Court Opinion

ID: 9690611
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 19:26:24.730939+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:04:03.091925
License: Public Domain

KESSLER, J.
¶ 24. (dissenting). I agree with the majority's implicit conclusion that the additional condition of extended supervision imposed by the reconfinement court was reasonable and appropriate. I disagree, however, that the plain language of the applicable statutes and applicable case law authorizes a reconfinement court to impose new conditions of extended supervision.
¶ 25. The only statute by which the legislature specifically authorized a court to impose conditions of extended supervision is Wis. Stat. § 973.01(5).1 These conditions are imposed at sentencing. The statute governing extended supervision, Wis. Stat. § 302.113, specifically allows the Department of Corrections to add new conditions to the extended supervision. See § 302.113(7) ("The department may set conditions of extended supervision in addition to any conditions of extended supervision required under s. 302.116, if applicable, or set by the court under sub. (7m) or s. 973.01(5) if the conditions set by the department do not conflict with the court's conditions.") (emphasis added). In addition, the Department or the person subject to the conditions "may petition the sentencing court to modify any conditions of extended supervision set by the court." Sec. 302.113(7m) (emphasis added).
¶ 26. Thus, we see that the legislature gave the Department, which supervises extended supervision, *554the flexibility to impose new conditions required by changed circumstances in extended supervision, where the new conditions do not conflict with the original conditions set by the sentencing court.2 See Wis. Stat. § 302.113(7). The legislature also allowed either the Department or the inmate to petition the sentencing court to modify any extended supervision conditions. See § 302.113(7m). What the legislature did not do was explicitly authorize a court imposing a period of reconfinement to add additional conditions to extended supervision on its own initiative (or at the suggestion of the State, as occurred here). We previously recognized that a reconfinement court's discretion is limited when we rejected a reconfinement court's attempt to determine a confined person's eligibility for the Challenge Incarceration Program (CIP) or the Earned Release Program (ERP). See State v. Hall, 2007 WI App 168, ¶ 15, 304 Wis. 2d 504, 737 N.W.2d 13 (concluding that Wis. Stat. § 302.113(9)(am) gave the reconfinement court a "grant of limited discretion" to "determin[e] the length of time for which a revoked supervisee will be returned to prison" but did not provide authority for a reconfinement court to "address eligibility for CIP and ERE"). For the same reasons we discussed in Hall, we should reject the reconfinement court's decision to impose a new condition of extended supervision at the reconfinement hearing.
¶ 27. Reasonable people might conclude that a system allowing either a sentencing court or a reconfinement court to impose new conditions of extended supervision is both reasonable and efficient. However, *555the legislature limited the discretion of reconfinement courts and any change to the reconfinement court's authority must come from the legislature. We do not have the authority to grant the reconfinement court authority under Wis. Stat. § 302.113(9)(am) which the legislature chose not to grant. See Seider v. O'Connell, 2000 WI 76, ¶ 80, 236 Wis. 2d 211, 612 N.W.2d 659 ("It is the role of the legislature to expand, contract, or repeal" statutes.).
¶ 28. Indeed, as the majority notes, Harris's victory might be Pyrrhic if this case were to be returned for a new reconfinement hearing, because it is highly likely the Department would promptly use its statutory authority to impose the same no-contact condition the reconfinement court here imposed. In that situation, Harris would have the right to move the trial court to set aside the condition, should he choose to do so. That is the scheme of condition change and review which the legislature established. We are bound by those legislative decisions.
¶ 29. Because I conclude the plain language of the statutes permits the Department, but not the reconfinement court, to impose new conditions of extended supervision, I respectfully dissent.

 Wisconsin Stat. § 973.01(5) provides: "Extended supervision conditions. Whenever the court imposes a bifurcated sentence under sub. (1), the court may impose conditions upon the term of extended supervision."

 Thus, pursuant to Wis. Stat. § 302.113(7), the Department could have responded to Harris's behavior on extended supervision by imposing the additional restriction at issue in this case.