Experts Find Illinois Inflicting Needless Pain and Suffering on Sick Prisoners
Study Released Today Says 60% of Non-Violent Deaths Show “Significant lapses in care”
CHICAGO – The Illinois Department of Corrections has failed to provide adequate medical care to prisoners across the state, . The report cites sweeping problems with a broad range of medical services, including unqualified and incompetent physicians and nurses, inadequate medical leadership and management and staffing of IDOC facilities, a lack of adequate and sanitary medical facilities across IDOC, and a lack of follow-up and ability to correct mistakes that pervade the system.
The report was filed by Dr. Ronald Shansky and a team of medical experts selected jointly by lawyers for IDOC and the inmates and appointed by the federal court in Lippert v. Godinez, a lawsuit challenging medical care in the IDOC system. IDOC currently houses nearly 50,000 prisoners in facilities in all parts of the state.
“This report demonstrates that Illinois is inflicting needless pain and suffering by failing to provide basic medical care for its prisoners.” said Benjamin Wolf, Associate Legal Director for the ACLU of Illinois. “The state is giving a for profit company tens of millions of dollars each year for substandard care. The broken nature of the system is revealed by the serious and preventable harm inflicted on so many of these vulnerable patients. People in the free world would never use a health care provider that did such a poor job, but these prisoners have no choice of who will provide their care when they get sick.”
The expert report criticized DOC for not having qualified physicians. As one example, a patient at the Menard Correctional Center with Type I diabetes was being treated by a physician who was not trained in primary care. The doctor discontinued the patient’s insulin use after his blood sugar levels were found to be normal while on the insulin. This error, the report notes, reflects “a lack of understanding of the basic pathophysiology of this common disease.”
The experts found “significant lapses in care” in 60% of the cases of prisoners who died from other than violent causes from January 1, 2013, to June 1, 2014. A patient at IDOC’s Illinois River facility, for example, presented “classic” signs and symptoms of lung cancer upon his entry into IDOC. Medical staff either ignored or failed to recognize these symptoms for more than three months. By the time the patient was diagnosed, the only treatment option was palliative radiation. The patient died nine days later.
The medical experts appointed by the court also examined a number of other deaths in the IDOC system. In many of the deaths, the experts found there were a number of significant deviations from the standard of care. These deviations vary from delays in testing and care to lack of follow up and failures to refer patients to specialists.
The report notes that in many IDOC locations, there are numerous medical vacancies, often including the medical director or other key leadership positions. Additionally, the report notes that many of the medical professionals – as in the example at Menard – are not trained to deal with the medical issues they confront in the prison population. The experts add that this problem is “compounded by a lack of oversight and peer review,” which causes problems to fester and grow.
“The lack of expertise and personnel is especially troubling,” added Jason Stiehl, a partner in the Chicago office of Seyfarth Shaw LLP. “Unqualified staff cannot provide competent, comprehensive medical care to the population. These deficiencies result in horrific consequences.”
“The tragic stories of prisoners unnecessarily suffering—even dying—from terrible medical care are disturbing. But the deeper question is why these elderly, seriously ill people are in prison in the first place. This report is further proof that Illinois simply has too many people in prison. As long as we imprison people, we have a constitutional obligation to provide decent care. Illinois is falling woefully short of its legal obligations,” said Alan Mills, Executive Director at Uptown People’s Law Center.
The filing of the expert report is the latest development in Lippert, et. al, v. Godinez. Lawyers from Uptown People’s Law Center and the Chicago office of Seyfarth Shaw LLP filed the class action complaint on behalf of six prisoners in 2012, and the ACLU of Illinois joined the lawsuit in 2013.
