Opinion ID: 447530
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: the liberty interest claim against the department

Text: 32 A motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted is generally viewed with disfavor and rarely granted. See 2A Moore's Federal Practice Sec. 12.08 (2d ed. 1948 & Supp.1984). For the purposes of such a motion, the factual allegations of the complaint must be taken as true, and any ambiguities or doubts concerning the sufficiency of the claim must be resolved in favor of the pleader. See Scheuer v. Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 236, 94 S.Ct. 1683, 1686, 40 L.Ed.2d 90 (1979); Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46, 78 S.Ct. 99, 101-102, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957); Sinclair v. Kleindienst, 711 F.2d 291, 293 (D.C.Cir.1983); Riegle v. Federal Open Market Committee, 656 F.2d 873, 877 (D.C.Cir.), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 1082, 102 S.Ct. 636, 70 L.Ed.2d 616 (1981); Shear v. National Rifle Ass'n of America, 606 F.2d 1251, 1253 (D.C.Cir.1979). In particular, a complaint should not be dismissed for failure to state a claim unless it appears beyond a doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his [or her] claim which would entitle him [or her] to relief. Conley, 355 U.S. at 45-46, 78 S.Ct. at 101-02; see Hughes v. Rowe, 449 U.S. 5, 10, 101 S.Ct. 173, 176, 66 L.Ed.2d 163 (1980). 33 The district court dismissed Doe's claim that the Department violated her fifth amendment interest in reputation for failure to state a claim solely on the ground that Doe did not seek the appropriate remedy. See Opinion at 1096-97. We now vacate this aspect of the district court's Rule 12 dismissal. We further hold that Doe's discharge amidst allegations of unprofessionalism implicates a constitutionally protected liberty interest in reputation and that, if those allegations were publicly disclosed, she is entitled to an opportunity to clear her name.
34 The district court did not reject Doe's version of the Department's actions which, she argues, deprived her of a liberty interest in reputation without due process. Instead, the court concluded that, if her professional reputation was stigmatized by the discharge, the well-settled remedy mandated by the Due Process Clause of the [Fifth] Amendment is an 'opportunity to refute the charge.'  Codd v. Velger, 429 U.S. 624, 627, 97 S.Ct. 882, 884, 51 L.Ed.2d 92 (1977) (quoting Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 573, 92 S.Ct. 2701, 2707, 33 L.Ed.2d 548 (1971)); see Opinion at 5. This conclusion is unassailable. Doe's liberty interest implicates her post-employment reputation rather than any right to continued employment with the Department; if Doe can demonstrate that the DOJ harmed her professional standing without providing the proper procedural protections, her remedy is a name-clearing hearing. See Codd, 429 U.S. at 627, 97 S.Ct. at 884; Roth, 408 U.S. at 573, 92 S.Ct. at 2707; Wehner v. Levi, 562 F.2d 1276, 1279 (D.C.Cir.1977); Campbell v. Pierce County, 741 F.2d 1342, 1344 (11th Cir.1984); In Re Selcraig, 705 F.2d 789 (5th Cir.1983); Dennis v. S & S Consolidated Rural High School Dist., 577 F.2d 338, 344 (5th Cir.1978) (The purpose of the due process hearing to which [the plaintiff] was entitled was not to afford an opportunity to recapture his previous employment but simply to clear his name.); Harper v. Blumenthal, 478 F.Supp. 176, 177 (D.D.C.1979). 35 Despite its apparent conclusion that Doe had alleged facts sufficient to entitle her to a Codd hearing, however, the district court dismissed the plaintiff's liberty interest claim against the Department. 36 Plaintiff does not allege that she ever requested a hearing to clear her name and does not seek one by this complaint. Absent a denial of such a request no violation of due process can be demonstrated, Arnett [v. Kennedy, 416 U.S. 134,] 157 [94 S.Ct. 1633, 1645,] [ (1974) ] (Rehnquist, J.), and plaintiff's complaint must fail as a matter of law. 37 Opinion at 6. 