Court Opinion

ID: 9676008
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 05:12:10.664459+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:42.454536
License: Public Domain

Gage, J.
(concurring in part and dissenting in part). I respectfully but firmly dissent to parts i and m of the majority opinion. I concur in part n.
As the majority notes, appellant is serving three concurrent terms of life imprisonment for her convictions of one count of second-degree murder and two counts of assault with intent to commit murder. Not evident from the majority opinion is the fact that appellant acted as a principal in the offenses by entering the crime scene alone and stealing money from the cash register. Moreover, she hid the murder weapon on the premises and later retrieved it from its hiding place. Three people were shot in the incident, and two died.
I also note, only because the majority fails to mention it, that appellant has also been found guilty of some misconduct violations while imprisoned, apparently for being “[o]ut of place.” In addition, she received two sexual misconduct determinations, although appellant apparently denied these charges.
i
Agreeing that appellant is overall a sympathetic and unusual parole candidate, I must nonetheless write that I adamantly disagree with part I of the majority opinion. The majority first finds, I believe correctly, that the applicable statutory scheme does not entitle appellant to a written explanation of the Parole Board’s decision to deny her parole. However, somewhat inexplicably, the majority then adopts a dissent *678from a 1979 United States Supreme Court case to justify its conclusion that appellant has a protectible liberty interest in attaining her conditional release on parole, this protectible interest gives rise to due process entitlements, and the Parole Board therefore abused its discretion in not providing appellant with a more detailed written explanation for denying her parole. Adding to what I believe is the incredibleness of the majority’s conclusion is the fact that the issue whether appellant was denied due process under either the federal constitution or the state constitution was not decided by the circuit court that affirmed the Parole Board’s decision, and whose opinion we now review, because appellant did not raise the issue before them. Nor does she raise the due process issue before this Court. Rather, the question whether appellant has been denied due process is confined entirely to an amicus brief filed with this Court.
Having chosen to decide this issue in appellant’s favor utilizing a due process analysis, the majority must find that appellant has a protectible liberty interest in attaining her release on parole. As the majority notes, “[T]o obtain a protectible right ‘a person clearly must have more than an abstract need or desire for it. He must have more than a unilateral expectation of it. He must, instead, have a legitimate claim of entitlement to it.’ ” Greenholtz v Inmates of the Nebraska Penal & Correctional Complex, 442 US 1, 7; 99 S Ct 2100; 60 L Ed 2d 668 (1979) (quoting Bd of Regents v Roth, 408 US 564, 570-571; 92 S Ct 2701; 33 L Ed 2d 548 [1972]). In Greenholtz, a majority of the Supreme Court justices concluded, “That the state holds out the possibility of parole provides no more *679than a mere hope that the benefit will be obtained, ... a hope which is not protected by due process.” Id. at 11 (emphasis in original). At least one published opinion of this Court has recognized the viewpoint expressed by the Greenholtz majority. See People v Malmquist, 155 Mich App 521, 524; 400 NW2d 317 (1986).
Notwithstanding the unambiguous holding from the United States Supreme Court and its recognition by a prior panel of this Court, the majority adopts the conclusion of a minority of justices in Greenholtz that if a state has enacted a parole system, prison inmates retain a protected interest in securing their freedom through utilizing the system, and therefore due process must be observed during parole release proceedings. Greenholtz, supra at 23 (Marshall, J., dissenting).
I simply cannot agree with this adoption. Although I recognize that the Malmquist opinion is not binding on this panel, it is still good law, and I would follow its holding as well as the reasoning and conclusion of the majority of the justices in Greenholtz, supra, who held that “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.
n
I concur in the reasoning and conclusion of part n of the majority opinion.
m
The majority also finds that the Parole Board violated the Open Meetings Act (oma), MCL 15.261 et seq.; MSA 4.1800(11) et seq., by making its final deci*680sion to deny appellant parole without public notice of the proceedings and in a closed, informal voting procedure. The majority finds that by clear and unambiguous terms, the oma applies to the decisions of the Parole Board to grant or deny parole. I disagree. The Legislature manifested its intent to exempt the board from oma requirements by amending MCL 791.202(2); MSA 28.2272(2) in 1987 and deleting all language concerning the Parole Board. 1987 PA 79. Moreover, a prisoner serving a life sentence has no right to a public hearing absent the Parole Board’s decision to hold one. Middleton v Parole Bd (On Remand), 208 Mich App 563, 568; 528 NW2d 791 (1995).
In conclusion, I do not believe that appellant has demonstrated either a statutory mandate or a pro-tectible interest covered by due process guarantees that entitles her to a more detailed explanation of the reasons behind the Parole Board’s denial of parole. Nor do I believe that the Parole Board’s decision violated the oma. I would affirm the circuit court order, which denies appellant’s motion to reverse the Parole Board’s decision.