Attorneys: Alabama Making Little Progress in Prison Staffing
This follows a court order that state prisons increase staffing dramatically by 2022.
Judge: Alabama has been ‘indifferent’ to isolated inmates
A federal judge said Monday that Alabama has been “deliberately indifferent” about monitoring the mental health of state inmates placed in the isolation of segregation cells. U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson issued the ruling days after attorneys for inmates said the suicide rate in state prisons has reached a crisis level. “The court finds that the (Alabama prison system’s) failure to provide adequate periodic mental-health assessments of prisoners in segregation creates a substantial risk of serious harm for those prisoners,” Thompson wrote in the 66-page order. Thompson wrote that prison officials have been “deliberately indifferent with regard to their failure to provide adequate periodic evaluations of mental health to prisoners in segregation.” Alabama Department of Corrections spokesman Bob Horton said the department is reviewing the decision. Thompson in 2017 wrote that mental health care in state prisons was “horrendously inadequate” and violated the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. In his Monday order, Thompson said the failure to adequately monitor inmates in segregation contributes to the unconstitutional conditions. Thompson directed the prison system and attorneys for inmates to confer on how to proceed. The Southern Poverty Law Center, which is representing inmates in the ongoing class-action lawsuit over prison mental health care, praised the decision. “It has been evident for years that ADOC has failed to identify, monitor, and properly care for people who have serious mental illnesses and who develop them in ADOC custody. That systematic failure has led to needless suffering, especially for people in segregation,” said Maria Morris, senior supervising attorney at the SPLC. The advocacy organization said Friday that there have been 13 suicides in 14 months. “People are killing themselves in our prisons because conditions are horrendous,” Southern Poverty Law Center President Richard Cohen said at a news conference with the families of inmates. The prison system said in a response Friday that it was working to address the issue, and said the suicide spike “calls into question the long-term effectiveness of the suicide prevention measures proposed by the SPLC” during the litigation. Republished with permission from the Associated Press
ADOC responds to SPLC’s claim state has prison suicide crisis
The Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) has responded to claims by the the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) that the state has a suicide crisis that demands immediate action. The ADOC said the recent spike in suicides in an “on-going concern” and the department is actively working on a solution. As reported by a number of media outlets today, 13 inmates in the custody of the Alabama Department of Corrections have died by suicide in the past 14 months. While the total number of recent suicides is significant, each suicide within an ADOC facility is a tragic and unfortunate event. Each of these 13 suicides represents a different person who faced individual struggles and challenges that led to their death. Nevertheless, the ADOC investigates every suicide and the circumstances surrounding each suicide to evaluate ways in which the Department can improve its existing suicide prevention program. … The recent spike in suicides within ADOC is an on-going concern and will be addressed by the ADOC. On March 8, 2019, an expert retained by the ADOC will issue a report (jointly authored with an SPLC expert) on recommendations on additional suicide prevention measures. Once we receive this report, the ADOC intends to fully implement those measures that will ensure a long-term solution in the prevention of suicides. The ADOC is referring to the deaths of 13 inmates in state custody have committed suicide in the last 14 months. In fact, in 2018 the suicide rate in ADOC facilities was higher than any previous year. And since since November 21, 2018, there has been an average of one suicide every 11.4 days in the ADOC, with two of those having been completed in 2019 – just eighteen days into the year. Which is what led the SPLC to take action on Friday. The group, along with victims’ families and their attorney, met at the Alabama State House where they called on the ADOC, Governor Kay Ivey, and state legislators to immediately address the systemic mental health crisis and need for comprehensive criminal justice reform. “Since a federal court found that mental health care in ADOC facilities was grossly inadequate in the summer of 2017, ADOC has continued to fail to provide adequate protection for suicidal people in its custody,” said Maria Morris, senior supervising attorney for the SPLC. “The result is that Alabamians under the supervision of ADOC, many of whom suffer from mental illness, hopelessness, and despair and are not receiving the resources they need, have taken their own lives. ADOC should take action. They need to step up and treat this like what it is – a life and death emergency.” On staffing, ADOC’s previous analysis provided to a federal court states it must hire 2261 new corrections officers and 130 new corrections supervisors by February 2022 to meet basic legal and safety standards for both officers and prisoners, which will add over $100 million annually to the ADOC budget. According to the SPLC, there is little evidence that ADOC is on a path to meet those benchmarks. Meanwhile, press reports indicate that the