Litigation

The MacArthur Justice Center and the National Center for Youth Law have filed a complaint with the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights claiming Title VI violations based on Rockford Public Schools’ (“RPS”) discriminatory referrals of Black students to police.

While Matthew Locke was peacefully protesting, a county sheriff and his chief deputy used extreme and gratuitous “pain compliance” tactics on him, causing him severe pain and neurological injury. The district court threw out Mr. Locke’s excessive-force suit based on the judicially invented doctrine of qualified immunity. The MacArthur Justice Center is fighting to ensure...

Can a police officer who frames an innocent person be held accountable in court? Before the MacArthur Justice Center won the landmark Supreme Court decision in Thompson v. Clark, the answer across most of the country was no: Once the innocent person got the false charges against them dismissed, the police officer who fabricated or falsified evidence against them was immune from a civil lawsuit. We took that issue all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and won.

When Timothy Finley was in the midst of a severe mental health spiral, Michigan prison officials responded by imposing on him the one condition they knew was likely to make it worse: months of solitary confinement in a tiny windowless cell. The MacArthur Justice Center is fighting to ensure that incarcerated people like Mr. Finley have their known psychiatric needs taken seriously, not punished with damaging social isolation.

Cindy Lou Hill was left to die in a jail cell while under NaphCare’s “Medical Watch” at the Spokane County Jail. Despite its name, there was nothing medical about “Medical Watch.” Rather, “Medical Watch” consisted of untrained jail guards—not medical professionals—occasionally peeking through a small cell window for seconds to check for signs of life.

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Derek Lee challenges the constitutionality of Pennsylvania’s felony murder sentencing scheme, which imposes mandatory life without parole (LWOP) on persons convicted of felony murder even if they did not kill or intend to take life. The MacArthur Justice Center is proud to add our voice to the growing chorus of groups and individuals recognizing that such extreme sentences in these circumstances are not only unjust—they are unconstitutional.

The State of Florida sentenced Sadik Baxter, at the age of 26, to spend the rest of his life in prison without possibility of parole for an accidental death that he did not cause, intend, or play any role in bringing about. The MacArthur Justice Center is fighting alongside Mr. Baxter to bring an end to extreme sentences for felony murder that are wildly out of proportion to the person’s culpability.

After four prisoners filed a joint lawsuit, the district court erroneously dismissed three of the prisoners’ complaints based on the false assertion that the Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA) categorically bars prisoners from joining together in one lawsuit. The MacArthur Justice Center is fighting to correct that atextual interpretation of the PLRA and ensure prisoners, an already marginalized group, can split a single filing fee, pool their legal knowledge, and share resources – critical abilities to ensure access to the courts.

After Christopher Welters suffered permanent injury when Minnesota prison officials refused to loosen his handcuffs for hours, the Minnesota Supreme Court correctly determined that the officials were not entitled to qualified immunity. The MacArthur Justice Center represents Mr. Welters to defend this decision from review in the U.S. Supreme Court and ensure that qualified immunity does not stand in the way of holding prison officials accountable for their abuse.

Before Jackson Maes died by suicide in a jail cell, jail officials saw him repeatedly and violently strike his head against a cell wall and heard him say he was trying to kill himself. They still failed to put him on suicide watch or obtain the mental health treatment he needed. The MacArthur Justice Center is fighting to ensure that qualified immunity does not shield jail and prison officials from being held accountable for their often-dangerous indifference toward prisoners’ health and safety.