Opinion ID: 590886
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: mandatory parolee's interest in freedom from antipsychotic drugs

Text: 40 If Mr. Felce has a liberty interest in being free from antipsychotic drugs while in a mandatory parole status, that liberty interest must be found, as we have previously noted, in either state law or in the Due Process Clause itself. See Hewitt v. Helms, 459 U.S. at 466, 103 S.Ct. at 868-69. When we turn to state law, we find an unexplainable void in an otherwise comprehensive state regulation of involuntary treatment with antipsychotic drugs. Even a casual reading of the applicable Wisconsin statutes and administrative code sections makes it clear that Wisconsin, as a matter of public policy, has approached the issue of the involuntary use of these mind-altering drugs with great caution. While the Wisconsin Attorney General suggests that this void indicates legislative-administrative acquiescence in giving corrections authorities very broad discretion in the parole situation, that bare assertion has a hollow ring when made against the backdrop of Wisconsin's policy choices in every other situation. Indeed, we note that, in its prison regulations, the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, which also administers the parole system, pointedly notes that the department considers involuntary treatment for mental illness of adult inmates to be the form of treatment of last resort. Wis.Admin.Code § DOC 314.01. 41 We are skeptical of the assertion that Wisconsin has given its corrections authorities a free hand with respect to antipsychotic drug therapy as a condition of parole while having restricted it drastically with respect to inmates. Nonetheless, the absence of state law and regulation with respect to parole makes it impossible for us to agree with Mr. Felce that Wisconsin has given mandatory parolees a liberty interest in avoiding antipsychotic drug therapy. While Wisconsin authorities may fill this gaping hole in its regulatory structure, we must, absent such action by the state, rest our decision on the strictures of the Due Process Clause, as recognized by the Supreme Court in Harper and Riggins. 42 We believe that Harper and Riggins make it clear that there is a liberty interest in not being subjected involuntarily to the administration of such drugs except when there is an overriding justification for their use and a determination of medical appropriateness. Riggins, --- U.S. at ----, 112 S.Ct. at 1815. Therefore, we conclude that a parolee has a liberty interest in being free from the involuntary use of such drugs, although, as we shall detail below, that is not an unqualified one. 43