governor and ADOC staff are preparing to build three mega-prisons at a cost of a billion dollars or more. “These men died senselessly from suicide because they did not get adequate care from the Alabama Department of Corrections,” added Mitch McGuire, attorney for many of the victims’ families. “That’s unacceptable and immoral, and their families will never replace them.” “The Legislature must solve this emergency because Governor Ivey and Commissioner Dunn have been derelict in their duty,” said Richard Cohen, president of the SPLC. “Every year without action, the crisis deepens and grows more expensive and harder to fix. The costs to the state of Alabama will grow and we will continue to mourn the deaths of incarcerated people who did not receive constitutionally-required care. Despite the SPLC’s complaints ADOC Commissioner Jeff Dunn says he is focused on solving this problem. “Our department is committed to providing appropriate care for those with mental illness and we have plan to address the conditions inside our prisons that hinder our ability to meet that commitment,” Dunn said. “In addition to increasing our mental health staff, we also are developing a prison revitalization plan that will consolidate the delivery of mental and medical health care in a new state-of-the-art health care facility. More information about the plan will be made public in the coming days. I am focused on solving this problem.” Suicides in ADOC from Dec. 2017 to Feb. 2019 (supplied by the SPLC):
Advocacy group: Alabama has prison suicide crisis
An advocacy group charged Friday that Alabama officials have failed to address a rising suicide rate in state prisons despite a federal court order to improve conditions for mentally ill inmates. Attorneys representing inmates in an ongoing lawsuit over mental health care argued state officials have done “precious little” to address inmate suicides. “People are killing themselves in our prisons because conditions are horrendous,” Southern Poverty Law Center President Richard Cohen said at a news conference outside the Alabama Statehouse. The organization said there have been 13 suicides in 14 months, the latest one on Wednesday. Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey’s office and the prison system did not immediately react to the allegations. A prison system spokesman said the department was working on a response. However, a state lawmaker said the prison system is working to improve conditions, but cautioned it will take time. “There is no question the suicide rate is higher than it should be. The data speaks for itself,” said state Sen. Cam Ward, who chairs a prison oversight committee. Alabama Department of Corrections monthly reports list that they were four inmate suicides in fiscal year 2017 and six in 2018. In late December and January, there were three suicides within four weeks in the state prisons. With their 8-year-old granddaughter beside her, Jerri Ford wiped away tears as she described the loss of her husband, Paul Ford. “He was our everything, everything and we don’t have him anymore. And it’s not right,” Jerri Ford said. Paul Ford, 49, was found hanging last month from a bed sheet in his cell at Kilby Correctional Facility. He was serving a sentence of life in prison without parole following a murder conviction. In court filings, the SPLC said, Ford had a prior suicide attempt and spent much of the past year in a restrictive setting or on some form of crisis watch. Jerri Ford said in the months before his death, she began to worry about her husband’s mental state. “He was seeing things, hallucinating. … He was scared to go to sleep,” she said. Inmate lawyers have asked a federal judge to block the state from placing prisoners with serious mental illnesses into segregation units or similar settings, where they said the extreme isolation becomes an incubator for worsening mental health symptoms. The judge responded by asking for the state to provide information on how many inmates are in such settings. U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson in 2017 ruled that mental health care in Alabama prisons was “horrendously inadequate.” In court filings, the state contends it has added mental health staff and is working to increase the number of corrections officers working in state prisons. Corrections Commissioner Jeff Dunn told lawmakers last month that the department is seeking a funding increase to hire 500 additional corrections officers, what he called a “down payment” amid plans to eventually add 2,000 correctional officers Ivey is expected to announce a proposal soon to replace state prisons, possibly leasing facilities built by private firms. The SPLC criticized the push for prison construction, saying the plan will be costly when the state faces a staff shortage. “Jamming thousands of people into some shiny new building will not solve the constitutional violations,” Maria Morris, an attorney with the SPLC, said. Republished with permission from the Associated Press
Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes sues Montgomery-based Southern Poverty Law Center
