Court Opinion

ID: 9706482
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 01:44:29.29703+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:23.042552
License: Public Domain

RANDALL, Judge
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. Our case today is round 4 of the State v. Dennis Darol Linehan.
Round 1 was the seminal ease from which all else follow State ex rel. Pearson v. Probate Court, 205 Minn. 545, 287 N.W. 297 (1939), aff'd, 309 U.S. 270, 60 S.Ct. 523, 84 L.Ed. 744 (1940).
*320Round 2 was In re Blodgett, 510 N.W.2d 910 (Minn.), cert. denied, — U.S. -, 115 S.Ct. 146, 130 L.Ed.2d 86 (1994), a Minnesota supreme court case narrowly upholding the psychopathic personality statute, “SDP’s” predecessor. Vocal dissents pointed out its tenuous logic. The foundation of these “civil” commitment statutes for dangerous people is inherently tenuous. No court can escape the one undeniable constitutional argument that no citizen can be imprisoned in a state facility after they have served all of their time. Exceptions, such as being convicted of a new jailable offense while in prison or violating terms of probation or parole after release, are not at issue.
Round 3 was Linehan I, 518 N.W.2d 609 (Minn.1994), where the supreme court reversed and remanded Linehan’s commitment as a psychopathic personality holding the state did not carry its burden of proof on the essential elements.
Round 4 was the Minnesota Legislature’s hasty assembly, in view of Linehan I, to figure out a legal way to keep Linehan in a secured facility, behind bars,1 after all of his time was served. The result was the “sexually dangerous persons” statute, Minn.Stat. § 253B.02, subd. 18b (1994), which we decide today against a frontal attack on substantive constitutional grounds. Our opinion will be Round 5. The probable petition for certiora-ri to the Minnesota Supreme Court will be the sixth round, and if they accept certiorari, that will become the seventh round. If they accept certiorari, the eighth round may be the United States Supreme Court.
This is Linehan’s first case under this brand new statute, which was designated specifically with Linehan in mind. Linehan is sui generis, unique. He is our World War II Eddie Slovik, our colonial Phillip Nolan, our Victorian England’s Elephant Man. Will there be more? I suspect so.
I suspect our state legislature and the courts will continue to struggle with how to legally incarcerate people after they are entitled to be released. Others will likely follow Linehan.
State ex rel. Pearson, was never a favored case to start with. Not all states have the equivalent of a psychopathic personality/sexually dangerous persons (PP/SDP) statute. When Minnesota’s PP/SDP test case, State ex rel. Pearson, went to the United States Supreme Court in the late 1930s, the statute was aimed, not at the Linehans of its day, but rather aimed at the recidivistic (and often times feeble-minded) public masturbator, the window peeper, the exposer, the little old man who gave candy to little boys and gii'ls. It was never meant for people convicted of hardened sexual crimes. Those individuals were given their right to a fair criminal trial, and if convicted, were detained and punished under a basic criminal justice system. For those chosen to be handled under the PP/ SDP statute, it was always as the result of a conscious choice by the state to bypass the criminal justice system as not needed, and to civilly commit truly mentally ill people who needed medical treatment. All writings and dissertations during the early years concerning the genesis and use of the PP/SDP statute tell us this is so.
Then approximately six to eight years ago, the State of Minnesota went through a small series of highly visible crimes, including rape and rape/murder, that galvanized law enforcement and prosecutor’s into wanting to do something. They read the politics of public and voter perception to mean that certain individuals with dangerous sexual proclivities were to be kept behind bars somewhere, somehow, and that whatever it takes to be done should be done.
Thus, the old psychopathic personality statute was dusted off, and, more importantly, was used, not to civilly commit and keep people out of the criminal justice system, but was deliberately held back until certain convicted criminals were nearing the end of their served sentences, and then activated against them so that upon release from prison, they would now undergo indeterminate, and hopefully very lengthy, incarceration in a secured “medical” facility.
