Effects of Refusal to Allow Inmate to Call Witness Explained

The Third Department, in determining that a new hearing, not expungement, was the appropriate remedy, explained the ramifications of a hearing officer’s refusal of an inmate’s request to call witnesses:

“[W]hile ‘[a] hearing officer’s actual outright denial of a witness without a stated good-faith reason, or lack of any effort to obtain a requested witness’s testimony, constitutes a clear constitutional violation [requiring expungement,] [m]ost other situations constitute regulatory violations [requiring a new hearing]'” … .  Here, … the denial of the witnesses constituted a regulatory violation, and the proper remedy is to remit the matter for a new hearing… . Matter of Griffin, 515749, 3rd Dept 10-24-13