Jerry Dempsey McIntyre v. Robert Bayer

We must decide whether a state statute, requiring interest generated by inmate trust accounts to be retained by prison authorities and expended for the benefit of the prison population as a whole, effects an unconstitutional taking.

I

Jerry Dempsey McIntyre is incarcerated at the Warm Springs Correctional Center in Carson City, Nevada. Like all inmates in Nevada prisons, he is required to keep his money, including wages earned during incarceration as well as any money received from outside sources, in a personal property trust fund run by the State of Nevada. See Nev.Rev.Stat. § 209.241(1) (1995). Inmates are allowed to make withdrawals from their trust accounts “for personal needs,” id. § 209.241(2)(b), and also can send checks outside the prison that are drawn on such accounts. While the state is required to “keep ... a full and accurate account of the[inmate’s] money,” id. § 209.241(2)(a), the inmate trust accounts are pooled together to generate interest. “The interest and income earned on the money in the fund, after deducting any applicable charges, must be credited to the offenders’ store fund.” Id. § 201.241(3). This “store fund,” in turn, “must be expended for…