Gavin McInnes, conservative provocateur and talk show host best known as the founder of the far-right fraternal organization known as the Proud Boys, on Monday filed a lawsuit against the Montgomery-based Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) for damages after the group designated his work as hate speech. In a statement released after the filing, McInnes said, “They have harassed me, my family, and my friends to a level of tortious interference that goes well into sabotage.” McInnes, a Canadian immigrant and comedian, claims he is an “avowed and vocal opponent of discrimination based on race, religion or sexual preference, and of ideologies and movements espousing extremism, nationalism and white supremacy.” In a YouTube statement published November 21, 2018 McInnes formally stepped away from the Proud Boys group and gave an extensive background of their history. The video description includes this statement, “As of today, November 21st, 2018, I am officially disassociating myself from the Proud Boys, in all capacities, forever. I quit.” In the taped statement, he asserts the mainstream media has repeatedly mischaracterized the purpose of the group as well as the members beliefs. In an interview with AL.Today a spokesman for McInnes described the group saying of members of the Proud Boys, “They share a common world view, they’re pro-western values, but don’t all share the same political beliefs and have never been a hate group.” McInnes claims the SPLC has given him a “Hate Designation,” a means by which it identifies activists, political figures and groups as targets that disagree with their own ideologies and designates them as “extremists,” “white supremacists,” and “hate groups” in order to “achieve its goals and those of its donors.” The 70-page complaint was electronically filed early evening Sunday in the Middle District of Alabama outlining defamation and other tortious acts resulting in reputation and economic damages. In the suit, McInnes says the SPLC is “defaming him by use of the SPLC Hate Designations, and publishing other false, damaging and defamatory statements about him.” McInnes is being represented by noted First Amendment attorney Ron Coleman of Mandelbaum Salsburg P.C. and Baron Coleman of the Baron Coleman Law Firm. Attorney Ron Coleman emphasized the significance of the case in relation of the growing partisan divide and practice of censorship by stating, “[t]his lawsuit has implications beyond Gavin McInnes because we’re challenging the use of deplatforming and defunding to privately censor speech. If we can’t stop this phenomenon now, the First Amendment will be rendered meaningless as dissent is silenced through private actors such as SPLC and its allies.” Montgomery-based attorney Baron Coleman noting, “I wasn’t familiar with Gavin or his work prior to beginning work on this case. But there is absolutely zero excuse in America for systematically targeting someone for complete personal and financial destruction because they support a different politician or different set of political beliefs. I wouldn’t represent a racist or an anti-semite. And Gavin is neither. And the most horrific part of this entire ordeal is that the SPLC knows Gavin isn’t a racist or anti-semite or anything else they’ve labeled him. Rather, he supports a different slate of politicians with his satire and wit, and the SPLC would rather destroy him than have him out there convincing other people to see politics his way.” For those interested in donating to McInnes’s legal defense fund it can be found at defendgavin.com Read the lawsuit below:
Alabama prison system ordered to report mental health segregation data
On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson issued an order for the Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) to report how many inmates with mental illnesses have been placed in segregation units, The Associated Press reports. This comes when attorneys for inmates requested intervention after three suicides occurred in four weeks in state prisons. Thompson previously instructed state prisons not to isolate prisoners without extenuating circumstances after finding in 2017 that care for mentally ill inmates was “horrendously inadequate.” History of mental health issues in Alabama prisons The issue of mental health care in state prisons has been ongoing. In December 2018, Alabama prison officials stated that they were making “substantial progress” in increasing mental health staff and asked not to be held in contempt of court of an order requiring minimum levels of mental health staff. In a December filing, the ADOC wrote that Wexford Health Sources, the contractor hired to provide health care, had not been able to meet staffing targets but said “both are making all efforts to increase staffing as quickly as possible.” The letter continued, “In sum, the state is not contending that it has fulfilled every requirement of the staffing remedial order. But it has made in good faith all reasonable efforts to do so, and those efforts have resulted in substantial progress.” They claimed that a shortage of professionals available, especially in rural areas, has made staffing difficult. Lawyers for the inmates wrote “Defendants’ contempt is placing prisoners with serious mental-health needs at a substantial risk of serious harm every day. Their failures are most evident when looking at staffing levels for mental-health staff with advanced training, specifically psychiatrists, CRNPs, psychologists, and registered nurses.” In September of 2018, the Southern Poverty Law Center asked Judge Thompson to hold the ADOC in contempt. “Adequate staffing is critical to address the mental health needs and secure the safety of the prisoners in ADOC’s care,” said Maria Morris, senior supervising attorney at the SPLC. “Time and time again, ADOC has failed to meet court-ordered deadlines to fill essential staffing positions. We have no confidence that ADOC is doing all it can to hire enough staff to care for prisoners with mental illnesses. We are asking the court to rule ADOC in contempt for continuing to fail to meet these court-ordered deadlines.” This came after a warden testified in February 2018 after a mentally ill prisoner committed suicide.
