Court Opinion

ID: 9718586
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:27:31.443517+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:00.526330
License: Public Domain

SHIRLEY S. ABRAHAMSON, J.
(concurring). Given this opportunity to review our prior decision, I would base the decision on both the federal constitution and the Wisconsin statutes and constitution. While it is my view that the same conclusion is reached under the fourteenth amendment as under chapter 975 and section 1, article I of the Wisconsin Constitution, I believe we are in any event independently constrained to the result we reached by the Wisconsin statutes and constitution.
*698Terry and the State both concede that sec. 975.11, Stats., creates a liberty interest benefiting the committee and warranting federal constitutional protection. See Meachum v. Fano, 427 U.S. 215, 226, 229 (1976); Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 577 (1972). In our prior decision we concluded that a person committed under ch. 975 has a liberty interest based on the Wisconsin statutory mandate that he shall be discharged “as soon as in its [the department’s] opinion there is a reasonable probability that he can be given full liberty without danger to the public.” Sec. 975.11, Stats. The statutes require the department to review the progress and status of the committee, e.g., sec. 975.09, Wis. Stats., and in our prior decision we concluded that the determination whether to continue commitment “calls for some orderly procedure.” 74 Wis.2d at 497.
Art. I, sec. 1 of the state constitution provides as follows:
“All men are born equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights; among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
This section has been viewed by this court as “substantially the equivalent of the due process and equal protection clauses of the 14th amendment of the U. S. Const. . . .” Buse v. Smith, 74 Wis.2d 550, 579, 247 N.W.2d 141 (1976). See Chicago & N.W. Ry. v. La Follette, 43 Wis.2d 631, 636, 169 N.W.2d 441 (1969); State ex rel. Sonneborn v. Sylvester, 26 Wis.2d 43, 49, 132 N.W.2d 249 (1965). Although the federal and state guarantees may be substantially equivalent, this court is not bound to give the Wisconsin Constitution the same interpretive scope as that the United States Supreme Court gives the fourteenth amendment. We have said that “it is the prerogative of the State of Wisconsin to *699afford greater protection to the liberties of persons within its boundaries under the Wisconsin Constitution than is mandated by the United States Supreme Court under the Fourteenth Amendment. . . . This court has never hesitated to do so.” State v. Doe, 78 Wis.2d 161, 171, 254 N.W.2d 210 (1977). See also State v. Taylor, 60 Wis.2d 506, 522, 210 N.W.2d 873 (1973) ; State v. Wallace, 59 Wis.2d 66, 79, 207 N.W.2d 855 (1973).
I would rest our decision on the state statutes and the state constitution, as well as the federal constitution, because the Wisconsin legislature has provided detailed commitment and release procedures for sex crime offenders and other committees, e.g., secs. 51.20; 51.37; 971.14 (2), (4), and (5), and 971.17, Wis. Stats., and because this court has interpreted these statutes, taking into consideration the interests of the committee and of the public, to assure meaningful procedural safeguards.
On numerous occasions, this court has demonstrated its commitment to fair administrative procedures. See e.g., State ex rel. Matalik v. Schubert, 57 Wis.2d 315, 326-27, 204 N.W.2d 13 (1973); State ex rel. Haskins v. Dodge County Court, 62 Wis.2d 250, 262, 214 N.W.2d 575 (1974) ; State ex rel. Kovach v. Schubert, 64 Wis.2d 612, 622-23, 219 N.W.2d 341 (1974), cert. denied 419 U.S. 1130 (1975) ; State ex rel. Gebarski v. Milwaukee County Circuit Court, 80 Wis.2d 489, 491, 259 N.W.2d 531 (1977). This court required that a separate sex crimes commitment hearing be held after conviction prior to the United States Supreme Court’s imposing the same requirement. Cf. Huebner v. State, 33 Wis.2d 505, 147 N.W.2d 646 (1967), with Specht v. Patterson, 386 U.S. 605 (1967). The court more recently held that a sex offender was entitled to a jury determination at the initial commitment hearing as well as at the recommitment hearing following expiration of the criminal term. State ex rel. Farrell v. Stovall, 59 Wis.2d 148, 207 N.W.2d 809 (1973).
*700Sec. 975.09, Stats., requiring periodic examinations of the sex offender and requiring the department to keep written records of all examinations and conclusions predicated thereon, is one of many statutes designed to protect the public from harm from the criminal and to protect the committee from being unjustly institutionalized. The procedures this court has mandated in its decision are necessary to implement in a meaningful way the legislative mandate of periodic examinations and to assure that persons committed under ch. 975 will be institutionalized as long as necessary for their own good and that of the public, but no longer.
The federal constitution assures all persons minimum procedural rights. State laws and the state constitutions can afford additional protections to persons within their boundaries. As Mr. Chief Justice WARREN E. BURGER recently observed,
“In our own time, and in very recent opinions of the [United States] Supreme Court, there are frequent references to the importance of allowing states to experiment and innovate, precisely so that no monolithic, universal system of justice would prevail. The states have far more flexibility; their legislatures are closer to the people and their judges are closer to the people and their problems.” Burger, To Weaken our State Courts is to Destroy Federalism, 17 Judges’ Journal 11, 12 (1978).
I view procedural rights of committees under ch. 975 as an area of the law in which national uniformity is not required and in which each state can formulate procedures to suit its individual needs. I would therefore base our decision on both the federal constitution and the state statutes and state constitution.
I am authorized to state that Mr. Justice Heffernan joins in this concurring opinion.