4th Amendment Violation

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: Nathaniel Brown v. Michael Randle, et al

Case No.: 14-2480

Officials: FLAUM, EASTERBROOK, and WILLIAMS, Circuit Judges

Focus: 4^th Amendment Violation

In 1994 Nathaniel Brown was convicted of four sex offenses and sentenced to prison in Illinois. His projected release date was July 10, 2009, after which his sentence required him to serve three years of “mandatory supervised release,” a status that officials in Illinois often call parole. When July 10 arrived, however, the Illinois Department of Corrections did not release Brown. Instead it issued a “Parole Violation Report” reciting that Brown had committed two anticipatory violations of the terms of supervised release. First, he had refused to accept electronic monitoring that is required of sex offenders; second, he lacked a place where he could lawfully reside outside the prison’s walls. (Like many other states, Illinois limits the locations where sex offenders can make their homes.) The problems are related. Illinois tries to find lawful accommodations for sex offenders who promise to wear electronic monitoring devices, but because Brown rejected the device the prison system did not try to help him find a place to live. Brown seeks damages for the delay in releasing him, yet he does not contend that either the electronic-monitoring or the residential-location condition of release is invalid. We have held that one is proper, and the Eighth Circuit has sustained the other. See Belleau v. Wall, 811 F.3d 929 (7th Cir. 2016) (state may require a sex offender to wear a GPS ankle bracelet as a condition of release); Weems v. Little Rock Police Department, 453 F.3d 1010 (8th Cir. 2006) (residential-location limits for sex offenders are valid); Doe v. Miller, 405 F.3d 700 (8th Cir. 2005) (same). Cf. Doe v. Lafayette, 377 F.3d 757 (7th Cir. 2004) (en banc) (states may prevent sex offenders from visiting places where children congregate). Nonetheless Brown contends that he was entitled to immediate release without regard to those conditions. Perhaps the state could have picked him up later and revoked his release, he allows, but first it had to discharge him. He contends that his confinement violated both the Fourth Amendment, applied to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment, and the Due Process Clause of that amendment.

Affirmed

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Attorney Derek A. Hawkins is the managing partner at Hawkins Law Offices LLC, where he heads up the firm’s startup law practice. He specializes in business formation, corporate governance, intellectual property protection, private equity and venture capital funding and mergers & acquisitions. Check out the website at www.hawkins-lawoffices.com or contact them at 262-737-8825.