SPLC sues ALEA for suspending Alabama licenses for unpaid traffic tickets
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is challenging Alabama’s practice of suspending drivers licenses of individuals who fail to pay traffic tickets, arguing it violates the Fourteenth Amendment by “punishing persons simply because they are poor.” The SPLC filed a lawsuit against the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency (ALEA) last Monday in which it claims roughly 23,000 Alabamians are without a valid divers license because they’ve been unable to pay traffic tickets. “A suspended driver’s license has disastrous implications for individuals living in poverty,” said Micah West, SPLC senior staff attorney. “The U.S. Constitution prohibits the state from suspending a person’s driver’s license without first determining their ability to pay. Through this lawsuit, we hope to end this illegal practice in Alabama.” The lawsuit describes how, under an existing rule of criminal procedure, Alabama courts routinely suspend driver’s licenses for nonpayment of traffic tickets without prior notice, an inquiry into an individual’s ability to pay, or an express finding that nonpayment was willful, as required by the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses to the U.S. Constitution. The ALEA carries out these suspensions and does not reinstate driver’s licenses until the individual has paid all outstanding fines and costs to the court. The SPLC filed the suit on behalf of three Alabama residents who had their licenses suspended. They seek a preliminary injunction to halt the practice while the case is before the court. Earlier this year, SPLC filed a lawsuit challenging similar practices in North Carolina and reached an agreement with the Mississippi last year that will result in the state lifting failure to pay suspensions for over 100,000 people. Lawsuits have also been filed challenging the suspension of driver’s licenses for nonpayment in Tennessee, Michigan, California and Virginia.
SPLC asks judge to rule Alabama’s prison system in contempt over mental health staffing
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is asking U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson to hold the Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) in contempt for failing to meet deadlines for increasing mental health staffing. “Adequate staffing is critical to address the mental health needs and secure the safety of the prisoners in ADOC’s care,” said Maria Morris, senior supervising attorney at the SPLC. “Time and time again, ADOC has failed to meet court-ordered deadlines to fill essential staffing positions. We have no confidence that ADOC is doing all it can to hire enough staff to care for prisoners with mental illnesses. We are asking the court to rule ADOC in contempt for continuing to fail to meet these court-ordered deadlines.” In the summer of 2017, Thompson ruled Alabama’s psychiatric care of state inmates is “horrendously inadequate” and in violation the U.S. Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment. In February, he set deadlines in May, June and July for increasing mental health staff, which the ADOC has failed to do. On Friday, Thompson issued an order requesting a hearing to begin Tuesday at the federal courthouse in Montgomery, Ala. to give ADOC the opportunity to show they should not be held in contempt. Parties ruled to be in contempt can face fines and, in some cases, jail time. SPLC is asking here that a monitor be appointed to oversee how ADOC is progressing and to keep the Court and the Plaintiffs informed.