Learn More About the Issues in This Press Release
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Press ReleaseDec 2024
Prisoners' Rights
Criminal Law Reform
ACLU Sues Bureau of Prisons for Keeping People in Prison Longer Than the Law AllowsACLU Sues Bureau of Prisons for Keeping People in Prison Longer Than the Law Allows
WASHINGTON – A federal lawsuit brought today by the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of D.C., and Jenner & Block LLP challenges the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) for unlawfully incarcerating people longer than the law allows under the First Step Act. The lawsuit contends that the BOP’s failure to implement the First Step Act according to its plain language violates the rights of thousands of people who should be returning to their communities and rebuilding their lives but instead remain incarcerated. Signed into law in 2018 by then-President Donald Trump, the bipartisan First Step Act was designed to reduce the population in federal prisons, reform extreme sentencing laws, and provide programming and reentry transition services to people in prison. Central to the First Step Act is a system of earned time credits, which allows people in prison to earn time off their sentences and time out of prison by participating in rehabilitation programs. Through the First Step Act, Congress unambiguously ordered BOP to move people out of prison when they meet certain requirements to use their earned time credits. Instead of faithfully following the mandatory law, BOP adopted a regulation treating the law as optional. As a result, thousands of people, who should already be back in their communities and with their families, remain in prison. “Every extra unlawful day our clients spend in prison is a serious injustice,” said Emma Andersson, deputy director of the Criminal Law Reform Project at the ACLU. “It is egregious that the Bureau of Prisons is imprisoning people for months longer than the law allows. The government must follow through on its legal obligation to get people out of prison on time and back into their communities, where they belong.” Additional comments below from: Vanessa Crowe, plaintiff: “Time is what I owed for my wrongdoing, and I have paid my time. But I should not have to spend more time in prison than the law allows. I often reflect on what I will miss during the months after when I should be out of prison. I will miss work and lose out on wages that would help me get back on my feet. I could be a tax paying citizen instead of a burden on society. But most of all, I will miss more precious time with my family. My family and I are ready to tum the page on this period in our lives — we are all ready to start a new life, a life with purpose, hope, and healing together. I want to start that life when I am legally entitled to start it-not five months later.” Arthur Spitzer, senior counsel at ACLU of D.C.: “There’s no excuse for the Bureau of Prisons to pretend not to understand Congress’s clear command that people who have earned the right to early release must be released. This law has been on the books for six years. The Bureau of Prisons has had plenty of time to understand it. Law enforcers should obey the law.” Betsy Henthorne, partner at Jenner & Block: “It has been six years since the First Step Act was signed, but despite Congress’s clear directives, the Bureau of Prisons continues to hold thousands of people in prison longer than the law allows. We should and do expect better—it’s past time for the BOP to ensure that those who have earned their release are able to return home to their families and communities according to the law Congress passed.” -
Press ReleaseSep 2024
National Security
Prisoners' Rights
ACLU Statement on Senator’s Discriminatory Questioning of Civil Rights Leader Maya BerryACLU Statement on Senator’s Discriminatory Questioning of Civil Rights Leader Maya Berry
WASHINGTON — American Civil Liberties Union Executive Director Anthony D. Romero, released the following statement regarding Sen. John Kennedy’s questioning of Maya Berry, the executive director of the Arab American Institute: “The American Civil Liberties Union condemns this discriminatory and vitriolic attack on Maya Berry, a renowned civil rights leader, and joins the chorus of voices from across the political spectrum in denouncing these remarks. “To use a hearing about the disturbing rise in anti-Muslim, anti-Arab, and antisemitic hate crimes to launch personal and discriminatory attacks on an expert witness they’ve invited to testify is both outrageous and inappropriate. This kind of racist rhetoric should be widely condemned. It has no place in Congress, or in politics. “Maya Berry is a courageous and compassionate leader who has spent her entire career working to strengthen our democracy and protect the rights of Arab American communities, and other vulnerable communities who face discrimination and targeting because of their ethnicity, race, or religion.” -
Ohio Supreme CourtSep 2024
Prisoners' Rights
State v. MorrisState v. Morris
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Oregon Supreme CourtSep 2024
Prisoners' Rights
Huskey v. Oregon Department of CorrectionsHuskey v. Oregon Department of Corrections
This case in the Oregon Supreme Court centers on whether Article I, Section 41(3) of the Oregon Constitution, which provides that Oregon prisoners lack legally enforceable rights to prison jobs and training, bars prisoners from collecting damages relating to lost prison jobs and training caused by the alleged breach of a settlement agreement by prison officials. The ACLU’s State Supreme Court Initiative, alongside the ACLU of Oregon, filed an amicus brief arguing that that plaintiff Arnold Huskey, an incarcerated individual whose identity was used in Department of Corrections training materials, is entitled to damages notwithstanding Article I, Section 41(3), because plaintiffs in contract disputes never have to show standalone legal rights to the damages they claim. Instead, they need only show that the damages were reasonably foreseeable consequences of the alleged breach of contract.