Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Religion & Law Blogs -> Religion Clause

Religion & Law

: Religion Clause

Recently Available Prisoner Free Exercise Cases

By Howard Friedman

In Graham v. Mahmood, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 33954 (SDNY, April 23, 2008), a New York federal district court dismissed claims under the First and 14th Amendments and RLUIPA brought by an inmate who was a follower of the Nation of Islam. Plaintiff alleged that NOI was disfavored in comparison to Sunni Muslims in access to prison meeting and office space. He also alleged retaliation for pursuing related grievances.

In Shilling v. Crawford, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 33567 (D NV, March 12, 2008), a Nevada federal district court held that defendants were entitled to qualified immunity in a suit by an inmate who claimed that his rights under RLUIPA were violated when his request for a kosher diet was accommodated only by offering to transfer him to a higher security facility at which such meals were available.

Rose v. Masiey, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 33499 (SDNY, Feb. 19, 2008), is one of over a dozen suits filed by Muslim inmates challenging the handling of food and related items at Rikers Island prison facility, and the failure to identify non-Halal food at the prison commissary. The court denied most of defendants' motions to dismiss, except that claims against certain of the corrections officers named as defendants were dismissed on the ground of qualified immunity.

Malik v. Ozmint, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 33904 (D SC, Feb. 13, 2008), involved a RLUIPA challenge to a South Carolina prison policy that prevented plaintiff from wearing his kufi outside of his cell. A federal magistrate judge recommended that the claim be dismissed without prejudice on exhaustion grounds, but that on the merits prison authorities had not justified the restriction. The court rejected plaintiff's claims that his right to fast during Ramadan was infringed by untimely meal deliveries.

Full post as published by Religion Clause on April 29, 2008 (boomark / email).