Opinion ID: 513498
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Plaintiffs' Due Process Claim.

Text: 88 The plaintiff class in this case is composed of mentally retarded persons who reside in institutions operated by the State of Georgia. 1 When this action was filed in 1981, the named plaintiffs were residents of the Gracewood State School, a state-owned facility. Like the named plaintiffs, the remaining members of the class reside in five similar institutions, which provide around the clock residential services to mentally retarded persons under the control and supervision of the Georgia Division of Mental Health, Retardation, and Substance Abuse. 89 Georgia statutes that govern the confinement and care for the mentally retarded were substantially amended in 1978. As a result of these changes, the State was required to provide certain judicial process safeguards for each mentally retarded person it undertook to institutionalize after September 1, 1978. Each person after institutionalization was entitled to a periodic review of his or her ongoing need for institutionalization and its appropriateness. See generally Ga.Code Ann. Sec. 37-4-42. Yet the defendants did not make these procedures available to members of the plaintiff class, who were all committed to institutions prior to September 1, 1978. As of September 1, 1981, there were more than 1,000 mentally retarded residents of institutions who had not been provided with any reviews and thus the opportunity for further administrative or judicial review. These facts constituted the basis of the plaintiff class's equal protection claim (Count I) and the procedural aspect of their due process claim (Count II). As is clear from the district court's opinion, the plaintiffs prevailed on these issues. The district court concluded that the plaintiff class was to be placed on equal footing with post-1978 institution admittees for the purposes of habilitation reviews. 90 On this issue the plaintiffs were successful and the defendants have not appealed the district court's rulings with regard to the procedural process claim. The issues related to this claim are not before this court. It should be therefore noted that although the majority is publishing the district court's opinion as its own, the section discussing this claim constitutes no more than dicta. See generally 1B Moore's Federal Practice p 0.402 (1984). 91