Opinion ID: 1958490
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Substantive due process right to treatment.

Text: [D]ue process requires that the nature and duration of commitment bear some reasonable relation to the purpose for which the individual is committed. Jackson v. Indiana, 406 U.S. 715, 738, 92 S.Ct. 1845, 1858, 32 L.Ed.2d 435, 451 (1972). Betsworth asserts his confinement bears no reasonable relationship to the purpose for his commitmenttreatmentbecause his condition is not treatable. Therefore, he claims, his right to substantive due process is violated. Even if we accept Betsworth's argument that his condition is untreatable, that circumstance would not violate his due process rights. In Hendricks, the United States Supreme Court pointed out that it had never held that a State could not civilly detain[] those for whom no treatment is available, but who nevertheless pose a danger to others. Hendricks, 521 U.S. at 366, 117 S.Ct. at 2084, 138 L.Ed.2d at 517. The court observed, that to require treatment as a precondition for civil confinement of the dangerously insane when no acceptable treatment existed. . . would obligate a State to release certain confined individuals who were both mentally ill and dangerous simply because they could not be successfully treated for their afflictions. Id. at 366, 117 S.Ct. at 2084, 138 L.Ed.2d at 518. In a later case, the Court more directly stated dangerous persons with untreatable conditions could be constitutionally confined. See Seling v. Young, 531 U.S. 250, 121 S.Ct. 727, 148 L.Ed.2d 734 (2001). In Seling, the Court interpreted its discussion in Hendricks as an explanation that there [is] no federal constitutional bar to [the] civil confinement [of sexually violent predators with untreatable conditions], because the State [has] an interest in protecting the public from dangerous individuals with treatable as well as untreatable conditions. Id. at 262, 121 S.Ct. at 734, 148 L.Ed.2d at 746. We hold, therefore, that Betsworth's confinement on the basis of his dangerousness as a sexually violent predator does not violate his due process rights, notwithstanding the dismal prognosis for improvement in his mental condition. See In re Blodgett, 510 N.W.2d 910, 916 (Minn.1994) (holding sexual predator's confinement did not violate due process even though treatment was problematic).