Judge rules Cullman County’s bail system illegally discriminates against the poor
People who fall victim to what many deem a “two-tiered” system of justice that’s based on wealth, won a significant victory in Cullman County, Ala. on Thursday when a federal court judge ruled that the practice of jailing those who cannot afford cash bail is unconstitutional. U.S. District Court Judge Madeline Haikala entered a preliminary injunction order that prohibits Cullman County from continuing to discriminate against the poor through its bail system, which many deem a “two-tiered” system of justice that’s based on wealth. Her decision follows a memorandum opinion entered last week explaining why the county’s practices were illegal. As the Court explained, “Cullman County’s discriminatory bail practices deprive indigent criminal defendants in Cullman County of equal protection of the law” and its justifications for using a bail schedule are “illusory and conspicuously arbitrary.” This preliminary injunction will remain in effect while the lawsuit challenging the practice is fully resolved and permanent relief is ordered. The suit was brought by the Southern Poverty Law Center(SPLC), Civil Rights Corps, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama on behalf of Bradley Hester, who was held on a $1,000 bond he could not afford. “Today was a big win for all Cullman County residents because no longer will the county be allowed to treat residents with means differently than those without in our criminal justice system,” said Sam Brooke, deputy legal director, the Southern Poverty Law Center. “Jails are not meant to warehouse people who have not been convicted of a crime, particularly where, as here, the rich are able to buy their freedom and impoverished people are left to languish in jail. This form of wealth-based discrimination that keeps people in jail just because they cannot afford their freedom is unconstitutional. We will continue to fight to eliminate wealth-based justice.” Katherine Hubbard, attorney, Civil Rights Corps, says most municipal courts have already moved away from cash. bail. “Today’s decision affirms that progress, and encourages more, recognizing that our district and circuit courts still have a long way to go,” she said. “We look forward to working with the county officials to ensure their new practices comply with the preliminary injunction order, and we will continue our litigation against Cullman County until permanent relief is implemented.” “The federal court’s decision today acknowledges what policy makers, advocates, and state courts across the country are recognizing: that locking people up simply based on poverty is unacceptable, and that a just bail system must provide robust protections to ensure that those presumed innocent are released pretrial, while only the most severe cases will require detention,” added Brock Boone, staff attorney, ACLU of Alabama. Brock continued, “Cullman County is in many ways typical of courts across Alabama. Far too often, its bail system results in people being locked away pretrial simply because they could not pay. Courts throughout Alabama, and the country, are setting bail above what people can pay, without any protections to ensure that this draconian penalty is used only when absolutely necessary.” Others moving away from cash bail Last month, California became the first state to fully abolish cash bail, a step backers said would create a more equitable criminal justice system, that’s not as dependent on a person’s wealth. “Several U.S. cities and states have in recent years reduced their reliance on bail, arguing the system unfairly confines poor people, creating overcrowded jails and extra costs for taxpayers,” the Wall Street Journal reported. Those who have been accused of crimes will instead be assessed, released on their own recognizance, given conditions for their release (GPS trackers, placed on house arrest) or held in jail.
SPLC apologizes, pays $3.3M to Islamic reformer it wrongly labeled ‘anti-Muslim extremist’
The Montgomery, Ala.-based Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) on Monday announced a settlement agreement with Islamic reformer Maajid Nawaz and his organization, the Quilliam Foundation, for wrongly including them on a now-deleted list of “anti-Muslim extremists.” The list, A Journalist’s Manual: Field Guide to Anti-Muslim Extremists, was published as a resource for journalists in 2016 to help identify “anti-Muslim extremists.” Nawaz, a current Muslim and a former Islamist, threatened to sue the SPLC for defamation for wrongly accusing him of being an extremist. Seeing has how they had no path to win in court, the SPLC admitted their error in inclusion and agreed to pay Nawaz and Quilliam $3.375 million “to fund their work to fight anti-Muslim bigotry and extremism.” “Since we published the Field Guide, we have taken the time to do more research and have consulted with human rights advocates we respect,” SPLC president Richard Cohen said in a statement. “We’ve found that Mr. Nawaz and Quilliam have made valuable and important contributions to public discourse, including by promoting pluralism and condemning both anti-Muslim bigotry and Islamist extremism.” Cohen said the SPLC will look to their insurance carrier to cover the cost of the settlement. “It was the right thing to do in light of our mistake and the right thing to do in light of the growing prejudice against the Muslim community on both sides of the Atlantic,” he added. Watch Cohen’s video statement below:
