Cite as: 523 U. S. 1 (1998)
Opinion of the Court
and Robbins v. Christianson, 904 F. 2d 492 (CA9 1990).) We granted certiorari. 520 U. S. 1165 (1997).
II
The District Court's conclusion that Spencer's release from prison caused his petition to be moot because it no longer satisfied the "in custody" requirement of the habeas statute was in error. Spencer was incarcerated by reason of the parole revocation at the time the petition was filed, which is all the "in custody" provision of 28 U. S. C. § 2254 requires. See Carafas v. LaVallee, 391 U. S. 234, 238 (1968); Maleng v. Cook, 490 U. S. 488, 490-491 (1989) (per curiam). The more substantial question, however, is whether petitioner's subsequent release caused the petition to be moot because it no longer presented a case or controversy under Article III, § 2, of the Constitution. "This case-or-controversy requirement subsists through all stages of federal judicial proceedings, trial and appellate. . . . The parties must continue to have a 'personal stake in the outcome' of the lawsuit." Lewis v. Continental Bank Corp., 494 U. S. 472, 477-478 (1990). See also Preiser v. Newkirk, 422 U. S. 395, 401 (1975). This means that, throughout the litigation, the plaintiff "must have suffered, or be threatened with, an actual injury traceable to the defendant and likely to be redressed by a favorable judicial decision." Lewis, supra, at 477.
An incarcerated convict's (or a parolee's) challenge to the validity of his conviction always satisfies the case-or-controversy requirement, because the incarceration (or the restriction imposed by the terms of the parole) constitutes a concrete injury, caused by the conviction and redressable by invalidation of the conviction. Once the convict's sentence has expired, however, some concrete and continuing injury other than the now-ended incarceration or parole—some "collateral consequence" of the conviction—must exist if the suit is to be maintained. See, e. g., Carafas, supra, at 237-
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