Early-release inmate wins Supreme Court appeal

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that state authorities must grant inmates hearings before removing them from some early-release programs.

The unanimous ruling was a victory for Ernest Eugene Harper, a convicted murderer in Oklahoma. Harper completed 15 years of a life sentence before being released in 1990 on pre- parole status -- an Oklahoma program designed to relieve prison overcrowding.

Harper spent five months outside prison gainfully employed and staying out of trouble, and was never charged with violating conditions of his release. He was nevertheless denied formal parole status and ordered back into prison with no hearing on his case.

Harper went to court, saying he had been entitled to the same kind of hearing granted to a parolee who has been accused of violating parole. An appeals court ruled that Harper had been denied due process, and the state of Oklahoma appealed the case to the Supreme Court.

"We hold that the program , as it appears to have been structured at the time (Harper) was placed on it, differed from parole in name only," Justice Clarence Thomas wrote for the court, "and affirm the (appeals court's) decision."

In a second decision issued Tuesday, the high court ruled against the IRS on a technical question involving estate taxes.

The court ruled in favor of the family of Otis Hubert, a Georgia man who died in 1986 leaving an estate valued at more than $30 million. The will was challenged, and the estate was not resolved until a 1990 settlement divided the estate between his widow and charities.

Before the settlement was reached, the estate incurred more than $2 million in administrative expenses. Most of the expenses were paid by income earned by the estate, which the IRS contended should have reduced the estate-tax deduction allowed for assets left to spouses or charities.

But a tax court judge and the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled for the Hubert estate. Tuesday, the Supreme Court upheld the lower court rulings. Justices Antonin Scalia and Stephen G. Breyer dissented from the 7-2 decision.

The decision should clarify tax law in cases involving large inheritances. The Justice Department has told the high court that the estate-tax question arises in "countless cases."

Correspondent Anthony Collings contributed to this report.

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• Supreme Court Justices
• FedWorld - Supreme Court Decisions

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