10 We find this statement an insufficient ground for dismissal for two reasons. First, the district court evidently concluded that Doe never requested a hearing to clear her name from the Department. The pleading discloses no basis for this conclusion. Indeed, Doe's complaint explicitly states that she requested a hearing and an opportunity to present favorable evidence [to Department officials] showing that the alleged incidents of misconduct were not true .... Plaintiff's Complaint p 24, J.A. at 19. Taken as a whole, moreover, the complaint certainly avers that the plaintiff sought, but was systematically denied, an opportunity to address the charges that resulted in her dismissal and stigmatized her professional reputation. The district court was obliged to accept these allegations as true for the purposes of a Rule 12(b)(6) motion. 38 Second, the district court assumed that the claim must be dismissed because Doe's complaint did not explicitly seek a name-clearing hearing. See Brief for Appellees at 30-31 (urging this interpretation of the district court's holding). Yet there can be little doubt that the thrust of Doe's complaint is that the Department's allegations and the discharge have damaged her professional reputation and that she has never been given an opportunity to refute the charges in any orderly way. Her complaint clearly indicates that she sought some kind of hearing from the Department, see Plaintiff's Complaint paragraphs 24, 28, J.A. 9, 12, and her prayer for relief seeks such other and further relief as the court may deem necessary and appropriate. Plaintiff's Prayer for Relief p 3, J.A. at 16. Courts are traditionally encouraged to adjudicate the basic legal claim, even where the plaintiff has failed to seek the precisely correct relief but has instead relied on a general request for other appropriate relief. See e.g., Pickus v. United States Board of Parole, 507 F.2d 1107, 1110 (D.C.Cir.1974); cf. Fed.R.Civ.P. 54(c) (every final judgment shall grant the relief to which the party in whose favor it is rendered is entitled, even if the party has not demanded such relief in his pleadings.) The liberal reading of complaints required under Rule 12(b)(6) thus minimally requires that Doe be permitted to amend her complaint in order to seek a Codd hearing. See generally 5 C. Wright & A. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure Sec. 1357 (1969 & Supp.1983) (collecting cases); 2A Moore's Federal Practice p 12.08 (2d ed. 1948 & Supp.1984) (same). 39 Moreover, it need not appear that the plaintiff can obtain the specific relief demanded as long as the court can ascertain from the face of the complaint that some relief can be granted. See 5 Wright & Miller Sec. 1357 at 602 & n. 77. 40 When a motion to dismiss a complaint is made, ... the clear and long-accepted meaning [of Rules 54(c) and 12] is that a complaint should not be dismissed for legal insufficiency except where there is failure to state a claim on which some relief, not limited by the request in the complaint, can be granted. 41 Norwalk CORE v. Norwalk Redevelopment Agency, 395 F.2d 920, 926 (2d Cir.1968) (footnote omitted) (emphasis in original); see Kahan v. Rosenstiel, 424 F.2d 161, 174 (3d Cir.), cert. denied, 398 U.S. 950, 90 S.Ct. 1870, 26 L.Ed.2d 290 (1970); Logan v. General Fireproofing Co., 521 F.2d 881, 884 n. 3 (4th Cir.1971); Sapp v. Renfroe, 511 F.2d 172, 176 n. 3 (5th Cir.1975). A district court should not grant a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss for failure to seek the technically appropriate remedy when the availability of some relief is readily apparent on the face of the complaint. 11 42 Here, the complaint and the motion for dismissal clearly demonstrated that Doe could prove a set of facts that would entitle her to some form of relief--namely a hearing to clear her name. The proper course of action at that point was to grant the plaintiff leave to amend her complaint in order to seek such a hearing or to read such a hearing request into the prayer for other appropriate relief. We therefore vacate the district court's dismissal of Doe's reputational liberty interest claim against the Department for failure to seek the appropriate remedy.
