Cinda Sandin, Unit Team Manager, Halawa Correctional Facility v. Demont R. D. Conner et al. (515 U.S. 472)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 19, 1995 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 515 U.S. 472 · 115 S. Ct. 2293
- Decided
- June 19, 1995
- Term
- October Term 1994
- Vote
- 5–4
- Majority author
- Justice Rehnquist
- Issue area
- Due Process
- Disposition
- Reversed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court. We granted certiorari to reexamine the circumstances under which state prison regulations afford inmates a liberty interest protected by the Due Process Clause. I DeMont Conner was convicted of numerous state crimes, including murder, kidnaping, robbery, and burglary, for which he is currently serving an indeterminate sentence of 30 years to life in a Hawaii prison. He was confined in the Halawa Correctional Facility, a maximum security prison in central Oahu. In August 1987, a prison officer escorted him from his cell to the module program area. The officer subjected Conner to a strip search, complete with an inspection of the rectal area. Conner retorted with angry and foul language directed at the officer. Eleven days later he received notice that he had been charged with disciplinary infractions. The notice charged Conner with “high misconduct” for using physical interference to impair a correctional function, and “low moderate misconduct” for using abusive or obscene language and for harassing employees. Conner appeared before an adjustment committee on August 28, 1987. The committee refused Conner’s request to present witnesses at the hearing, stating that “[witnesses were unavailable due to move [sic] to the medium facility and being short staffed on the modules.” App. to Pet. for Cert. A-67. At the conclusion…
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