Court Opinion

ID: 9429175
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:25:53.285099+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:17.629208
License: Public Domain

Justice Marshall,
with whom Justice Brennan joins, and with whom Justice Stevens joins as to Part I, dissenting.
In my view, the transfer of respondent Delbert Kaahanui Wakinekona from a prison in Hawaii to a prison in California implicated an interest in'liberty protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. I respectfully dissent.
I
An inmate’s liberty interest is not limited to whatever a State chooses to bestow upon him. An inmate retains a significant residuum of constitutionally protected liberty following his incarceration independent of any state law. As we stated in Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U. S. 539, 555-556 (1974): “[A] prisoner is not wholly stripped of constitutional protections when he is imprisoned for crime. There is no iron curtain drawn between the Constitution and the prisons *252of this country. . . . [Prisoners] may not be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.”
In determining whether a change in the conditions of imprisonment implicates a prisoner’s retained liberty interest, the relevant question is whether the change constitutes a sufficiently “grievous loss” to trigger the protection of due process. Vitek v. Jones, 445 U. S. 480, 488 (1980). See Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U. S. 471, 481 (1972), citing Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee v. McGrath, 341 U. S. 123, 168 (1951) (Frankfurter, J., concurring). The answer depends in part on a comparison of “the treatment of the particular prisoner with the customary, habitual treatment of the population of the prison as a whole.” Hewitt v. Helms, 459 U. S. 460, 486 (1983) (Stevens, J., dissenting). This principle was established in our decision in Vitek, which held that the transfer of an inmate from a prison to a mental hospital implicated a liberty interest because it brought about “consequences . . . qualitatively different from the punishment characteristically suffered by a person convicted of crime.” 445 U. S., at 493. Because a significant qualitative change in the conditions of confinement is not “within the range of conditions of confinement to which a prison sentence subjects an individual,” ibid., such a change implicates a prisoner’s protected liberty interest.
There can be little doubt that the transfer of Wakinekona from a Hawaii prison to a prison in California represents a substantial qualitative change in the conditions of his confinement. In addition to being incarcerated, which is the ordinary consequence of a criminal conviction and sentence, Wakinekona has in effect been banished from his home, a punishment historically considered to be “among the severest.”1 For an indeterminate period of time, possibly the *253rest of his life, nearly 2,500 miles of ocean will separate him from his family and friends. As a practical matter, Waki-nekona may be entirely cut off from his only contacts with the outside world, just as if he had been imprisoned in an institution which prohibited visits by outsiders. Surely the isolation imposed on him by the transfer is far more drastic than that which normally accompanies imprisonment.
I cannot agree with the Court that Meachum v. Fano, 427 U. S. 215 (1976), and Montanye v. Haymes, 427 U. S. 236, 243 (1976), compel the conclusion that Wakinekona’s transfer implicates no liberty interest. Ante, at 248. Both cases involved transfers of- prisoners between institutions located within the same State in which they were convicted, and the Court expressly phrased its holdings in terms of mimstate transfers.2 Both decisions rested on the premise that no liberty interest is implicated by an initial decision to place a prisoner in one institution in the State rather than another. See Meachum, supra, at 224; Montanye, supra, at 243. On the basis of that premise, the Court concluded that the subsequent transfer of a prisoner to a different facility within the State likewise implicates no liberty interest. - In this case, however, we cannot assume that a State’s initial placement of an individual in a prison far removed from his family and residence would raise no due process questions. None of our *254prior decisions has indicated that such a decision would be immune from scrutiny under the Due Process Clause.
Actual experience simply does not bear out the Court’s assumptions that interstate transfers are routine and that it is “not unusual” for a prisoner “to serve practically his entire sentence in a State other than the one in which he was convicted and sentenced.” Ante, at 247. In Hawaii less than three percent of the state prisoners were transferred to prisons in other jurisdictions in 1979, and on a nationwide basis less than one percent of the prisoners held in state institutions were transferred to other jurisdictions.3 Moreover, the vast majority of state prisoners are held in facilities located less than 250 miles from their homes.4 Measured against these norms, Wakinekona’s transfer to a California prison represents a punishment “qualitively different from the punishment characteristically suffered by a person convicted of crime.” Vitek v. Jones, supra, at 493.
I therefore cannot agree that a State may transfer its prisoners at will, to any place, for any reason, without ever implicating any interest in liberty protected by the Due Process Clause.
II