43 By dismissing Doe's liberty interest claim against the Department on technical grounds, the district court avoided the prickly question of whether the DOJ's actions infringed Doe's constitutionally protected liberty interest in professional reputation. Taking the plaintiff's factual allegations as true, we now find that the stigmatizing nature of the Department's charges, her discharge, and the subsequent foreclosure of future employment opportunities, including government job opportunities, combined to deprive Doe of a constitutionally protected liberty interest in reputation without due process. 12 The district court rightly noted that: 44 A government employee's liberty interests are implicated where in terminating the employee the government make[s] any charge against him that might seriously damage his standing and associations in the community or impose[s] on him a stigma or other disability that foreclose[s] his freedom to take advantage of other employment opportunities. Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 573, 92 S.Ct. 2701, 2707, 33 L.Ed.2d 548 (1972). 45 Opinion at 5; see also Bishop v. Wood, 426 U.S. 341, 348-49, 96 S.Ct. 2074, 2079-80, 48 L.Ed.2d 684 (1967). In Roth, the Court ruled that the mere failure to rehire a non-tenured teacher did not carry such a stigma. But the Roth Court observed that an individual's liberty interest is impaired when the government acts to injure his or her good name, reputation, honor or integrity, or imposes a stigma that effectively forecloses his or her future employment opportunities. See Roth, 408 U.S. at 573, 92 S.Ct. at 2707. In Paul v. Davis, 424 U.S. 693, 96 S.Ct. 1155, 47 L.Ed.2d 405 (1976), the Court went on to require some tangible alteration of a status--in addition to an injury to reputation--before a liberty interest will be recognized. We conclude that Doe states a claim under the fifth amendment because her discharge from the Department and her effective loss of future government employment opportunities constitute the tangible alteration of a governmental status required by Paul, and the Department's charges of unprofessionalism and dishonesty impose the type of stigma recognized by Roth. 46 First, Doe does not present the reputation alone case precluded by Paul. In Paul, the plaintiff challenged the circulation by local police of a flyer describing active shoplifters bearing the plaintiff's name and picture. The Court held that the plaintiff's charge that the flyer had defamed him, standing alone and apart from any other governmental action with respect to him, did not state a claim for relief under section 1983, see 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983, and the fourteenth amendment. See Paul, 424 U.S. at 694, 96 S.Ct. at 1157. 13 After reviewing its prior stigma jurisprudence, the Court rejected the position that every government defamation infringes a constitutionally recognized liberty interest: 47 In each of these cases, as a result of the state action complained of, a right or status previously recognized by state law was distinctly altered or extinguished. It was this alteration, officially removing the interest from the recognition and protection previously afforded by the State, which we found sufficient to invoke the procedural guarantees contained in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. But the interest in reputation alone which respondent seeks to vindicate in this action in federal court is quite different from the liberty or property recognized in those decisions. 48 Id. at 711, 96 S.Ct. at 1165. 49 Instead, the Court indicated that a constitutionally recognized liberty interest depends on the existence of a special, tangible relationship between the government and the individual in specific contexts. A property interest explicitly created and protected by independent state or federal law undoubtedly creates such a relationship and satisfies the threshold aspect of this reputation plus standard. See id. at 711-12, 96 S.Ct. at 1165-66. The Paul court, however, clearly indicated that the other governmental action, id. at 699, 96 S.Ct. at 1159, required to satisfy the plus in this formula also includes a loss of government employment or a foreclosure of future government employment opportunities. 50 While we have in a number of our prior cases pointed out the frequently drastic effect of the stigma which may result from defamation from the government in a variety of contexts this line of cases does not establish the proposition that reputation alone, apart from some more tangible interest such as employment, is either liberty or property by itself sufficient to invoke the procedural protection of the Due Process Clause. 