It is not in dispute that those advocating this new and extended use of the PP/SDP *321statute and those warning against because of its high potential for serious constitutional abuse agree as one that PP/SDP must be done “civilly.” Criminal commitment, not based on the criminal justice system with its requirement of a fan1 trial and presumption of innocence, is out of the question. The use in Nazi Germany and the Soviet system, under Stalin, of “Gulags,” for dissidents, eccentrics, Gypsies, and other ethnic groups, is not tolerated. Respondent concedes that Li-nehan is close to serving every hour of every day that he owes the State of Minnesota for long ago criminal acts. From the criminal justice standpoint, when his last day comes, he has earned his release.
Now we need to address the overriding element which the State must surmount to get by with what they want to do. Our Minnesota law is subservient, as all state laws are, to the constitutional rights of all citizens spelled out in the United States Constitution. No citation is needed for the proposition that a state cannot take away rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution, but rather it is limited to granting at least the same or more.
The United States Supreme Court again took a look at In Re Pearson and its progeny, Foucha v. Louisiana, 504 U.S. 71, 112 S.Ct. 1780, 118 L.Ed.2d 437 (1992). Foucha discussed the Louisiana civil commitment equivalent of our SDP and its predecessor, the psychopathic personality statute.
In Foucha, the United States Supreme Court stated:
The Due Process Clause contains a substantive component that bars certain arbitrary, wrongful government actions “regardless of the fairness of the procedures used to implement them.” ⅜ * * Freedom from bodily restraint has always been at the core of the liberty protected by the due process clause from arbitrary governmental action. * ⅜ * “It is clear that commitment for any purpose constitutes a significant deprivation of liberty that requires due process protection.”
504 U.S. 71 at 80, 112 S.Ct. 1780 at 1785 (citations omitted).
The court in Foucha discussed the circumstances under which a person may be deprived of liberty, summarized in Blodgett as follows:
(a) imprisonment of convicted criminals for purpose of deterrence and rehabilitation;
(b) confinement for persons mentally ill and dangerous; and
(c) in ‘certain narrow circumstances, persons who pose a danger to others or to the community may be subject to limited confinement,’ such as pretrial detention of dangerous criminal defendants.
Blodgett, 510 N.W.2d at 914 (citation omitted).
In Foucha, the Supreme Court held unconstitutional a Louisiana commitment statute which allowed a person acquitted by reason of insanity, who had an antisocial personality disorder, but no longer a true mental illness, to remain indefinitely committed to the mental hospital on the basis of dangerousness alone. The Louisiana commitment statute seriously violated substantive due process and procedural rights, rights grounded in the sacred proposition that personal liberty cannot easily be tampered with, even when we do not like somebody. Even when we fear what they might do in the future. They are entitled to honest due process.
We can rightfully incarcerate for past acts after a fair trial. It is dangerous to incarcerate dissidents based on pure projection. Medical experts throughout the country differ, not only in the predictability of dangerousness, but on the methods by which they predict. This case today is similar. One medical expert said Linehan is not mentally ill. Other experts said he is “mentally ill.”
Foucha is instructive. It appears the United States Supreme Court is telling us clearly that a convicted criminal, even one with an antisocial personality disorder for which there may be no effective treatment, cannot be held indefinitely under the guise of “medical treatment,” when the real purpose is medical incarceration for reasons of public safety. The Foucha court disallowed further incarceration for Foucha based not on what he had done, but on what he “might do.”
*322Our Foucha issue is not (c) because we are not talking about “limited confinement.” We are talking about indefinite and possibly lifelong deprivation of liberty. This can no more be done in a locked and secured hospital secretly than it can be done in a locked and secured prison openly.
The issue here is not (a) as Linehan will soon complete his prescribed term of imprisonment. The issue here is squarely confined to (b). To do what the state wants to do, Linehan has to be both mentally ill and dangerous, and the “mentally ill” portion must be substantially more than a subterfuge to keep dangerous people locked up after they have served every day that they are supposed to serve.
