Spencer v. Kemna, 523 U.S. 1, 14 (1998)

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14

SPENCER v. KEMNA

Opinion of the Court

We adhere to the principles announced in Lane, and decline to presume that collateral consequences adequate to meet Article III's injury-in-fact requirement resulted from petitioner's parole revocation. The question remains, then, whether petitioner demonstrated such consequences.

III

Petitioner asserts four concrete injuries-in-fact attributable to his parole revocation. First, he claims that the revocation could be used to his detriment in a future parole proceeding. This possibility is no longer contingent on petitioner's again violating the law; he has already done so, and is currently serving a 7-year term of imprisonment. But it is, nonetheless, still a possibility rather than a certainty or even a probability. Under Missouri law, as under the Illinois law addressed in Lane, a prior parole revocation "[does] not render an individual ineligible for parole[,] [but is] simply one factor, among many, that may be considered by the parole authority in determining whether there is a substantial risk that the parole candidate will not conform to reasonable conditions of parole." 455 U. S., at 633, n. 13. Under Missouri law, "[w]hen in its opinion there is reasonable probability that an offender . . . can be released without detriment to the community or himself, the board may in its discretion release or parole such person." Mo. Rev. Stat. § 217.690 (1996). The Missouri Supreme Court has said that this statute "giv[es] the Board 'almost unlimited discretion' in whether to grant parole release." Shaw v. Missouri Board of Probation and Parole, 937 S. W. 2d 771, 772 (1997).

been unnecessary. The Court did not contest the dissenters' contention that "respondents . . . seek to have the parole term declared void, or expunged," id., at 635 (Marshall, J., dissenting), which "would have the effect of removing respondents' parole-violation status and would relieve respondents of the collateral consequences flowing from this status," id., at 636, n. 1.

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