51 Id. at 701, 96 S.Ct. at 1160-61 (emphasis added); see also id. at 705, 96 S.Ct. at 1163 (noting that protected liberty interests are implicated  'where government action has operated to bestow [stigma] with an attendant foreclosure from other employment opportunity.' ) (quoting Cafeteria & Restaurant Workers v. McElroy, 367 U.S. 886, 898, 81 S.Ct. 1743, 1750, 6 L.Ed.2d 1230) (emphasis added by the Paul court); id. at 706, 96 S.Ct. at 1163 ([T]he Court has never held that the mere defamation of an individual ... was sufficient to invoke the guarantees of procedural due process absent an accompanying loss of government employment.) (emphasis added) (footnote omitted). 52 This reading of the reputation plus standard is also inescapable in light of the Paul Court's treatment of Roth v. Board of Regents. Although the government employee in Roth plainly did not enjoy any property or quasi-property interest in continued employment, see Roth, 408 U.S. at 578, 92 S.Ct. at 2709, the Roth Court indicated that the employee would have stated a liberty interest claim had the state sufficiently stigmatized him. See id. at 573, 92 S.Ct. at 2707; see also infra note 21. The Paul court expressly reaffirmed this dictum, emphasizing that government defamation accompanied by the loss of government employment would support a liberty interest claim. 53 While Roth recognized that governmental action defaming an individual in the course of declining to rehire him could entitle the person to notice and an opportunity to be heard as to the defamation, its language is quite inconsistent with any notion that a defamation perpetrated by a government official but unconnected with any refusal to rehire would be actionable under the Fourteenth Amendment: 54 The state in declining to rehire the respondent, did not make any charge against him that might seriously damage his standing and association in his community .... 55 Similarly, there is no suggestion that the State, in declining to re-employ the respondent, imposed on him a stigma or other disability that foreclosed his freedom to take advantage of other employment opportunities. 56 Thus, it was not thought sufficient to establish a claim under Sec. 1983 and the Fourteenth Amendment that there simply be defamation by a state official; the defamation had to occur in the course of the termination of employment. 57 Paul, 424 U.S. at 709, 96 S.Ct. at 1164-65 (emphasis added) (quoting Roth, 408 U.S. at 573, 92 S.Ct. at 2707 (emphasis added by the Paul court)). In other words, Paul explicitly recognized that the combination of government defamation plus the failure to rehire or the discharge of a government employee states a liberty interest claim even if the discharge itself deprives the employee of no property interest protected by the fifth or fourteenth amendments. As the Seventh Circuit has put it, [i]t is the individual's status as a government employee and not his property interest in continued employment which furnishes the 'plus' that raises reputation to the level of a constitutionally protected liberty interest. Dennis v. S. & S. Consolidated Rural High School Dist., 577 F.2d 338, 343 (5th Cir.1978); see Colaizzi v. Walker, 542 F.2d 969, 972-73 (7th Cir.1976) (same), cert. denied, 430 U.S. 960, 97 S.Ct. 1610, 51 L.Ed.2d 811 (1977); see also infra note 18 (collecting cases). 58 In Owen v. City of Independence, 445 U.S. 622, 100 S.Ct. 1398, 63 L.Ed.2d 673 (1979), moreover, the Supreme Court unmistakeably indicated that Paul does not bar a liberty interest claim by a discharged government employee who does not enjoy a property right to continued employment. In Owen, a nontenured city employee brought a liberty interest claim against the city and various city officials after he was discharged amidst stigmatizing allegations of impropriety. The Owen plaintiff did not enjoy any property interest in continued employment or any procedural protection from an at-will discharge. See id. at 630 n. 10, 631, 100 S.Ct. at 1405 n. 10. 14 Nonetheless, the Court found no merit in the government's contention that the employer could not state a claim under the liberty clause. 59 Wisconsin v. Constantineau, 400 U.S. 433, 437 [91 S.Ct. 507, 510, 27 L.Ed.2d 515] (1971), held that [w]here a person's good name, reputation, honor, or integrity is at stake because of what the government is doing to him, notice and an opportunity to be heard are essential. In Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 573 [92 S.Ct. 2701, 2707, 33 L.Ed.2d 548] (1972), we explained that the dismissal of a government employee accompanied by a charge against him that might seriously damage his standing and associations in his community would qualify as something the government is doing to him, so as to trigger the due process right to a hearing at which the employee could refute the charges and publicly clear his name. In the present case, the [city's] accusations received extensive coverage in the press and even if they did not in point of fact cause petitioner's discharge, the defamatory and stigmatizing charges certainly occur[red] in the course of the termination of employment. Cf. Paul v. Davis, 424 U.S. 693, 710 [96 S.Ct. 1155, 1165, 47 L.Ed.2d 405] (1976). Yet the city twice refused petitioner's request that he be given written specification of the charges against him and an opportunity to clear his name. Under the circumstances, we have no doubt that the Court of Appeals correctly concluded that the city's actions deprived petitioner of liberty without due process of law. 60 Id. at 633 n. 13, 100 S.Ct. 1406 n. 13 (emphasis added). 