So today the majority, acknowledging the viability and mandates of Foucha, properly concentrates on the “mentally ill” portion, coupled with dangerousness. The mental illness provided by the statute for SDP in many ways is a carbon copy of psychopathic personality. I note that the “utter lack of power and ability to control sexual impulses” is deleted. I suspect this died an unmourned death. The majority in Linehan I did not find the “utter lack” of control. 518 N.W.2d 609, 614 (Minn.1994).
The dissent of Justice Gardebring pointed out that “utter lack” could be found, but shouldn’t be because if found, its finding would constitute an attack on the sine qua non of judicial reasoning, logic, and common sense. The Gardebring dissent pointed out that all the Linehans of the world are convicted criminally for crimes almost always involving, as an essential element, a specific intent to do something wrong. 518 N.W.2d at 614-616 (Gardebring, J., and Coyne, J., dissenting). But somehow, when their prison time is over and the state wants to incarcerate them civilly, the state is most solicitous and forgiving of their intent to offend (which by definition had been proven by proof beyond a reasonable doubt in their criminal trial), and now postulates that the poor defendant has lost complete control of himself and now exhibits an utter lack of control over his sexual impulses and now needs treatment.
Since it is never explained how, between the date of criminal conviction and the expiration of prison time, one’s specific intent (mens rea) to do something wrong disappears into a void, and is replaced by an utter lack of ability to control ones impulses, it can only be presumed that it happens in prison life, perhaps by osmosis.
Thus, following Linehan I, the need for SDP was born. The statute, and other collateral changes to the commitment statutes, were aimed squarely at Dennis Linehan. To state otherwise is to be without candor. Li-nehan became the focus, not just of the media and the Minnesota Legislature, but actually became a talking point in a contested election for the position of the Ramsey County Attorney’s office.
The legislative history of SDP, including the open debates and the recommendations and writings from staff, tell us that the overwhelming urge to pass this new version of the PP/SDP statute was a direct response to concerns about public safety. The statute was needed to ensure the continued incarceration of Dennis Linehan.
At times the word “treatment” was mentioned, but always in passing, before the real issue, continued confinement for reasons of public safety and deterrence, was again the focus.
To recognize the truth of the above, we need to look at nothing other than the legislation. To ensure Linehan’s continued confinement, and the confinement of the Line-hans to follow, the legislature carefully looked at the former essential element of proof that PP/SDP statutes normally carry. That element is a showing that the proposed committee truly harmed people. They removed that element. They removed it by bringing forth the “rebuttable presumption of harm.” Minn.Stat. § 253B.02, subd. 7a(b). Put another way, certain acts create a rebut-table presumption that harm was done and the burden shifts to the defendant to show “I did no harm.” The legislative background is honest and instructive. It was conceded this would be a virtually impossible burden for any proposed committee to bear; thus insuring his indefinite commitment.
*323The only example I could find in the legislative history where a proposed committee might have a chance to beat continued confinement was the example given of where the aggressor was a 19 year old woman and the victim a 15 year old boy. There it was thought possible that the 19 year old woman might be able to show that although she broke the law concerning one of our many statutes forbidding illegal sexual conduct, she might be able to bear her burden of proof to show there was no serious emotional or physical harm.
In other words, by adding the rebuttable presumption of harm, the SDP statute now summarily forecloses any person’s chances of not being committed. I suggest the statutory mandate of rebuttable presumption is a pure denial of constitutional due process and, standing alone, even if there were no other problems with the statute, voids, on constitutional grounds, the SDP we examine today.
