In Georgia, deaf people ensnared in the criminal legal system are routinely denied sign language interpretation and other accommodations, dramatically disadvantaging them while in prison and at every stage of their criminal justice proceedings. The ACLU on Wednesday filed a motion seeking a class action lawsuit on behalf of currently and formerly imprisoned deaf people in Georgia. The motion highlights gross violations of their constitutional rights.
The criminal legal system is stacked against many of the most vulnerable Americans, including people with disabilities. At every stage — arrest, interrogation, trial, sentencing, prison, and parole — deaf people are more susceptible to going to prison more often, staying longer, suffering more, and returning to prison faster.
Deaf people with — including those who are LGBTQ and come from communities of color — fare even worse. Throughout the country, our system to provide sign language interpreters and other communication access, as required by federal law. Our case against the Georgia Department of Corrections, the Georgia Department of Community Supervision, and the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles — calls out these institutions for violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act, and the Constitution.
As a co-founder and volunteer director of (HEARD), I have been working with incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people who are deaf and disabled for the last 10 years. Their experiences break my heart, haunt my dreams, and fuel my advocacy.
The problems they face are particularly acute in Georgia.
Take our plaintiff Ricardo Harris. Ricardo was a star student at one of the few colleges in the country that provides instruction in sign language. While on winter break visiting friends in Georgia in 2013, this bright, Black-Latino deaf man was arrested and accused of murder. He was tried and convicted. Over the course of two and half years of incarceration, he was not provided qualified interpreters during police interrogation or for communication with his own defense attorney. Without interpreters or telecommunication access, he could not participate in his own defense or even begin to tell his side of the story. He has been in prison, effectively barred from communication with attorneys, advocates, and loved ones, including a young child, since 2013.
Jerry Coen, another plaintiff in the case, was arrested for behavior related to addiction. He had tried to attend recovery programs, but could not find programs available in American Sign Language or a program that provided ASL interpreters. Like many people who use ASL as their only language, Jerry does not understand English.
The isolation of prison was devastating for Jerry. Without videophones, he could not communicate with his family. So, once a month, his parents would make the seven-hour round trip in order to spend a few hours with their son in prison. These visits were the only connection he had to the outside world for the 10 years he was incarcerated.
Jerry was regularly unfairly punished. The prison refused to use ASL interpreters to explain the rules or procedures he needed to follow, and he could not understand any of the written rules or information from the prison. Guards refused to use ASL interpreters when they thought he had broken rules. Disciplinary hearing officers refused to use ASL interpreters during hearings where they concluded that he had broken rules and set punishments. Jerry’s hands were handcuffed behind his back during these disciplinary hearings — sometimes so tightly that they left scars. He could not gesture or even try to write a few words in his own defense. Jerry spent a week in solitary confinement. His beloved father passed away just months before he was released in 2017.
Another plaintiff, Jonah Wooden, was supposed to attend substance abuse classes as a condition of probation. These classes had no interpreters. Jonah spent months sitting in class struggling to understand the content. When he asked for interpreters, he was told that he would have to pay for them himself, even though federal law requires the program provider to ensure effective communication. After months of dealing with the frustration and isolation of sitting through classes without interpreters — and even trying to pay for interpreters before he realized he couldn’t afford them — he stopped showing up. He was arrested for violating his probation, and is now serving two years in prison.
These are not isolated stories. There are hundreds more, in Georgia and throughout the country.
The injustices faced by deaf and disabled people in the criminal legal system are not widely understood, well-documented, or sufficiently challenged. But the stories of Ricardo, Jerry, Jonah, and hundreds of other deaf and disabled incarcerated people, coupled with scant research, paints a bleak picture: The criminal legal system — from start to finish — consistently violates deaf people’s constitutional, civil, and human rights.
We can and must do better. The ACLU and partners are seeking a class action lawsuit to ensure that the state of Georgia provides sign language interpreters and other needed auxiliary aids and services so that deaf people in its criminal legal system have the access that the law requires.
