by David M. Reutter

On April 26, 2024, the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) entered into the last of multiple settlement agreements with a Muslim prisoner who accused the prison agency of failing to accommodate his religion and discriminating against him because of his faith. The settlements provided for attorney’s fees and mandated injunctive relief regarding medical care and housing arrangements for the prisoner, Ahmed Ajaj.

Ajaj, 58, went into BOP custody in 1993 after a conviction for bombing the World Trade Center in Manhattan. He was housed in high security prisons until the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, which destroyed the same buildings he had targeted. BOP “abruptly” placed Ajaj in the Special Housing Unit (SHU), without notice of disciplinary action. He was then moved in September 2002 to the Administrative Maximum (ADX) prison, also known as the “Alcatraz of the Rockies,” in Florence, Colorado. In January 2010, Ajaj was transferred once more, this time to the U.S. Penitentiary (USP) in Marion, Illinois; there he was placed in the Communications Management Unit, which manages and monitors and severely restricts prisoners’ communications with the outside world. Then in May 2012 he was again abruptly transferred back to ADX.

As PLN reported, BOP allegedly refused to provide oral medications at ADX after sundown, forcing Ajaj to break his religious fasts to orally ingest them. He sued in 2015, accusing BOP officials of violating the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb, et seq., also calling the transfer back to ADX “clear retaliation for filing administrative grievances, many of them related to religious issues.” After a move to USP-Terre Haute in Indiana, the federal court for the District of Colorado dismissed his group-prayer claims, agreeing with Defendants that they were mooted by the move from ADX. But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit reversed that decision in February 2022. [See: PLN, Aug. 2022, p.32.]

Meanwhile, BOP agreed to settle Ajaj’s claims-to-date in 2019 for attorney’s fees with a payment of $175,000. After the Tenth Circuit’s decision, the parties proceeded to reach two more settlement agreements. One entered on April 23, 2024, provided for an additional $35,000 in attorney fees and costs. The settlement also promised care for the prisoner’s chronic fatigue syndrome, allowing Ajaj to choose a specialist to examine and treat him and requiring BOP to provide medication that the specialist prescribed. The settlement further provided for Ajaj “to be permitted to make a $350 monthly special purchase order for halal food products, including halal sweets,” since one of his related religious claims involved allegations that his access to a halal diet was disrupted with BOP’s frequent transfers.

The parties entered into a third settlement agreement on April 26, 2024, to resolve Ajaj’s remaining claims. The agreement provided for his transfer to USP in Coleman, Illinois, in a worker’s or program unit. The agreement also allowed Ajaj to pray with other Muslim prisoners and access video visits with his family, as well as giving him 60 days to choose a suitable Muslim prisoner as a cellmate, subject to BOP approval; failure to meet the 60-day deadline would punt the choice of cellmate back to the agency.

Ajaj was represented throughout the long years of his case by Laura L. Rovner and fellow attorneys with the University of Denver Sturm College of Law Civil Rights Clinic, along with co-counsel from attorney Darold W. Killmer of Killmer Lane & Newman LLP in Denver. See: Ajaj v. Fed. Bur. of Prisons, USDC (D. Colo.), Case No. 1:15-cv-00992.  

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