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<h1 class="pagename">Previously-Secret Prison Docs Show Constitutional
Violations in Experimental Prison Units</h1>
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<p><strong>Docs Confirm Lack of Due Process in Communications
Management Units, Attorneys Say</strong></p>
<p><a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:press@ccrjustice.org">press@ccrjustice.org</a><br>
<b><small><small><small><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://ccrjustice.org/newsroom/press-releases/previously-secret-prison-docs-show-constitutional-violations-experimental-prison-units">http://ccrjustice.org/newsroom/press-releases/previously-secret-prison-docs-show-constitutional-violations-experimental-prison-units</a></small></small></small></b><br>
</p>
<p>April 23, 2014, Washington D.C.<i> – </i>For the first time,
hundreds of documents detailing the Bureau of Prisons’ process for
designating prisoners to controversial Communications Management Units
(CMUs) are public. The documents had been under a protective order in
the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) lawsuit, <a
href="http://ccrjustice.org/ourcases/current-cases/aref-et-al-v-holder-et-al"><i>Aref
v. Holder</i></a>, since CCR filed the case in 2010.
</p>
<div align="left">The CMUs were quietly opened in Terre Haute, IN and
Marion, IL in 2006 and 2008, respectively, to monitor and control the
communications of certain prisoners and to isolate them from other
prisoners and the outside world. But the documents revealed today show
that the BOP did not draft criteria for designating prisoners to the
facilities <a
href="http://ccrjustice.org/files/SJ%20-%20Exhibit%2046.pdf">until 2009</a>
and that, even then, different offices within the BOP, each of which
plays a role in the designation process, have a different understanding
of the criteria. Other documents reveal that the <a
href="http://ccrjustice.org/files/SJ%20-%20Exhibit%2065.pdf">reasons
provided</a> to CMU prisoners for their designation were <a
href="http://ccrjustice.org/files/SJ%20-%20Exhibit%2068.pdf">incomplete,
inaccurate, and sometimes even false</a>. Discovery in the case also
shows that prisoners were told they could earn their way out of the CMU
by completing <a
href="http://ccrjustice.org/files/SJ%20-%20Excerpts%20from%20Exhibit%2012.pdf">18
months with clear conduct</a>, but upon meeting that goal, their
requests for transfer out of the CMU were repeatedly denied without
explanation. Other documents show<a
href="http://ccrjustice.org/files/SJ%20-%20Exhibit%20150.pdf">
political speech</a> was used as a factor in CMU designation. The
documents made public today also show that 60 percent of CMU prisoners
are Muslim, though Muslims comprise only six percent of the federal
prisoner population.</div>
<div align="left"> </div>
<div align="left">“The documents revealed today show that CMU prisoners
have been denied due process at every step, from designation to
review,” said CCR Senior Staff Attorney Alexis Agathocleous. “The CMUs
impose harsh restrictions on prisoners, including a ban on even
momentarily hugging their families. Meanwhile, the BOP has denied
hundreds of prisoners, who are mostly Muslim, the opportunity to
understand or rebut the rationale for their placement, or a meaningful
review process to earn their way out,”</div>
<div align="left"> </div>
<div align="left">The documents revealed today also show that
decision-makers are not required to, and do not, document their reasons
for selecting a prisoner for CMU placement. As a result, it is
effectively impossible for prisoners to challenge their designation. </div>
<div align="left"> </div>
<div>“I was told the <a
href="http://ccrjustice.org/files/SJ%20-%20Excerpt%20from%20Exhibit%2052.pdf">reason</a>
I was moved to CMU was because of ‘recruitment and radicalization,’ but
wasn’t told anything else. I tried to find out more about these
allegations so I could <a
href="http://ccrjustice.org/files/SJ%20-%20Exhibit%2072.pdf">challenge
my designation</a>, but to no avail,” said former plaintiff Avon
Twitty, who has been released from prison since this lawsuit was
filed. “Without knowing what I had allegedly done to land in a CMU, I
was helpless to challenge those allegations and had no hope of being
transferred out. This lawsuit is my first opportunity to get to the
bottom of my placement in a harsh, restrictive, and secretive prison
unit.”</div>
<div align="left"> </div>
<div align="left">In addition to heavily restricted telephone and
visitation access, CMU prisoners are categorically denied any physical
contact with family members and are forbidden from hugging, touching or
embracing their children or spouses during visits. The plaintiffs in <i>Aref</i>
spent years under these conditions without knowing why and were
designated to CMUs despite having relatively or totally clean
disciplinary histories; none of the plaintiffs have received any
communications-related disciplinary infractions in the last decade.</div>
<div align="left"> </div>
<div align="left"><a
href="http://ccrjustice.org/files/Memo%20in%20Support%20of%20Summary%20Judgment%20Motion.pdf">View
today’s filing here.</a></div>
<div><em> </em></div>
<div>For further information about CCR’s federal lawsuit around CMUs,
visit the <a
title="http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=S%2FzEuiLe1E%2FNJSHrWtEQP1IgcSZPLK%2Bg Learn about CCR's case Aref et al. v Holder et al"
target="_blank"
href="http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=S%2FzEuiLe1E%2FNJSHrWtEQP1IgcSZPLK%2Bg"><i>Aref,
et al. v. Holder, et al</i> </a> case page or <a
href="http://www.ccrjustice.org/cmu">www.ccrjustice.org/cmu</a>.</div>
<div><br>
The law firm <a title="Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP"
href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&ct=res&cd=1&ved=0CBoQFDAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.weil.com%2F&rct=j&q=Weil%2C+Gotschel+&ei=gVUFTImuL4a8lQf7n4DXBg&usg=AFQjCNF5Q7_VjnlS4M-5Auiw9sbn9MLrwQ">Weil
Gotshal & Manges LLP</a> and attorney Kenneth A. Kreuscher of the
Portland Law Collective are co-counsel in the case.</div>
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