This case sheds light on the horrors of being deaf and imprisoned in the United States. We hope it also serves as encouragement for incarcerated people; a warning to prisons; and a call to action for advocates, attorneys, and people across our country to do right by deaf and disabled people and to hold our government accountable when it fails to do the same.
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CaliforniaDec 2024
Disability Rights
Powers v. McDonoughPowers v. McDonough
Every night, thousands of veterans sleep without shelter on the streets of Los Angeles. Meanwhile, the Department of Veterans Affairs owns hundreds of acres of land in prime West Los Angeles—land directly adjacent to a VA medical facility that was once earmarked to house veterans, but today is instead home to private school sports fields and an oil well. In November 2022, a group of unhoused veterans and a non-profit organization filed suit alleging that the Department of Veterans Affairs (“VA”) failed to provide adequate housing and health care to veterans with severe disabilities in Los Angeles. These failures have significantly undermined veterans’ abilities to access the benefits they are entitled to by law, leaving many stranded on the streets after serving our country. The veterans sued the VA under the Rehabilitation Act, a federal statute that prohibits federal agencies from discriminating against people with disabilities. As a remedy, the plaintiffs seek the construction of significant units of permanent supportive housing on the The VA argued that a provision of the Veterans’ Judicial Review Act (“VJRA”)— a federal statute that prohibits federal district courts from second-guessing VA’s individualized benefits determinations—bars federal district courts from hearing the veterans’ Rehabilitation Act claims. Should the court accept this position, it would deprive veterans of a meaningful opportunity to have their rights under the Rehabilitation Act and other generally applicable nondiscrimination statutes enforced. -
News & CommentaryDec 2024
Criminal Law Reform
Disability Rights
Incarceration Should Not be a Death Sentence for Individuals Who Use OpioidsIncarceration Should Not be a Death Sentence for Individuals Who Use Opioids
New litigation centered on increasing access to substance-use disorder treatment in jails and prisons is helping to reduce mortality rates among incarcerated individuals. -
Press ReleaseSep 2024
Disability Rights
Criminal Law Reform
Lawsuit Challenging Armed Police Response to Mental Health Emergencies in Washington, D.C. to ProceedLawsuit Challenging Armed Police Response to Mental Health Emergencies in Washington, D.C. to Proceed
WASHINGTON — A federal judge in Washington, D.C. today rejected the District of Columbia’s motion to dismiss a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of the District of Columbia, and the law firm Sheppard Mullin. The lawsuit contends that the District’s emergency response system discriminates against people with mental health disabilities by deploying armed police officers to address the vast majority of mental health crises while sending trained medical professionals to most other health emergencies. “This ruling moves us one step closer to bringing essential, life-saving emergency mental health care to D.C. communities. Qualified providers are best equipped to handle mental health emergencies with skills and compassion; police with a gun only serve to escalate, handcuff, and arrest,” said Ashika Verriest, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Criminal Law Reform Project. “Far too many people are harmed at the hands of police during a mental health crisis, or simply receive ineffective care. This must end.” The plaintiff in the case is Bread for the City, a D.C.-based nonprofit supporting underserved communities. The lawsuit contends that the District’s unequal response to mental health crises violates the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act. The ruling will move the case forward, allowing the ACLU to show in court that a fully functioning mental health crisis response system that sends a medical, rather than a law enforcement, response to most mental health crises is legally required. “Relying on mental health professionals, not armed police, to serve people experiencing mental health crises is not just logical, it’s required under the law. Today’s decision made clear that communities can’t single out mental health emergencies for worse services than other health emergencies,” said Michael Perloff, staff attorney with the ACLU of the District of Columbia. The ruling comes on the heels of a recommendation made in a similar case filed against Washington County, Oregon by the ACLU, the ACLU of Oregon, Disability Rights Oregon, and Sheppard Mullin. On August 30, 2024, a federal magistrate judge recognized that sending police, rather than health providers to a mental health crisis, may be discrimination against people with mental health disabilities in violation of federal law. The magistrate judge recommended that the case proceed. More details about the case are accessible here: /cases/bread-for-the-city-v-district-of-columbia -