15 61 This circuit, in turn, has consistently interpreted Paul 's stigma plus test to require two forms of government action before a plaintiff can transform a [common law] defamation into a [constitutional] deprivation of liberty. Mosrie v. Barry, 718 F.2d 1151, 1161-62 (D.C.Cir.1983). First, the government must be the source of the defamatory allegations. See id. at 1161. Second, the resulting stigma must involve some tangible change of status vis-avis the government. As the Mosrie court explained: 62 [T]he principal recent cases from this court in which a government-imposed stigma was found to have deprived the stigmatized person of a liberty interest involved either loss of employment or foreclosure of a right to be considered for government contracts in common with all other persons. 63 Id. at 1161 (emphasis added). In Mosrie, moreover, we expressly recognized that a discharge from government employment satisfies Paul's reputation plus requirement regardless of whether the employee can point to any independent property interest in continued employment. For a defamation to give rise to a right to procedural due process, it is necessary--we need not say when it is sufficient--that the defamation be accompanied by a discharge from government employment or at least a demotion in rank and pay. Id. at 1161 (emphasis added). 16 Although the Mosrie plaintiff could not meet this requirement, we clearly indicated that Paul does not bar a defamation suit by a discharged government employee. 64 The harms suffered by appellant in this case do not meet the Paul v. Davis requirement of loss of a government position or change in legal status. Appellant was merely transferred laterally, not discharged from government employment or demoted in rank and pay. To find the lateral transfer a deprivation of liberty would be inconsistent with Paul v. Davis's repeated emphasis on loss of government employment, and, in particular, with its reading of Roth as requiring a termination of employment. 65 Id. (emphasis added); see also id. at 1162 ([A]n actual loss of employment or change of legal status [is] sufficient to qualify as a deprivation of liberty when accompanied by stigmatizing remarks.) (emphasis added). 66 In Conset Corporation v. Community Services Administration, 655 F.2d 1291 (D.C.Cir.1981), and Old Dominion Dairy Products, Inc. v. Secretary of Defense, 631 F.2d 953 (D.C.Cir.1980), we likewise indicated that government defamation accompanied by an effective foreclosure of the ability to seek future government employment on the same terms as other similarly situated applicants satisfies Paul 's reputation plus standard, notwithstanding the absence of any property interest or independent legal right to future government employment or contracts. See Conset, 655 F.2d at 1295-98 (government contractor states liberty interest claim under Paul despite its lack of an independent property interest); Old Dominion Dairy, 631 F.2d at 964-66 ([I]t is clear that the opinion in Paul v. Davis supports the [plaintiff's] claim in this case. For ... it is precisely the 'accompanying loss of government employment' and the 'foreclosure from other employment opportunity' which is the injury resulting from the government defamation ....); see generally Mosrie, 728 F.2d at 1161 (noting that Conset and Old Dominion Dairy illustrate the meaning of the Paul v. Davis conception of liberty). 17 67 On the record before us, we have no difficulty concluding that Doe's liberty interest claim satisfies the Paul v. Davis standard as interpreted by the Supreme Court and this circuit. Doe was discharged from government employment amidst stigmatizing allegations which have effectively foreclosed future employment opportunities with the government as well as private employers. 