by David M. Reutter
AS PREVIOUSLY REPORTED BY PLN, OFficials with the Nevada Department of Corrections (DOC) in 2020 lost a suit filed pro se in federal district court by a state prisoner they disciplined for smuggling methamphetamine through the prison mail, with the court agreeing his Fourteenth Amendment due-process ...
by David M. Reutter
In an opinion issued on September 8, 2021, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit ruled the federal district court in Colorado erred in dismissing a state prisoner’s claim filed under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), 42 U.S.C. ch. 126 §12101 et seq., ...
by David M. Reutter
An Illinois federal district court issued a preliminary injunction in favor of a state prisoner on October 12, 2021, requiring prison officials to provide him fresh or frozen kosher meal entrées because he suffers an allergic reaction to those provided, which are “shelf-stable.”
The prisoner, Mark ...
by David M. Reutter
On July 7, 2021, the Connecticut Department of Corrections (DOC) paid $1.65 million to settle a lawsuit alleging medical personnel failed to diagnose and treat a 19-year-old state prisoner who died of lupus.
The settlement resolves a lawsuit brought by the estate of Karon Nealy, Jr. ...
by David M. Reutter
A settlement agreement setting out guidelines for care that the Vermont Department of Corrections (DOC) will provide to prisoners with Hepatitis-C was finalized on May 14, 2021, calling for enhanced screening of incoming prisoners and altering policies and procedures governing who can receive Direct-Acting Antiviral (DAA) ...
by David M. Reutter
In a ruling on September 27, 2021, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit held that a “mixed dismissal” of a Pennsylvania prisoner’s civil rights action does not count as a strike under the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1996 that would prevent him ...
by David M. Reutter
On June 2, 2021, a federal district court in New York approved an agreement by Montgomery County to pay $1 million to resolve a federal class-action lawsuit alleging it provided inadequate nutrition to people held at its jail. The agreement includes an additional $317,083.22 in fees ...
A lesson in why privatized prison health care is the wrong answer
by David M. Reutter
On Friday, January 18, 2022, three days before sentencing in a pay-to-play bribery and corruption scandal involving health care at the city jail in Norfolk, Virginia, attorneys for disgraced former sheriff Bob McCabe filed ...
by David M. Reutter
On March 17, 2021, a federal district court in Tennessee awarded a $500,000 default judgment, plus another $60,863.75 in attorney’s fees, to a woman who alleged in a lawsuit that her probation officer sexually assaulted her.
The order from the U.S. District Court for the Eastern ...
Just in Time for the ‘Omicron Winter’
by David M. Reutter
On November 10, 2021, one day before first detection of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, a federal district court in Hawaii approved a settlement in a lawsuit filed over the response to the pandemic by ...
