In re Efstathiou

This case concerns a constitutional challenge to an amendment of Penal Code section 2933.6. (Pen. Code, § 2933.6, subd. (a); hereafter, section 2933.6(a) or the section 2933.6(a) amendment.) 1 That amendment, effective January 25, 2010, makes prison gang members, who are placed in an administrative segregation unit upon validation, ineligible to earn sentence reduction conduct credits during such placement.

Through a petition for writ of habeas corpus, petitioner Christopher Efstathiou challenges this amendment on ex post facto and procedural due process grounds.

We shall deny the petition. As for ex post facto, the amendment does not apply retrospectively to petitioner. As for procedural due process, the determination that petitioner has chosen to remain an active prison gang member was supported by the applicable legal standard of “some evidence.”

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

In 1999, the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (the Department) validated petitioner as a member of the Nazi Low Riders (NLR) prison gang. On January 5, 2006, the Department again validated petitioner as an NLR member. In 2009, petitioner was paroled but returned to prison in…