PEOPLE EX REL. GAITO v. COUTURE

Petitioner was sentenced to serve an indeterminate term of imprisonment of 5 to 15 years for various felony convictions and was subsequently released to parole supervision. Petitioner was thereafter charged with parole violations and, following a February 1998 final parole revocation hearing, his parole was revoked. Although petitioner requested an administrative appeal in April 1998, in the interim he brought this application in January 1999 seeking a writ of habeas corpus claiming that the parole regulations relied upon in assessing the penalty at his parole revocation hearing were unconstitutional ex post facto laws. Petitioner's application was dismissed by Supreme Court and we affirm.

It is well settled that "[h]abeas corpus relief is inappropriate in cases where the claimed errors could have been remedied by means of an administrative appeal" (People ex rel. Vazquez v. Travis, 236 A.D.2d 745, 746, appeal dismissed 91 N.Y.2d 847;see, People ex rel. Lee v. La Paglia, 249 A.D.2d 601, 602, lv denied 92 N.Y.2d 807). Notably, previous challenges to 9 NYCRR 8005.20 (c) on ex post facto grounds have been rejected (see,People ex rel. Tyler v. Travis, 269 A.D.2d 636 [Feb. 3, 2000];People ex rel. Kelly v. New York State Div. of Parole, 264 A.D.2d 361, 694 N.Y.S.2d 378; People ex rel. Johnson v. Russi, 258 A.D.2d 346,appeal dismissed, lv denied 93 N.Y.2d 945) and, in any event, we are unpersuaded that petitioner has raised "the type of constitutional claims that would justify departing from the general rule requiring exhaustion of administrative remedies" (People ex rel. Gibbs v. New York Bd. of Parole, 251 A.D.2d 718, 718, lv denied 92 N.Y.2d 814). Thus, before seeking judicial redress, petitioner was required to "pursue his administrative appeal to conclusion" (People ex rel. Carroll v. Russi, 232 A.D.2d 692, 692).

ORDERED that the judgment is affirmed, without costs.