COVID-19 Summary: This class-action lawsuit originated with a claim that the Louisiana State Penitentiary provided inadequate medical care that violated the plaintiffs' Eighth Amendment rights. Upon learning that the penitentiary planned to transfer individuals with COVID-19 to the penitentiary, the plaintiffs filed an emergency motion to stop the transfer and re-open discovery to determine that the defendant's policies for COVID-19 were adequate. Both motions were denied as non-justiciable.

On May 20, 2015, prisoners incarcerated at Louisiana State Penitentiary filed this class-action lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Louisiana (Baton Rouge). The plaintiffs sued the Louisiana State Penitentiary and the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act, and 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The plaintiffs, represented by the ACLU and private counsel, asked the court for declaratory and injunctive relief. The plaintiffs claimed to have serious medical needs that went untreated, undertreated, or mistreated by the defendants in violation of the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The plaintiffs claimed that defendants engaged in systemic practices that exposed the plaintiffs to unacceptable risks to their health. These practices included routinely delaying specialty care, declining to provide medically necessary treatment, discouraging plaintiffs from requesting medical assistance, punishing plaintiffs who seek medical treatment, and maintaining an insufficient number of qualified medical personnel. The case was assigned to Judge Brian A. Jackson.

On December 14, 2015, the plaintiffs filed a motion for Entry of Protective Order Governing Protected and Individually Identifiable Health Information (PHI/IIHI). The order was granted on December 16, 2015 and the terms will survive through the end of litigation, and continue to fully apply to all materials containing PHI/IIHI. Further, the court will retain jurisdiction over all parties and persons who received access to such materials, indefinitely.

Plaintiffs moved for class certification on October 14, 2016. Plaintiffs moved for partial summary judgment on their ADA and Eighth Amendment claims on January 6, 2017. Defendants moved to disqualify the judge on February 28, 2017. The court (Judge Brian A. Jackson) granted defendants' motion to disqualify the judge on April 20, 2017, and the case was reassigned to Judge Shelly D. Dick. Defendants filed a sealed motion for summary judgment on May 12, 2017. The court denied both parties' motions for summary judgment on September 21, 2017, but granted parties to re-urge the motions, without being required to refile them, following the hearing on the class action certification.

The court granted class action certification on February 26, 2018 as "all inmates who now, or will be in the future, incarcerated at LSP" and a granted a subclass of "all qualified individuals with a disability, as defined by the ADA/RA, who are now, or will be in the future, incarcerated at LSP." Defendants subsequently moved to re-urge their motion for summary judgment on July 11, 2018. A bench trial was held between October 11 and October 25, 2018.

After both parties submitted post-trial briefs, they engaged in a settlement conference before the court on July 24, 2019. The parties were unable to reach a resolution. While negotiations continued, the court conducted a site visit at Angola State Penitentiary on February 4, 2020.

Almost three weeks later, the court issued an order informing the parties that it was preparing to issue a ruling on the merits. The order stated that the court planned to find the medical care at Angola State Penitentiary unconstitutional in some respects and was prepared to order injunctive relief to remediate these findings. The court encouraged the litigants to reach an agreement on some or all of the claims.

The sudden onset of the COVID-19 pandemic led the plaintiffs to file an emergency motion to re-open discovery on March 28. Given the congregated nature of the Louisiana State Penitentiary and penitentiary's history of inadequate medical care, the plaintiffs were concerned that the penitentiary would be a "tinderbox" for a COVID-19 outbreak. Therefore, the plaintiffs moved to re-open discovery for the "limited and sole purpose of ensuring that Defendants' policies and practices concerning COVID-19 do not place class members at a substantial risk of serious harm or likely death."

Three days later, the plaintiffs filed an emergency motion to restrain the defendants from transferring COVID-19 carriers to the Louisiana State Penitentiary. The plaintiffs argued that the penitentiary already possesses inadequate medical care (as evidenced by the original claim of this case alleging that the medical care was unconstitutional), and that the planned transfer would place the class members at particular risk given that many members are either elderly or suffer from underlying medical conditions. If the transfer were to occur as planned, the plaintiffs argue, the harm would be irreparable.

On April 2, Judge Shelly Dick denied the plaintiff's Emergency Motion to Re-open Discovery, and denied the plaintiff's Emergency Motion to Restrain Defendants from Transferring COVID-19 Carriers. The judge found both measures to be non-justiciable. The two measures were found to be beyond the scope of the original claims asserted, and the plaintiff did not cite an authority for joining these independent claims to their ongoing case. Further, Judge Dick found the plaintiff's measures to be based on speculation and conjecture as to what the defendant "might" do with respect to transferring prisoners.

A settlement conference was held on June 4, and the case is ongoing.

Lakshmi Gopal - 10/17/2015
Elizabeth Heise - 10/28/2018
Justin Hill - 06/15/2020


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