The Dobbs Wire: Loss in 8th Circuit – Civil Commitment
Today a federal appeals court handed down a decision that allows Minnesota’s ‘civil commitment’ program for sexual wrongdoers to keep rolling. In 2015, after a six-week-long trial of a class action lawsuit brought by 700 individuals who continue to be held indefinitely–a federal judge was appalled at the goings-on and declared the Minnesota program unconstitutional. That’s history now as today’s appellate decision gives government officials and treatment providers a green light to run what is essentially a 21st century gulag. Minnesota’s civil commitment program is one of the worst of the 20 or so such operations in the country. ‘Treatment’ for which individuals are detained turns out to be a sham; few ever get their freedom back. The considerable liberty at stake is treated by courts as a civil matter so many of the due process protections afforded in criminal prosecutions don’t apply. Now the US Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has turned a blind eye to this governmental abuse of power. Here are links to mainstream media reports followed by a link to the court decision. –Bill Dobbs
Minneapolis Star Tribune | Jan. 3, 2017
Appellate court affirms constitutionality of Minnesota’s sex-offender program
Reversal is a victory for Minnesota, defeat for sex offenders who sued.
By Chris Serres
A federal appeals court in St. Louis has reversed a lower-court ruling that Minnesota’s sex-offender treatment program is unconstitutional — a major victory for the Minnesota Department of Human Services and a decision that could delay long-awaited reforms to the state’s system of indefinite detention for sex offenders.
In a decision Tuesday, a three-judge panel of the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals found that a class of sex offenders who sued the state failed to prove that the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP) violated their due process rights under the U.S. Constitution.
“We conclude that the class plaintiffs have failed to demonstrate that any of the identified actions of the state defendants or arguable shortcomings in the MSOP were egregious, malicious, or sadistic as is necessary to meet the conscience-shocking standard,” the court ruled. MORE:
Minnesota Public Radio | Jan. 3, 2017
Federal judges: MN sex offender program constitutional
By Brian Bakst
Excerpts: A U.S. Court of Appeals panel has reversed a ruling that had declared Minnesota’s sex offender confinement program unconstitutional, putting the matter back in the hands of a lower court and easing pressure on lawmakers to make major changes.
Tuesday’s ruling overturned an order by federal Judge Donovan Frank that threatened to upend the program. Frank ripped the program in his June 2015 ruling, saying the “stark reality is that there is something very wrong with this state’s method of dealing with sex offenders.”
More than 700 civilly committed sex offenders had sued the state claiming it was unconstitutional to keep them locked up indefinitely and that they don’t get adequate treatment from the program run by the Minnesota Department of Human Services. MORE:
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2017/01/03/federal-judges-mn-sex-offender-program-constitutional
Karsjens v. Piper
US Eight Circuit Court of Appeals, Case No. 15-3485
Decision filed Jan. 3, 2017:
http://media.ca8.uscourts.gov/opndir/17/01/153485P.pdf
Oral argument, April 12, 2016 — archived audio:
Think this one will go to SCOTUS?
SCOTUS won’t touch it until there is a discrepancy in rulings at the appellate level, I believe. Another state’s law would have to be challenged and then the ruling appealed setting up a conflict in the courts.