18 68 The Department nonetheless argues that Doe's complaint does not state a claim under the liberty clause, apparently relying on Roth 's holding that the government's failure to rehire an employee does not by itself impose a constitutionally recognized stigma. Conceding that her discharge might vaguely handicap her future employment opportunities, the DOJ contends that every termination makes an employee less attractive to prospective employers and that more than a mere impediment to finding new employment is required for a deprivation of a liberty interest. See Brief for Appellees at 26-27. In effect, the Department argues that although the allegations of unprofessionalism and dishonesty were responsible for the plaintiff's loss of her government job, the DOJ has not significantly harmed Doe's professional reputation. It urges that we read into the Paul-Roth standard a third threshold requirement: the plaintiff must allege not simply the harm attendant upon a discharge for misconduct, but an additional and more substantial injury to reputation. 69 In support of this argument, the Department points to this court's holding in Mazaleski v. Treusdell, 562 F.2d 701 (1977), that a federal employee could not, under the particular facts alleged, prove a deprivation of liberty when he was discharged for substandard work. See id. at 714. The Mazaleski court reasoned that because all involuntary terminations adversely affect future employment, bare discharge was not enough to make out a constitutional action absent some specific stigma. See id. at 713. The plaintiff in this case, however, was not simply discharged for unspecified reasons; she was instead terminated for unprofessional conduct and dishonesty. She alleges that the public dissemination of those charges--not the mere fact of her termination--has stigmatized her professional reputation and foreclosed future employment opportunities. The Mazaleski court itself recognized that charges of dishonesty leading to dismissal--like the charges of disloyalty involved in several Supreme Court cases 19 --infringe a government employee's protected liberty interests in professional reputation. See id. at 714 & n. 37. And Roth likewise indicated that a termination amidst charges of dishonesty infringes reputational interests protected by the liberty clause. See Roth, 408 U.S. at 573, 92 S.Ct. at 2707; see also Owen, 445 U.S. at 633 n. 13, 100 S.Ct. at 1406 n. 13. 70 Indeed, this circuit has consistently held that government allegations akin to those involved in this case infringe protected liberty interests when accompanied by a discharge from government employment. In Old Dominion Dairy, we held that a government contractor's liberty interests were infringed when the government failed to renew a contract and branded the plaintiff as nonresponsible due to a lack of integrity without affording the contractor a meaningful opportunity to clear its name. In Old Dominion Dairy, as in the case before us, the lack of integrity charge had been communicated to other government agencies and would undoubtedly have been recommunicated every time [the plaintiff] bid on a subsequent contract. Old Dominion Dairy, 631 F.2d at 963; see also id. at 966 n. 24. The opinion emphasized the severely stigmatizing nature of the government's determination that the plaintiff lacked integrity, id. at 963-64 (quoting Roth, 408 U.S. at 573, 92 S.Ct. at 2707), and it pointed out that the Mazaleski court had expressly stated ... that the employee was not terminated for grounds of dishonesty, noting that dismissals in such a case have been held to affect liberty interests. Id. at 964; see Mazaleski, 562 F.2d at 714. 71 Similarly, in Conset, we reversed a summary dismissal of a liberty interest claim where the plaintiff alleged that the government had circulated a memorandum calling into question its business integrity thereby barring the plaintiff from future government employment. Again, the court emphasized the stigma attendant upon a charge of dishonesty. See Conset, 653 F.2d at 1295-96 & n. 12; cf. Rolles v. Civil Service Commission, 512 F.2d 1319 (D.C.Cir.1975). 72 Most recently, in Mosrie, we held that a supervisory police officer publicly charged with unprofessionalism and subsequently transferred to another division could not meet the Paul standard because the defamation did not coincide with a loss of a government position or a change in legal status. Id. at 1161. Yet the Mosrie court explicitly recognized that a government employee's or contractor's liberty interests are infringed by charges of unprofessional conduct or dishonesty when the allegations are accompanied by discharge or a bar to future government employment. See id. at 1161-62 (discussing Old Dominion Dairy, Conset, and Rolles ). 20 73 The net result of this line of cases, then, is that a plaintiff's claim that the government has deprived him or her of a constitutionally protected liberty interest in reputation must meet two requirements. Paul and Mosrie require that a plaintiff demonstrate that the government's defamation resulted in a harm to some interest beyond reputation. Loss of present or future government employment, however, satisfies that required additional interest. Roth and other recent liberty interest cases in this circuit indicate a second inquiry. A government discharge does not by itself constitute an injury to an employee's liberty interest in reputation; a plaintiff must allege that the government has actually stigmatized his or her reputation by, for example, charging the employee with dishonesty, and that the stigma has hampered future employment prospects. This case meets that requirement as well: Doe was discharged on the basis of allegations of unprofessional conduct and dishonesty, and the charges were allegedly disseminated to prospective employers, public and private. The harm resulting from the Department's actions thus constitutes a deprivation of a liberty interest that cannot be effected without due process. 21