Press ReleaseSep 2024
Criminal Law Reform
+2 Issues
Judge Orders Supervision System in Washington, D.C. to Accommodate People with DisabilitiesJudge Orders Supervision System in Washington, D.C. to Accommodate People with Disabilities
WASHINGTON – A federal court granted a preliminary injunction yesterday in a case filed on behalf of people with disabilities on parole and supervised release in Washington, D.C., ordering immediate action to address discriminatory conditions faced by the two named plaintiffs. The court also denied the government’s motion to dismiss, allowing the case to proceed. The case, brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of D.C., Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia, and Latham & Watkins LLP, challenges the federal government’s post-conviction supervision system in Washington, D.C. for systematically ignoring the needs of people with disabilities, thereby setting them up for failure on supervision and putting them at constant risk of sanctions, including incarceration. As the court held in its decision, such accommodations are likely required under federal disability law, specifically the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. The preliminary injunction requires that the United States Parole Commission and the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency (CSOSA), the two federal agencies responsible for supervision in D.C., assess what reasonable accommodations the two named plaintiffs require to have an equal opportunity to succeed on supervision, and provide all such required accommodations. “Absent an injunction,” the court’s decision reads, “the Parolees will be forced to participate in the Government’s supervision programs on an unequal footing just because of their disabilities.” People on supervision in D.C. are required to comply with myriad and onerous rules. For people with disabilities, navigating these complex conditions is even more challenging. For example, Plaintiff Mr. Mathis — a 70-year-old military veteran with congestive heart failure that limits his ability to walk — struggles to travel throughout the city to attend frequent supervision meetings that often conflict with necessary medical procedures and hospitalizations. His supervision officer required him to wear an ankle monitor even after his doctor warned the monitor would jeopardize his health due to his heart condition. Plaintiff Mr. Davis, who lives with chronic pain stemming from third-degree burns as well as mental health conditions, also faces disability-related barriers getting to required meetings. Yet failing to meet any of these conditions, even something as simple as missing an appointment, can land a person back in jail or prison, even when no new criminal conduct is alleged. The court agreed that “absent immediate relief, the Parolees will face irreparable harm; namely, obstacles to success on supervision solely because of their disabilities, which expose them to downstream harms like revocation and reincarceration.” The court did not decide whether it will ultimately certify a class that could yield relief for all people on supervision in D.C. who need accommodations. Instead, the court directed the parties to agree on a schedule for further proceedings on that issue. “The undue hardships faced by people with disabilities on federal criminal supervision in the District of Columbia have gone unaddressed for too long,” said Scott Michelman, legal director, ACLU of the District of Columbia. “This decision is a victory for equal treatment and common sense.” “The Court’s opinion emphatically rejects the federal government's ‘do-nothing’ policy for people with disabilities on supervision in Washington, D.C., who have been forced to navigate onerous requirements without accommodations for decades,” said Allison Frankel, staff attorney with the ACLU Criminal Law Reform Project. “This ruling ensures that our named Plaintiffs will have the accommodations they need to have a fair shot at completing parole and remaining in their communities.“ “We are thrilled the Court recognized that the Parole Commission and CSOSA must accommodate our clients’ disabilities so that they have an equal opportunity to succeed on supervision,” said Zoé Friedland, staff attorney with the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia. “We will keep fighting to make this relief permanent and systemic so that all people on supervision have an equal chance to succeed.” The decision on the preliminary injunction can be found here: /cases/mathis-v-united-states-parole-commission?document=Preliminary-Injunction-Opinion The complaint can be found here: /documents/w-mathis-v-united-states-parole-commission-complaint