Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Recent Prisoner Decisions On Claims By Muslim and Atheist

In Hamdan v. Copes, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 46765 (WD La., May 19, 2006), the court rejected a prisoner's claim that Muslim prisoniers at South Louisiana Correctional Center were denied the right to attend Friday Ju'mah services on a regular basis.

In Kaufman v. Frank, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 47840 (WD Wis., July 13, 2006), a state prison inmate who was an atheist claimed that his rights under the First Amendment and RLUIPA were violated by: (1) references to God in the Wisconsin Constitution; (2) a state statute granting inmates access to Bibles; (3) prohibitions on sex offenders changing their names; (4) the prison's refusal to allow him to possess a silver circle emblem representing Atheist beliefs; (5) its refusal to authorize study groups for atheist and agnostic inmates; and (6) its refusal to make donated atheist literature available in the prison library. The court permitted plaintiff to proceed only as to claims that the Establishment Clause was violated by the prison's making Christian literature, but not literature about atheism available, and its excluding free non-religious items and publications while permitting other inmates to receive free religious items and publications.