Nor can I agree with the majority’s conclusion that Hawaii’s prison regulations do not create a liberty interest. This Court’s prior decisions establish that a liberty interest *255may be “created”5 by state laws, prison rules, regulations, or practices. State laws that impose substantive criteria which limit or guide the discretion of officials have been held to create a protected liberty interest. See, e. g., Hewitt v. Helms, 459 U. S. 460 (1983); Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U. S. 539 (1974); Greenholtz v. Nebraska Penal Inmates, 442 U. S. 1 (1979); Wright v. Enomoto, 462 F. Supp. 397 (ND Cal. 1976), summarily aff’d, 434 U. S. 1052 (1978). By contrast, a liberty interest is not created by a law which “imposes no conditions on [prison officials’] discretionary power,” Montanye, supra, at 243, authorizes prison officials to act “for whatever reason or for no reason at all,” Meachum, supra, at 228, or accords officials “unfettered discretion,” Connecticut Board of Pardons v. Dumschat, 452 U. S. 458, 466 (1981).
The Court misapplies these principles in concluding that Hawaii’s prison regulations leave prison officials with unfettered discretion to transfer inmates. Ante, at 249-250. Rule IV establishes a scheme under which inmates are classified upon initial placement in an institution, and must subsequently be reclassified before they can be transferred to another institution. Under the Rule the standard for classifying inmates is their “optimum placement within the Corrections Division” in light of the “best interests of the individual, the State, and the community.”6 In classifying inmates, the Program *256Committee may not consider punitive aims. It may consider only factors relevant to determining where the individual will be “best situated,” such as “his history, his changing needs, the resources and facilities available to the Corrections Divisions, the other inmates/wards, the exigencies of the community, and any other relevant factors.” Paragraph 3 of Rule IV establishes a detailed set of procedures applicable when, as in this case, the reclassification of a prisoner may lead to a transfer involving a “grievous loss,” a phrase contained in the Rule itself.7 The procedural rules are cast in mandatory language, and cover such matters as notice, access to information, hearing, confrontation and cross-examination, and the basis on which the Committee is to make its recommendation to the facility administrator.
The limitations imposed by Rule IV are at least as substantial as those found sufficient to create a liberty interest in Hewitt v. Helms, supra, decided earlier this Term. In Hewitt an inmate contended that his confinement in administrative custody implicated an interest in liberty protected by the Due Process Clause. State law provided that a prison official could place inmates in administrative custody “upon his assessment of the situation and the need for control,” or “where it has been determined that there is a threat of a serious disturbance, or a serious threat to the individual or others,” and mandated certain procedures such as notice and a *257hearing.8 This Court construed the phrases “‘the need for control/ or ‘the threat of a serious disturbance/ ” as “substantive predicates” which restricted official discretion. Id., at 472. These restrictions, in combination with the mandatory procedural safeguards, “deman[ded] a conclusion that the State has created a protected liberty interest.” Ibid.
Rule IV is not distinguishable in any meaningful respect from the provisions at issue in Helms. The procedural requirements contained in Rule IV are, if anything, far more elaborate than those involved in Helms, and are likewise couched in “language of an unmistakably mandatory character.” Id., at 471. Moreover, Rule IV, to no less an extent than the state law at issue in Helms, imposes substantive criteria restricting official discretion. In Helms this Court held that a statutory phrase such as “the need for control” constituted a limitation on the discretion of prison officials to place inmates in administrative custody. In my view Rule IV, which states that transfers are intended to ensure an inmate’s “optimum placement” in accordance with considerations which include “his changing needs [and] the resources and facilities available to the Corrections Division,” also restricts official discretion in ordering transfers.9
The Court suggests that, even if the Program Committee does not have unlimited discretion in making recommendations for classifications and transfers, this cannot give rise to a state-created liberty interest because the prison Administrator retains “completely unfettered” “discretion to transfer *258an inmate,” ante, at 249. I disagree. Rule IV, ¶ 3(d)(3), provides for review by the prison Administrator of recommendations forwarded to him by the Program Committee.10 Even if this provision must be construed as authorizing the Administrator to transfer a prisoner for wholly arbitrary reasons,11 that mere possibility does not defeat the protectible expectation otherwise created by Hawaii’s reclassification and transfer scheme that transfers will take place only if required to ensure an inmate’s optimum placement. In Helms a prison regulation also left open the possibility that the Superintendent could decide, for any reason or no reason at all, whether an inmate should be confined in administrative custody.12 This Court nevertheless held that the state scheme as a whole created an interest in liberty protected by the Due Process Clause. 459 U. S., at 471-472. Helms thus necessarily rejects the view that state laws which impose substantive *259limitations and elaborate procedural requirements on official conduct create no liberty interest solely because there remains the possibility that an official will act in an arbitrary manner at the end of the process.13
For the foregoing reasons, I dissent.

