Opinion ID: 468842
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Implications of Morrissey:

Text: 18 The appellees argue that as to the members of the Second Group, who were paroled and whose parole was subsequently revoked, nonconstitutionally derived liberty interests can also arise independent of the language in Olim. Such interests can also have their source in a presumption of releasability created by the state when the underlying issue is freedom or incarceration. Appellees' Brief at 12 (emphasis omitted). In short, once a state grants a prisoner his freedom in the form of parole it has created a nonconstitutional liberty interest, whether or not it also provides particularized standards of review. Appellees rely for this proposition on Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U.S. 471, 92 S.Ct. 2593, 33 L.Ed.2d 484 (1972), where the Supreme Court held that parole revocation may be effected only if consistent with due process because [b]y whatever name, the liberty is valuable and must be seen as within the protection of the Fourteenth Amendment. Id. at 482, 92 S.Ct. at 2600. 19 At first blush this is a strong argument, since the factual parallels between this case and Morrissey are strong. But in reality this argument does not get us very far. Careful review of Morrissey and Greenholtz v. Nebraska Penal Inmates, 442 U.S. 1, 99 S.Ct. 2100, 60 L.Ed.2d 668 (1979), the case that limited Morrissey's reach, makes clear that the liberty interest extant in the parole revocation context is derived directly from the Due Process Clause itself. Morrissey notes that the state, in granting parole, has given the prisoner a concrete liberty interest by releasing him. That interest implicates the core values of unqualified liberty.... 408 U.S. at 482, 92 S.Ct. at 2600. 7 It is simply not a nonconstitutional interest. Thus the appellees focus on the wrong factor. 20 In the case of a nonconstitutional liberty interest the due process claim arises from the creation of rules and machinery. One does not have one's liberty yet, one merely has an expectancy reinforced by a system capable of granting or withholding that liberty. It is the creation of the system itself that yields the due process claim. See generally Dumschat, 452 U.S. at 467, 101 S.Ct. at 2465 (Brennan, J., concurring). On the other hand, a constitutionally-based liberty interest arises only when one actually had one's liberty and has that liberty taken away. Its existence is independent of the presence or absence of a hearing mechanism or promulgated rules. The protected interest is not in the system of parole revocation or in particularized standards per se, it is in the fact that the prisoner is actually out and enjoying his liberty, as was the case with the Second Group. We perceive no other way to construe the subsequent holding in Greenholtz, where the Supreme Court distinguished between the actionable liberty interest in a hearing upon parole revocation and the non-actionable interest in a hearing on the grant or denial of parole. The latter does not implicate the core values because there is a crucial distinction between being deprived of a liberty one has, as in parole, and being denied a conditional liberty that one desires. 442 U.S. at 9, 99 S.Ct. at 2104. 21 Thus, the appellees have misapprehended the holding in Morrissey, and the failure of understanding is crucial. The rights created in Morrissey are directly derived from the Due Process Clause. We have held the Due Process Clause yields these aliens no liberty interest in a parole revocation hearing. Fernandez II, 734 F.2d at 581-82 & n. 8. Consequently the rights enunciated in Morrissey cannot obtain for these respondents, although those rights might have been viable had Morrissey been based on a more attenuated nonconstitutional interest.