On May 8, 2002, a prisoner at the Wisconsin Secure Program Facility in Boscobel, Wisconsin filed a pro se lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. §1983 against the Wisconsin Department of Corrections in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin. The plaintiff asked the Court for declaratory and injunctive relief, alleging that the defendants had violated his constitutional rights by taking away his clothes, forcing him to sleep on a concrete slab, denying him human contact, feeding him only "nutri-loaf," and giving him only four squares of toilet paper at a time. He also alleged that his constitutional rights had been violated by a lack of due process, improper classification procedures, deprivation of heat in winter, inadequate health care, inadequate mental health care, deprivation of medication, and deprivation of soap, as well as denial of mail, visitors, phone privileges, canteen items, writing materials, and time with the law library.

On March 31, 2005, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin (Judge William C. Griesbach) granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment. The plaintiff appealed. On November 14, 2006, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit (Judge Terence Thomas Evans) vacated the District Court's order of summary judgment and remanded the case to the District Court. Gillis v. Litscher, 468 F.3d 488 (7th Cir. 2006).

After remand, the parties entered a private settlement and the case was dismissed with prejudice on January 31, 2007. The terms of the settlement are unknown.

Joshua Arocho - 07/11/2012


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