74 As we have already indicated, the proper remedy for the Department's infringement of Doe's liberty interest in reputation is an opportunity for Doe to refute the charges and clear her name. See Codd v. Velger, 429 U.S. 624, 627, 97 S.Ct. 882, 884, 51 L.Ed.2d 92 (1977). Although the district court did not consider whether the plaintiff's liberty interest was afforded adequate procedural protection by the DOJ investigation in this case, 22 our reading of the complaint and motion to dismiss leads us to conclude that Doe was never afforded the meaningful opportunity to clear her name required by the fifth amendment. The March 24, 1981, meeting with her supervisors at which she was initially accused of unprofessional conduct surely did not satisfy her due process rights. The plaintiff was not given any notice whatsoever of the charges against her prior to that meeting; indeed, she was told that the meeting would consist of a routine briefing. See supra p. 1096. Due process requires that an individual be given notice before a hearing if there is to be a meaningful opportunity to respond. See Roth, 408 U.S. at 573, 92 S.Ct. at 2707; Boddie v. Connecticut, 401 U.S. 371, 378, 91 S.Ct. 780, 786, 28 L.Ed.2d 113 (1971); Old Dominion Dairy, 631 F.2d at 966-67. After Doe received notice that the investigation was complete and that the Department intended to terminate her as a result of those charges, she requested, but was refused, an opportunity to confront the sources of the allegations and to produce evidence on her own behalf. See supra p. 1097. 23 75 We therefore vacate the district court's dismissal of Doe's liberty interest claim against the Department. If Doe can demonstrate that the stigmatizing reasons for her discharge were disclosed to the public or were made available to prospective employers or other government personnel, she is entitled to a Codd hearing. See Bishop v. Wood, 426 U.S. 341, 348-49, 96 S.Ct. 2074, 2079-80, 48 L.Ed.2d 684 (1975) (emphasizing public disclosure); Old Dominion Dairy, 631 F.2d at 963 (emphasizing the availability of stigmatizing charges to government personnel and to prospective employers). Assuming that Doe can meet this minimal burden, 24 the district court will be required to determine the precise nature of the name-clearing procedure that the Department must provide Doe. 25 The standard of Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U.S. 319, 96 S.Ct. 893, 47 L.Ed.2d 18 (1976) will presumably govern that determination. 26 In Mathews, the Court identified the factors that must be weighed in order to determine the process due under the fourteenth or fifth amendments. 76 Identification of the specific dictates of due process generally requires consideration of three distinct factors: first, the private interest that will be affected by the official action; second, the risk of an erroneous deprivation of such interest through the procedures used, and the probable value, if any, of additional or substitute procedural safeguards; and finally, the Government's interest, including the function involved and the fiscal and administrative burdens that the additional or substitute procedural requirement would entail. 77 Mathews, 424 U.S. at 334-35, 96 S.Ct. at 903. 78 Although we leave it to the district court to specify the precise contours of the Codd hearing, we note that the private interest affected by the Department's action in this case is quite substantial: it encompasses not merely a discrete employment opportunity but Doe's professional reputation and future career as an attorney in the government or private practice. See Larry v. Lawler, 605 F.2d 954, 961 (7th Cir.1978). Furthermore, the risk of erroneous deprivation was exacerbated in this case by the reliance on affidavits from individuals whose reliability and veracity have been called into question by the plaintiff. See Larry, 605 F.2d at 960; cf. Goldberg v. Kelly, 397 U.S. 254, 261, 90 S.Ct. 1011, 1016, 25 L.Ed.2d 287 (1970). Finally, the administrative burdens involved in a post-termination Codd hearing do not in any way interfere with the Department's employment decisions; the issue in the Codd hearing will be the veracity of the Department's charges, not the propriety of the discharge itself. 27 79