In re Pers. Restraint of Winton

474 P.3d 532, 196 Wash. 2d 270
CourtWashington Supreme Court
DecidedSeptember 17, 2020
Docket97452-7
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 474 P.3d 532 (In re Pers. Restraint of Winton) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Washington Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In re Pers. Restraint of Winton, 474 P.3d 532, 196 Wash. 2d 270 (Wash. 2020).

Opinion

NOTICE: SLIP OPINION (not the court’s final written decision)

The opinion that begins on the next page is a slip opinion. Slip opinions are the written opinions that are originally filed by the court. A slip opinion is not necessarily the court’s final written decision. Slip opinions can be changed by subsequent court orders. For example, a court may issue an order making substantive changes to a slip opinion or publishing for precedential purposes a previously “unpublished” opinion. Additionally, nonsubstantive edits (for style, grammar, citation, format, punctuation, etc.) are made before the opinions that have precedential value are published in the official reports of court decisions: the Washington Reports 2d and the Washington Appellate Reports. An opinion in the official reports replaces the slip opinion as the official opinion of the court. The slip opinion that begins on the next page is for a published opinion, and it has since been revised for publication in the printed official reports. The official text of the court’s opinion is found in the advance sheets and the bound volumes of the official reports. Also, an electronic version (intended to mirror the language found in the official reports) of the revised opinion can be found, free of charge, at this website: https://www.lexisnexis.com/clients/wareports. For more information about precedential (published) opinions, nonprecedential (unpublished) opinions, slip opinions, and the official reports, see https://www.courts.wa.gov/opinions and the information that is linked there. For the current opinion, go to https://www.lexisnexis.com/clients/wareports/. FILE THIS OPINION WAS FILED FOR RECORD AT 8 A.M. ON IN CLERK’S OFFICE SEPTEMBER 17, 2020 SUPREME COURT, STATE OF WASHINGTON SEPTEMBER 17, 2020 SUSAN L. CARLSON SUPREME COURT CLERK

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON

In the Matter of the Personal Restraint of ) No. 97452-7 ) DON WESLEY WINTON, ) En Banc ) Petitioner. ) ) Filed : September 17, 2020

JOHNSON, J.—This case involves the discretion of the Indeterminate

Sentence Review Board (ISRB), under chapter 9.94A RCW and chapter 9.95

RCW, to restrict a parolee’s ability to travel while serving community custody.

The State seeks reversal of an unpublished Court of Appeals decision granting Don

Wesley Winton’s personal restraint petition (PRP) and striking a geographic

community custody condition imposed pursuant to RCW 9.95.420(2) that

restricted his travel into Clark County without prior approval. The Court of

Appeals analyzed the condition as implicating a fundamental constitutional right to

travel, applied strict scrutiny, found the condition was not narrowly tailored, and

vacated the condition. We reject the Court of Appeals’ analytical lens on the For the current opinion, go to https://www.lexisnexis.com/clients/wareports/. In re Pers. Restraint of Winton, No. 97452-7

grounds that a parolee remains under state custody and their constitutional right to

travel is curtailed and can be restricted under the statute. We reverse the Court of

Appeals and dismiss the PRP.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

In 2007, Winton pleaded guilty in Clark County Superior Court to two

counts of first degree child molestation and one count of third degree child

molestation. The sentencing court imposed an indeterminate sentence of 98 months

to life on one of the counts of first degree child molestation. The sentencing court

also imposed no contact orders with respect to the two victims, one permanent and

one for five years. The victims live in Clark County.

In September 2014, the ISRB granted Winton’s conditional release. The

initial conditions of release included geographic restrictions prohibiting Winton

from traveling to Seattle, Clark County, or Clallam County without prior written

approval from his community corrections officer and the ISRB. In October 2014,

the ISRB added an additional condition prohibiting travel to Skamania County and

the portion of Oregon north of Highway 20 without prior permission. In 2016, the

ISRB added Arch Cape, Oregon to the list of prohibited locations. In May 2018,

Winton filed this personal restraint petition seeking the removal of the

geographical conditions of his community custody. In July 2018, the ISRB

removed all geographic restrictions except the condition that he not enter Clark

2 For the current opinion, go to https://www.lexisnexis.com/clients/wareports/. In re Pers. Restraint of Winton, No. 97452-7

County without prior written approval; the victims still lived in Clark County and

Winton had requested and received permission to travel through the county in the

past. Winton asserts that he periodically travels to visit with his biological daughter

in Oregon and asserts that the Clark County restriction is burdensome because it

prohibits traveling to Oregon using Interstate 5 without first obtaining permission.1

Winton filed this challenge as a PRP in the Court of Appeals. The Court of

Appeals granted Winton’s PRP, analyzing the restriction as impacting Winton’s

constitutional right to travel, applying strict scrutiny to the ISRB’s travel condition,

and finding that it was not narrowly tailored. 2

ANALYSIS

We review questions of law in PRPs de novo. In re Pers. Restraint of Coats,

173 Wn.2d 123, 133, 267 P.3d 324 (2011). Community custody conditions are

reviewed for an abuse of discretion, but we review whether an entity had authority

to impose such restrictions de novo. State v. Armendariz, 160 Wn.2d 106, 110, 156

P.3d 201 (2007). The State’s primary concern and argument centers on the

standard of review applied by the Court of Appeals.

1 The ISRB narrowed the Clark County travel restriction in December 2018, allowing Winton to travel through Clark County, requiring permission only if Winton desires Clark County to be his final destination. 2 The Washington Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys [Lawyers] filed an amicus curiae brief in this case.

3 For the current opinion, go to https://www.lexisnexis.com/clients/wareports/. In re Pers. Restraint of Winton, No. 97452-7

While the right to travel is recognized as a fundamental right of citizenship,

this right is affected by a criminal conviction. See Bagley v. Harvey, 718 F.2d 921,

924 (9th Cir. 1983); see also Jones v. Helms, 452 U.S. 412, 420, 101 S. Ct. 2434,

69 L. Ed. 2d 118 (1981) (“[A]ppellee’s own misconduct had qualified his right to

travel interstate before he sought to exercise that right.”). Bagley addressed

whether a parole commission’s decision to parole Bagley to Iowa violated his right

to travel. After noting that other courts have found that parolees have a right to

travel, the Bagley court reached the opposite conclusion and upheld the travel

condition, reasoning that

[t]here can be no doubt that Bagley’s constitutional right to interstate travel was extinguished upon his valid convictions and imprisonment. Since, to this date, Bagley has never regained that freedom of travel he lost upon conviction, he may not invoke the due process clause of the fifth amendment to compel the Government to grant him the desired right.

718 F.2d at 924 (internal citation omitted).

We find the analysis in Bagley to be persuasive and applicable here.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
474 P.3d 532, 196 Wash. 2d 270, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-pers-restraint-of-winton-wash-2020.