PASADENA, Calif. (CN) – The full 9th Circuit should have been called to consider whether to let a sex offender challenge his parole conditions, as the question imperils “our constitutional system’s respect for state sovereignty,” five judges said Tuesday.
____ ____ alleges that California prison officials violated his civil rights by imposing residency and GPS monitoring restrictions typically reserved for sex offenders, even though he had only been convicted in the Golden State for robbery. The state justified the Jessica’s Law parole conditions because of ____’s sexual battery conviction in Tennessee 27 years ago.
Finding that ____ could seek relief only from the restrictions via habeas petition, a federal judge dismissed ____’s case.
This past August, a divided three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit concluded that the trial court had misapplied the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Heck v. Humphrey since ____ had not challenged either his underlying conviction or the parole itself – only certain conditions of the parole. Full Article
Can someone explain this for dummies like me?
I understand the retro-active application of a previous conviction requires that the person had been incarcerated in State Prison – presumably a California conviction resulting in a California prison confinement.
They have gone so far out of their way to ensnare people whose prior convictions are so far in the past and beyond California jurisdictions, it is beyond ridiculous.
I don’t know if my information is correct but I still had a hard time interpreting this article because of my limited knowledge of legalese.
If anyone can put this in simple terms what this means to us, I would also appreciate it.
My best guess is that this guy had exhausted his registry period in Tennessee (No longer required to register there). But recently he’s committed a new felony here in California. California has dug up the fact of his previous conviction of sexual assault and now wants to make him register for life as well as give him all the special treatment that a sex offender receives while on parole. He’s challenging this. I also believe that they had an issue when he filed his petition of habeas corpus past a certain deadline, but I think he was originally misled by the prison personnel that he could not file one while incarcerated.
This was just my own interpretation.
Ironically, I find his actions as a robber, particularly if he had or threatened use of a weapon, more frightening than the actions of the majority of registrants in their own crimes.
I believe that the significance of the article is the avenue of redress available to challenge conditions of parole. It seems that a parolee was previously required to bring such a challenge via Habeas Corpus. However, this person brought his challenge via lawsuit- alleging that his parole conditions were imposed in violation of his Constitutional Rights- under U.S.C. 42, sect.1983. The Dist. Court dismissed his complaint (under Heck v Humphrey), holding that Habeas Corpus was the appropriate avenue…but the 9th Cir. reversed that decision. In other words, according to the 9th Cir., a parolee can now sue (under sect.1983) if s/he believes their parole conditions are unconstitutional in some way. This opens-up a whole new can of worms,e.g., federal jurisdiction over state law issues; evidence laws; attorney’s fee’s; etc.. I know it’s confusing, but I hope this helps. P.S. I’m just a parolee who studied law for a few years (13?) in the pen,i.e.,a layman in the law.