But there are other problems with this new statute. The majority, acknowledging the viability of Foucha, sets out the trial court’s reliance on certain facts and testimony in the record to clear the hurdle that Linehan must be mentally ill, as well as dangerous, before he can be committed as an SDP. The majority states:
A court-appointed examiner testified Line-han does not presently exhibit a personality disorder, a sexual disorder, or a mental disorder, even though that expert had diagnosed Linehan with an antisocial personality disorder in 1992. By contrast, a licensed psychologist testified Linehan has an alcohol dependence (in remission), impulse control disorder, and an antisocial personality disorder and supported his commitment as a sexually dangerous person. Another licensed psychologist also diagnosed Linehan as a paraphilia with an antisocial personality disorder, and testified Linehan is highly likely to engage in harmful sexual conduct. Linehan’s treating psychologist at the security hospital diagnosed Linehan as having a antisocial personality disorder based on historical information.
(emphasis added.)
First of all, I note that one court-appointed examiner found that although Linehan had an antisocial personality disorder, he was not even mentally ill. The other experts quoted, each in turn, Linehan’s “antisocial personality disorder” as one of the underpinnings to fit Linehan under the SDP model of mental illness.
Now let us revisit Foucha. The U.S. Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional a Louisiana state statute allowing continued, indefinite confinement of a man found dangerous but possessing only an “antisocial personality.” Foucha, 504 U.S. 71, 112 S.Ct. 1780 (1992). Based on the medical testimony in Foucha, the court found that “antisocial personality” was not enough of a true mental disease to qualify as one of the two constitutionally essential elements for indefinite commitment, to-wit: both “mentally ill” and “dangerous.” Id. 504 U.S. at 77-86, 112 S.Ct. at 1784-1788.
Now superimpose on the weak reliance of the state to commit Linehan as a SDP based on medical experts who continuously found Linehan to have an antisocial personality, the “rebuttable presumption of harm.” The handwriting is not only on the wall, but chiseled in two inch high block letters; this new PP/SDP statute is so constitutionally infirm that it cannot stand.
I cannot state with any degree of certainty that the medical testimony about Linehan would have convinced the U.S. Supreme Court to change the result in Foucha.
Let us discuss a little further the suspect part of SDP that mandates a rebuttable presumption of harm to be used against Linehan and the Linehans to follow.
Trial courts and appellate courts, have for years analyzed, discussed, and made findings in hundreds of standard civil commitment cases where the issue is simply your basic mentally ill person who is deemed incapable of taking care of themselves, a threat to themselves or others, and who thus need real medical treatment. Minn.Stat. §§ 253B.09, subd. 1, 253B.02, Subd. 13(b).
Courts have, on scores of occasions, heard the same or similar litanies of how a man or a woman, the proposed civil committee, does *324not employ the usual personal hygiene, has long and unkempt hair, does not feed themselves properly, perhaps even appears malnourished, goes out in cold weather without a hat, gloves or proper outer clothing, does not seek proper medical help or take prescribed medication, and so on and so forth.
All of these together “may” constitute evidence that the person is a threat to themselves, and if so, that coupled with the finding of mental illness can lead to a sound and hopefully short civil commitment.
Now let us assume that downtown shoppers and business people in the Twin Cities began a campaign against street persons, panhandlers, those who seem to mill about our scattered soup kitchens and missions without real purpose, or evidence of gainful occupation. It is not uncommon for the city councils of many large cities to want to do such a sweep as part of a downtown beautification program to encourage development and tourist dollars. So now let us assume that in addition to wanting the city police to adopt periodic sweeps, the downtown business people convince that state’s legislature to start civilly committing the street people who just won’t go away, but appear to be coming in and out of police precincts on a revolving door basis. So, to help make sure the commitments stand, the legislature passes a statute that says there is a rebutta-ble presumption that you can be committed if, for instance, your weight drops 30% within seven weeks or less, you are found outdoors where the windchill factor is a minus 15 degrees or lower, without mittens, a hat, scarf and boots, or you are found sleeping in a totally unheated apartment with the wind blowing through a broken window. See Minn.Stat. § 253B.02, Subd. 13(b)(i).
