee did not deliber‐

ately fail to comply with parole conditions. I would allow the

qualified immunity defense for the local parole agents and

their supervisors who had been ordered to implement AD 02‐

10, but we should reverse for trial on the claims against the

policy‐making defendants.

   

  

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