Portland Law Collective joins the Center for Constitutional Rights as co-counsel in Aref, et al. v. Holder, et al., a statutory and constitutional challenge to overly restrictive prisons.

An attorney from the Portland Law Collective recently joined the legal team of Aref, et al. v. Holder, et al. as co-counsel. Aref is a lawsuit challenging the legality of the U.S. Bureau of Prisons’ special prison units known as “Communications Management Units” or “CMUs.

The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) in New York City organized the team and initiated the litigation.   To read the complaint click here.

Starting in 2006, the U.S. government formed special units designed to isolate certain prisoners from the rest of the world.  Those prisoners have mostly been Muslim inmates and inmates with “unpopular” politics.  Prisoners in CMUs enjoy far less opportunities for education, work, and other programs.  CMU prisoners are virtually cut off from their family, friends, and communities.  There is no known mechanism to review the government’s designation of CMU prisoners.  As CCR explains on its website:

Prisoners in the CMU, alone out of all general population prisoners within the federal system, are categorically banned from any physical contact with visiting friends and family, including babies, infants, and minor children.  To further their social isolation, the BOP has placed severe restrictions on their access to phone calls and work and educational opportunities.  Adding to the suspect nature of these units, upwards of two-thirds of the prisoners confined there are Muslim – a figure that over-represents the proportion of Muslim prisoners in BOP facilities by at least 1000 percent.  Many of the remaining prisoners have unpopular political views, including environmental activists designated as “ecoterrorists.”

Five CMU prisoners and two of their spouses (who, along with their children, have been subjected to draconian rules governing visitation and phone calls) have joined the lawsuit as plaintiffs.  All five men confined in the CMU have been classified as low or medium security, but were designated to the CMU despite their relatively, and in two cases perfectly, clean disciplinary history.  Not a single one has received discipline for any communications-related infraction within the last decade, nor any significant disciplinary offense.

Like all CMU prisoners, the men received no procedural protections related to their designation, and were not allowed to examine or refute the allegations that led to their transfer.  They are also being held indefinitely at the CMU without any meaningful review process.  They expect to serve their entire sentences in these isolated and punitive units.

Predictably, the lack of procedural protections has allowed for an unchecked pattern of discriminatory and retaliatory designations to the CMU.  Rather than being related to a legitimate penological purpose or based on substantiated information, our clients’ designations were instead based on their religious and/or perceived political beliefs, or in retaliation for other protected First Amendment activity.

These conditions have unjustifiably interfered with the men’s ability to maintain relationships with their loved ones – relationships that are the key to their successful transition back to society.

To learn more about Communication Management Unit (CMU) prisons, download CCR’s CMU fact sheet here.