Opinion ID: 678573
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Creation of a Liberty Interest

Text: 25 Sultenfuss alleges that the Board's departure from the grid recommendation violated his rights under the Due Process Clause of the United States Constitution. The Due Process Clause provides that [n]o State shall ... deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law. U.S. Const. amend. XIV, Sec. 1. The requirements of procedural due process, therefore, apply only to the deprivation of interests encompassed by the Fourteenth Amendment's protection of liberty and property. Board of Regents of State Colleges v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 569, 92 S.Ct. 2701, 2705, 33 L.Ed.2d 548 (1972). As the Supreme Court has explained, 26 [t]he types of interests that constitute liberty and property for Fourteenth Amendment purposes are not unlimited; the interest must rise to more than an abstract need or desire and must be based on more than a unilateral hope. Rather, an individual claiming a protected liberty interest must have a legitimate claim of entitlement to it. 27 Kentucky Dep't of Corrections v. Thompson, 490 U.S. 454, 461, 109 S.Ct. 1904, 1908, 104 L.Ed.2d 506 (1989) (citations omitted). In order to establish that the Board violated his rights to due process, therefore, Sultenfuss first must demonstrate that the Georgia parole system provides inmates with a liberty interest in parole. 28 In Greenholtz v. Inmates of Nebraska Penal & Correctional Complex, 442 U.S. 1, 99 S.Ct. 2100, 60 L.Ed.2d 668 (1979), the Supreme Court recognized that the mere establishment of a parole system by a state does not automatically create a liberty interest in parole. There is no constitutional or inherent right of a convicted person to be conditionally released before the expiration of a valid sentence. Id. at 7, 99 S.Ct. at 2104. This is not to say, however, that the establishment of a parole system cannot give rise to a liberty interest in parole. 29 When a state parole system creates a legitimate expectation of parole, an inmate has a liberty interest protected by the Due Process Clause. Id. at 12, 99 S.Ct. at 2106. In Greenholtz, for instance, the Court found a Nebraska parole statute stating that the parole board shall order [the inmate's] release unless it is of the opinion that his release should be deferred because one of four specified criteria is met created a protectible liberty interest in parole. Id. at 11, 99 S.Ct. at 2106. Based on the mandatory language of the statute and the presumption that parole be granted unless one of the factors is present, the Court accepted the inmates' view that the statute created an expectation of release protected by the Due Process Clause. 30 Likewise, in Board of Pardons v. Allen, 482 U.S. 369, 107 S.Ct. 2415, 96 L.Ed.2d 303 (1987), the Court analyzed a Montana parole statute similar to the statute in Greenholtz. The Montana statute stated that the board shall release on parole ... any [inmate] when in its opinion there is reasonable probability that the prisoner can be released without detriment to the prisoner or to the community. Id. at 376, 107 S.Ct. at 2420 (emphasis omitted) (first alteration in original). According to the Court, the statute placed substantive predicates on the discretion of the decisionmakers and used mandatory language to create a presumption that release would be granted unless the designated findings are made. Id. at 377-80, 107 S.Ct. at 2420-21. Therefore, the Court found that a liberty interest existed. 31 In other cases, however, the Court has found that penal regulations and parole guidelines do not implicate the Due Process Clause where no liberty interest exists. In Thompson, for instance, the Court analyzed Kentucky prison regulations to determine whether inmates had a liberty interest in visitation. There, the Court focused on the discretion vested in state decisionmakers: Stated simply, 'a State creates a protected liberty interest by placing substantive limitations on official discretion.'  Thompson, 490 U.S. at 462, 109 S.Ct. at 1909 (quoting Olim v. Wakinekona, 461 U.S. 238, 249, 103 S.Ct. 1741, 1747, 75 L.Ed.2d 813 (1983)). The Court also emphasized the requirement, implicit in our earlier decisions, that the regulations contain 'explicitly mandatory language,' i.e., specific directives to the decisionmaker that if the regulations' substantive predicates are present, a particular outcome must follow. Id. at 463, 109 S.Ct. at 1910. The Court found that the regulations at issue lacked the requisite mandatory language because [t]hey stop short of requiring that a particular result is to be reached upon a finding that the substantive predicates are met. Id. at 464, 109 S.Ct. at 1910. The Court also focused on language in the regulations in which the administrative staff reserved the right to allow or disallow prison visits. 32 While the Supreme Court has written extensively on whether various prison guidelines create a liberty interest, the Court has declined to set forth any definitve rules. Instead, the Court has emphasized that whether any ... state statute provides a protectible entitlement must be decided on a case-by-case basis. Greenholtz, 442 U.S. at 12, 99 S.Ct. at 2106. In conducting this case-specific analysis, we are bound by certain principles. After reviewing the relevant caselaw from the Supreme Court and this circuit, we conclude that three, sometimes overlapping, factors are crucial in determining whether a liberty interest is created: (1) whether the system places substantive limitations on the discretion of the decisionmakers; (2) whether the system mandates the outcome that must follow if the substantive predicates are met; and (3) whether the relevant statutes and regulations contain explicitly mandatory language dictating the procedures that must be followed and the result that must be reached if the relevant criteria are satisfied. We explain these factors in more detail below as we examine their application to Georgia's parole system.