All of the above are commonly seen in petitions for commitment by well-meaning-relatives or social workers or medical personnel. But they are only considered evidentia-ry. They do not shift the burden of proof. The patient is allowed to point out the circumstances under which their weight dropped, or why they went outside without proper clothing, or slept in an apartment that did not pass code standards. If we superimposed on that evidence a statutorily mandated rebuttable presumption that those conditions would put you in a mental hospital, I suggest virtually every attorney and judge in this state of a civil libertarian bent would rise in concern to combat such a mandated presumption.
How different is that from the rebuttable presumption in the SDP statute that includes every act of criminal sexual conduct down to the fourth degree. The rebuttable presumption further includes acts with a sexual impulse or sexual gratification as a goal. When that is found, the rebuttable presumption includes nonsexual crimes beginning with numerous degrees of homicide and assault all the way down to assault in the third degree, simple robbery, arson, terroristic threats, harassment in stalking, and tampering with a witness.2 See Minn.Stat. § 253B.02, subd. 7a(b).
The only honest inference is that the decks are intentionally stacked against anyone who is tagged with the prospective label “SDP.” For reasons of public safety and deterrence, they are going to a secure locked facility, after they have served all the time they owe the state in secured locked facilities.
I can no longer accept the argument that PP/SDP is about remediation and medical treatment. If medical treatment were part of the prosecution’s game plan, they would bring the PP/SDP charge as soon as possible after the inmate’s conviction and initial incarceration. The state has every right at that point to invoke the PP/SDP statute. In recent years they appear to deliberately choose not to invoke the statute at the onset of the person’s time in prison. In fact, one could argue the state ignores public safety by intentionally not invoking the statute at the onset of incarceration and that may allow the defendant to go untreated for several years while he serves his time in prison. It needs no reference to note that all medical experts agree that the sooner symptoms are diagnosed, the sooner treatment should be begun.
The state may counter this argument by pointing out that you do not have to be a *325candidate for PP/SDP to get treatment in prison in the various programs for sexual offenders. I agree that is so. But if that is so, and sexual offender treatment is available from the outset, then why does the state so strongly want to tack on PP/SDP at the end? If the answer be that the normal sexual treatment programs in prison are voluntary rather than mandatory, then once a person is determined to fit the PP/SDP profile, can not a legal carrot be found to ensure participation in the prison program? Could we not craft a law that someone so found, after a fair healing, to fit the PP/SDP profile, could have extra years of intensive supervised release added on to his or her time upon their release date from prison, if they did not voluntarily take part in prison treatment?
The legislative deliberations that led to the passage of the new PP/SDP laws noted that in one control group, a probation officer with approximately a 15 man case load (instead of the normal 75) was able to truly supervise intensely, and the recidivism rate was exceptionally low compared to those offenders who had probation officers staggering under the normal full case load.
There is always the danger that if this program worked, the legislature would immediately want to add it to crime category after crime category. Right now, the only offenders in Minnesota who technically are on parole for life after they are released are those convicted of murder in the first degree. Although their time of parole can be dropped after a certain number of years out of prison, there is no absolute right to that, so they can literally be on the intensive supervised release/parole for life. For all other offenses, after full expiration of the sentences served, either through straight prison time or through a combination of prison and probation time, there is no more probation absent a new offense. It would be important to carefully craft any law that would add intensive supervised release after the normal expiration of one’s prison sentence. But extended intensive supervised release, being a far, far, far less deprivation of liberty than incarceration in a locked medical facility, is a goal that could more easily pass constitutional muster.
Instead, what the state does here is intentional. They wait until the target defendant is down to several months before expiration, then they invoke the PP/SDP statute so that the “civil commitment” will be used to ensure safe confinement after release.
