This sounds like a terrible injustice. Here is the 10th Circuit’s description of the case (J. Tymkovich writing):
Miki Ann DiMarco lived her life as a woman even though she was anatomically male. In 2000, after she violated the terms of her probation, a Wyoming state court sentenced her to prison. Not realizing DiMarco’s medical condition and believing her to be a woman, the court placed her in Wyoming’s women’s correctional facility in Laramie. It was only during a routine prison intake examination that prison officials learned DiMarco was a hermaphrodite.
Because the officials believed that she presented a safety risk, DiMarco was placed in administrative segregation apart from the rest of the prison population. After an initial evaluation period, officials decided to continue her administrative segregation because they concluded she should not be placed with the general female prison population. Her confinement was reviewed every ninety days, but she remained segregated until her release from prison 14 months later.
DiMarco does not contest her segregation on appeal. Rather, the issue is whether Wyoming had a constitutional duty to provide her an opportunity to challenge the placement and conditions of confinement under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. DiMarco contends that she had a right to contest her prior placement and living conditions through an administrative hearing, and that Wyoming violated her rights by failing to provide the hearing. The district court agreed and held that the Wyoming Department of Corrections and the individual defendants violated her procedural due process rights. Since she had been released from prison in 2002 and before the time of trial, the district court awarded $1,000 in nominal damages as well as costs, attorney’s fees and expert fees.
Because we conclude DiMarco does not have a liberty interest in her placement and the conditions of confinement, we reverse.
Here is an except from the “background” section of the opinion:
As part of their review of DiMarco’s initial placement, prison officials determined that she was a low security risk. Placement officials nonetheless recommended that she be kept apart from the general population for three reasons: (1) DiMarco’s safety and that of the general female inmate population, (2) her physical condition, and (3) the need to tailor programs for her condition. WWC’s warden testified at trial that a primary concern was that other inmates might try to harm DiMarco if they discovered her physical condition. Furthermore, questions surrounded DiMarco’s identity because of DiMarco’s use of multiple, unverifiable aliases. The warden felt that she did not know enough about DiMarco to risk placing her in the general population.
The entire opinion is available here. Via the blog Polymorphous Perversity.
