On June 1, 2017, former detainees at a private detention facility in Leavenworth, Kansas filed this lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas. The plaintiffs sued CoreCivic, Inc. (the facility's operator) and Securus Technologies, Inc. (its phone and video services provider) for violations of the Kansas, Missouri and federal (18 U.S.C. §§ 2510, et seq.) wiretapping statutes. The plaintiffs were represented by private counsel and sought monetary relief and attorney’s fees. The plaintiffs claimed that throughout the time they were detained, defendants improperly and without authorization recorded confidential phone calls and meetings between them and their attorneys. Magistrate Judge James P. O’Hara was assigned to the case.

On November 13, 2017 an individual tried to join the case as a member of the class, but this motion was denied because class certification had not been granted.

CoreCivic and Securus moved to dismiss Count I (the violation of the Missouri wiretapping statute), and this motion was granted because none of the allegedly unlawful interceptions took place Missouri. Securus also moved to dismiss Counts II and III (the violations of the Kansas and federal wiretapping statutes). The court granted in part and denied in part this motion. Specifically, the court found that the plaintiffs had not adequately alleged that any of their intercepted communications had been disclosed but had adequately alleged that their communications had been unlawfully intercepted and a statutory business use exception did not apply because intercepting conversations between detainees and their lawyers was not part of the defendants' ordinary course of business. 2018 WL 1175042 (Mar. 5, 2018).

The parties began settlement negotiations in August, 2018. These negotiations continued until August 23, 2019, when the plaintiffs moved to certify the class and for preliminary approval of class action settlement. The court granted this motion on September 26, 2019. Five members of the class filed objections to the settlement, but the court overruled these objections and approved the settlement on January 28, 2020.

The certified class included:

All detainees at Leavenworth Detention Center who, during the period of June 1, 2014 through June 19, 2017, had their attorney-client telephone calls recorded by Defendants: (a) after the detainee requested privatization of his or her attorney’s phone number (subclass A); (b) after his or her attorney requested privatization of the attorney’s phone number (subclass B); (c) after Judge Robinson’s cease and desist order on August 10, 2016, in the case styled U.S. v. Black, Case No. 2:16-CR-20032 (subclass C); or (d) after the detainee or his or her attorney otherwise notified one or more Defendants in writing of their attorney-client relationship and provided written notification of the attorney’s phone number at issue (subclass D).

The settlement agreement created a Settlement Fund of $1,450,000.00, of which CoreCivic agreed to fund $1,100,000.00 and Securua agreed to fund $350,000.00. The plaintiffs' attorneys received about $500,000 of the settlement funds. The settlement did not provide for relief besides damages.

As of April 5, 2020, the court has retained jurisdiction for the administration of ongoing settlement payments.

Anna Brito - 10/03/2018
Alex Moody - 04/05/2020


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