 4 J. Elliott, Debates on the Federal Constitution 555 (1836). Whether it is called banishment, exile, deportation, relegation, or transportation, compelling a person “to quit a city, place, or country, for a specified period of time, or for life,” has long been considered a unique and severe deprivation, and was specifically outlawed by “[t]he twelfth section of the English *253Habeas Corpus Act, 31 Car. II, one of the three great muniments of English liberty.” United States v. Ju Toy, 198 U. S. 253, 269-270 (1905) (Brewer, J., dissenting).

 Thus in Meachum the Court stated that the State, by convicting the defendant, was “empowered] to confine him in any of its prisons,” 427 U. S., at 224 (emphasis deleted), that a “transfer from one institution to another within the state prison system” implicated no due process interest, id., at 225, and that “[confinement in any of the State’s institutions is within the normal limits or range of custody which the conviction has authorized the State to impose.” Ibid. See also Montanye, 427 U. S., at 242 (“We held in Meachum v. Fano, that no Due Process Clause liberty interest of a duly convicted prison inmate is infringed when he is transferred from one prison to another within the State”).

 U. S. Dept, of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics — 1981, Table 6.27, pp. 478-479 (T. Flanagan, D. Van Alstyne, & M. Gottfredson eds. 1982). These figures reflect “all inmates who were transferred from one State’s jurisdiction to another to continue sentences already in force,” and “[d]oes not include the release if [the] State does not relinquish jurisdiction.” Id., at 590.

 U. S. Dept. of Justice, Profile of State Prison Inmates: Sociodemo-graphic Findings from the 1974 Survey of Inmates of State Correctional Facilities 1 (1979). Over 70 percent of state inmates are held in institutions located less than 250 miles from their homes.

 But see Hewitt v. Helms, 459 U. S. 460, 488 (1983) (Stevens, J., dissenting) (Prison regulations-“provide evidentiary support for the conclusion that the transfer affects a constitutionally protected interest in liberty,” but they “do not create that interest” (emphasis in original)).

 Paragraph 1 of Rule IV provides:
“An inmate’s/ward’s classification determines where he is best situated within the Corrections Division. Rather than being concerned with isolated aspects of the individual or punishment (as is the adjustment process), classification is a dynamic process which considers the individual, his history, his changing needs, the resources and facilities available to the Corrections Division, the other inmates/wards, the exigencies of the community, and any other relevant factors. It never inflicts punishment; on *256the contrary, even the imposition of a stricter classification is intended to be in the best interests of the individual, the State, and the community. In short, classification is a continuing evaluation of each individual to ensure that he is given the optimum placement within the Corrections Division.” App. 20.

 While the term “grievous loss” is not explicitly defined, the prison regulations treat a transfer to the mainland as a grievous loss entitling an inmate to the procedural rights established in-Rule IV, ¶ 3. This is readily inferred from Rule IV, ¶ 3, which states that intrastate transfers do not involve a grievous loss, and Rule V, which permits inmates to retain counsel only in specified circumstances, one of which is a reclassification that may result in an interstate transfer. App. 25.

 See 459 U. S., at 470-471, n. 6.

 See also Wright v. Enomoto, 462 F. Supp. 397 (ND Cal. 1976), summarily aff’d, 434 U. S. 1052 (1978). In that case, the District Court held that the language of a prison policy statement, stating that “[i]nmates may be segregated for medical, psychiatric, disciplinary, or administrative reasons,” 462 F. Supp., at 403, was sufficient to create a protected expectation that an inmate would not be segregated for arbitrary reasons. See also Bills v. Henderson, 631 F. 2d 1287, 1293 (CA6 1980), cert. denied, 449 U. S. 1093 (1981); Winsett v. McGinnes, 617 F. 2d 996, 107 (CA3 1980) (en banc).

 Rule IV, ¶3(d)(8), provides:
“The facility administrator will, within a reasonable period of time, review the Program Committee’s recommendation. He may, as the final decisionmaker:
“(a) Affirm or reverse, in whole or in part, the recommendation; or
“(b) hold in abeyance any action he believes jeopardizes the safety, security, or welfare of the staff, inmate/ward, other inmates/wards, institution, or community and refer the matter back to the Program Committee for further study and recommendation.” App. 21.

 doubt that Rule IV would be construed to permit the Administrator to order a transfer for punitive reasons, since Rule IV expressly disallows punitive transfers.

 That provision stated: “All decisions of the Program Review Committee shall be reviewed by the Superintendent for his sustaining the decision or amending or reversing the decision in favor of the inmate.” Pennsylvania Bureau of Correction Administrative Directive BC-ADM 801, Rule 111(H)(7). App. to Brief for Respondent in Hewitt v. Helms, O. T. 1982, No. 81-638, p. 12a. Because an inmate could be confined in administrative custody only if the Program Review Committee determined that such confinement is and continues to be “appropriate,” id., at 18a, the Superintendent in Helms was the “decisionmaker,” ante, at 249-250, who determined whether inmates would be held in administrative custody.

 This view was also implicitly rejected in Greenholtz v. Nebraska Penal Inmates, 442 U. S. 1 (1979). The Court held that the Nebraska statute governing the decision whether or not to grant parole created a “pro-teetible entitlement,” id., at 12, even though the statute, which listed a number of factors to be considered in the parole decision, also authorized the Parole Board to deny parole on the basis of “[a]ny other factors the board determines to be relevant.” Id., at 18.
To the extent that Lono v. Ariyoshi, 63 Haw. 138, 144-145, 621 P. 2d 976, 980-981 (1981), on which the majority relies, ante, at 249, suggests that no liberty interest is created as state law has not entirely eliminated the possibility of arbitrary action, it is inconsistent with both Helms and Greenholtz.