New study reveals Alabama has 5th highest incarceration rate in the world
The Prison Policy Initiative released a new report in May comparing the incarceration rate of each American state to countries around the world, and the Yellowhammer state came in fifth place overall. Fifth place, compared to the entire world; yikes Alabama. Oklahoma topped the list with 1,079 inmates per 100,000 of populous in their state but Alabama was not far behind, reporting 946 people imprisoned per 100,000 people in the state; the U.S. national average is 698 per 100,000. But the Yellowhammer state was not the only one with higher ratings, a total 23 states in the nation were reported to have rates over the national average, giving them the highest incarceration rates in the world. The report then compared these numbers to other nations around the world, where even places like Slovakia, Argentina, Australia and the Ukraine had less than 200 people per 100,000 incarcerated. “If we imagine every state as an independent nation…every state appears extreme,” said the report. “Massachusetts, the state with the lowest incarceration rate in the nation, would rank 9th in the world, just below Brazil and followed closely by countries like Belarus, Turkey, Iran, and South Africa.” “States like Alabama, with incarceration rates even higher than the U.S. average, compare even worse. Next to other stable democracies, Alabama is off the charts,” the Prison Policy Initiative explained. The prison system in Alabama is long overdue for an overhaul, the state prison system houses nearly twice the inmates it was designed for. Prison officers and inmates have been killed and injured in a series of violent crimes behind bars, and with several reports this year of Sheriff’s stealing and pocketing hundreds of thousands of dollars meant for inmates food rations, it’s a wonder we’re not talking about this issue. In 2014, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and the Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program filed a lawsuit against the Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) to end the poor conditions in the state prison system, including the understaffing of both correctional and mental health workers. According to the SPLC, as of January 2018, the state still hadn’t come up with an acceptable remedy to address the “horrendously inadequate” and unconstitutional mental health care and staffing needs of the ADOC. “As Gov. Kay Ivey and ADOC Commissioner Jeff Dunn have both recognized, the constitutional violations of how the state treats prisoners developed over a generation. It will be difficult, and likely costly, to fix them. But ADOC has to fix them,” said Maria Morris, senior supervising attorney for the SPLC, and lead litigator in the case. Ivey responded by adding an additional $51 million to the ADOC budget earlier in 2018.
SPLC claims Medicaid work requirements have disparate impact on communities of color
In January, Gov. Kay Ivey and state Medicaid officials revealed a plan for Alabama to become the newest state to institute a work requirement for some Medicaid recipients. Ivey’s office announced in March, that the Yellowhammer State would formally be seeking permission from the federal government to make that change to its Medicaid program. Ivey’s administration and Alabama Medicaid believe the changes will put Alabamians on a path to better health outcomes, but Sam Brooke, deputy legal director for the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), disagrees. “We have long known that subjecting Medicaid recipients to bureaucratic hurdles like work requirements will force them off the rolls, and that those forced to work who aren’t able will assuredly see their health decline,” he said. “We are now seeing that, in an effort to mitigate these harms in rural, predominantly white counties where few jobs are offered, the government will make an exception. This is particularly problematic because the unemployment rate in urban centers is often just as bad or worse, but it is masked by the use of county-wide data that includes much better off and affluent white neighborhoods.” Brooke believes the work requirements will disadvantage communities of color, in the crossfire of “welfare reform.” “These changes are not reform,” said Brooke. “They are benefit cuts intended to save dollars by kicking off people of color who are deemed ‘undeserving’ by criteria that are neither fair nor objective. We’ve seen this before. We don’t need to make this mistake again.” Ivey’s proposal would only apply to “able-bodied” Parent or Caretaker Relative (POCR) recipients — with exemptions being made for people with disabilities, anyone who pregnant or receiving post-partum care, anyone required to care for a disabled child or adult, among others — that will require unemployed or underemployed adults to become gainfully employed, or participate in training opportunities to enhance their potential for full employment. Several other Republican majority states are seeking similar Medicaid work waivers, with Kentucky being the first state to move forward with the work requirements, which the Trump administration approved in January.