If it is argued that intensive treatment for inmates with sexual disorders is costly in prison, the only answer is, it is far, far more costly to first incarcerate a person for a lengthy period of time, and then begin the PP/SDP process after expiration when they are now confined to state security hospitals where the yearly cost is even higher than while in prison. In other words, the public, from both a cost dollar and public safety standpoint, is far better served by instituting the treatment for those for whom it is deemed needed as soon as possible after incarceration. The money, and then some, for intensive sexual offender treatment programs while in prison would easily come from the tremendous savings to be effected by the now long needed adjustment of Minnesota’s mandatory prison time on our various sentences once the Minnesota sentencing guidelines level 7 is reached.
Essentially, except for murder in the first degree, all other offenses have a determinate period, a true expiration date. When you are sentenced under the sentencing guidelines, whether it is presumptive, an upward departure, or a downward departure, you will seive two-thirds of that sentence in prison and then one-third of the sentence on probation. Minnesota’s mandatory two-thirds in prison requirement is one of the highest in the entire nation. Minnesota need not be concerned about longer sentences, but rather need be concerned about sentences now that in many eases are far too long. If the present requirement of 66%% of the sentence to be spent behind bars were shortened to perhaps 55% for the more violent offenders, and then down to 50% for all others, the money freed up from having to warehouse men and women would run into the millions and could be used for more prison programs and more up-front programs to help prevent crime, as opposed to spending hundreds of millions merely to punish past acts. Even this slight adjustment to our mandated incarceration *326time would still leave Minnesota among the leaders in this country in the amount of time men and women actually do behind bars.
Virtually the clearest argument that PP/ SDP is for punishment and confinement, and not for treatment, is that we devised a civil commitment statute only for sexual offenders. If sexual offenders are truly deserving of medical treatment, then why not all other felons who commit dangerous acts:
We do not commit and do not attempt “to treat” first degree murderers, even contract killers, even if they have sworn vengeance against their accusers, after they have served all their time. They may be released with strong warnings not to run afoul of the law again. If there is any probation or parole time left, the state might well “sit on their heads” with onerous release conditions, but no attempt is made to commit them against their will to a hospital. First degree murder is as serious, or more serious, than sex offenses, so we cannot distinguish between the two on the basis of who has done the more heinous thing. We do not attempt to involuntarily commit and treat habitual check forgers, even though their recidivism is high or higher than sex offenders. So we cannot differentiate between the two classes on the basis of recidivism.
Also, we do not try to involuntarily commit and then treat kleptomaniacs, pyromaniacs, or any other of the “manias” that are criminal conduct. Respondent alludes to this reasoning, and argues that sexual offenders are dangerous in a way different than those who commit these other offenses. See also Blodgett, 510 N.W.2d at 917 (stating there are substantial distinctions between sexual predators and other criminals). That reasoning, however, is not constitutionally significant. Instead, it proves the point. Psychopathic personalities are the subject of preventive detention. The state simply chooses this one class of people, to the exclusion of other classes of felons, to involuntarily commit to protect the public from any further possibility of harm — read preventive detention.
The allusions to treatment are a guise to justify the detention. These offenders had access to treatment programs in prison during the fairly lengthy criminal sentences they served. The medical personnel at the security hospital are clear that confinement is the guiding force, not medical treatment.
In Re Mattson, No. C5-95-452, unpub. op. at 2-4, 1995 WL 365374 (Minn.App. June 20, 1995) (emphasis added).
I respectfully dissent. I conclude that the new Minnesota sexually dangerous person statute is unconstitutional when examined in light of the Foucha holding that a dangerous person with an antisocial personality can be incarcerated for crimes committed in the past, but can neither be incarcerated nor “medically confined” for what he might do in the future. Further, the rebuttable presumption of harm built into the sexually dangerous personality statute directs our attention, like nothing else can, to the fact that this statute is based purely on public safety concerns, employs preventive detention, thus unlawfully incarcerating citizens in a secured and locked medical facility, not for a crime, but for speculation.

. Make no mistake. The medical facilities designated in the statute are the equivalent of medium to maximum security prisons. This is intentional, not accidental.

. X did not make this up. See Minn.Stat. § 253B.02, subd. 7a(b).