Supreme Court holds connected issuing cardinal decisions
Washington — The Supreme Court said Monday that it volition see a spiritual rights lawsuit brought by a erstwhile Louisiana inmate who is seeking to writer Louisiana situation officials for wealth damages for shaving his dreadlocks successful usurpation of his spiritual beliefs.
The precocious tribunal volition reappraisal a determination from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit that said the erstwhile inmate, Damon Landor, could not question monetary damages against the officials successful their idiosyncratic capacities nether the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, oregon RLUIPA.
Landor is simply a devout Rastafarian who pledged to "let the locks of the hairsbreadth of his caput grow," known arsenic the Nazarite Vow. Landor upheld that pledge for astir 20 years, until helium was astir finished with a five-month situation condemnation successful Louisiana.
For the archetypal 4 months of his incarceration, the 2 facilities wherever Landor was housed allowed him to support his hairsbreadth agelong oregon nether a "rastacap." But that changed aft Landor was transferred to the Raymond Laborde Correctional Center for the last 3 weeks of his sentence. Once there, Landor told an intake defender that helium was a practicing Rastafarian and handed implicit impervious of his spiritual accommodations, arsenic good arsenic a transcript of a 2017 determination from the 5th Circuit that recovered Louisiana's argumentation of cutting Rastafarians' hairsbreadth violated RLUIPA, according to tribunal filings.
But 2 guards yet handcuffed Landor to a chair, held him down and had his caput shaved, according to papers filed with the Supreme Court.
Landor filed a suit against the situation officials aft helium was released and brought galore claims, including nether the RLUIPA. But a national justice agreed to disregard the case, uncovering that the instrumentality does not let for damages against idiosyncratic authorities officials.
A three-judge sheet of judges connected the 5th Circuit affirmed that decision, ruling that portion it "emphatically" condemned Landor's treatment, a anterior determination successful the circuit required it to clasp that helium could not question wealth damages from officials successful their idiosyncratic capacities for violations of RLUIPA.
The afloat 5th Circuit refused to reconsider the case, with 11 judges voting not to rehear it and six voting successful favor.
The lawsuit follows a Supreme Court determination from December 2020 successful which it unanimously held that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, RLUIPA's sister statute, allows litigants to get wealth damages against national officials successful their idiosyncratic capacities.
Lawyers for Landor argued that Congress enacted the 2 laws to supply meaningful extortion for spiritual liberty, and denying litigants the accidental to question damages for violations of RLUIPA would render that committedness empty.
Louisiana officials said successful tribunal papers that the allegations raised successful Landor's entreaty are "antithetical to spiritual state and just attraction of authorities prisoners," and condemned them "in the strongest imaginable terms." But they urged the Supreme Court to crook distant his entreaty and said the authorities amended its situation grooming argumentation to forestall different inmates from being treated arsenic Landor was.
The justices volition perceive arguments successful its adjacent term, which begins successful October, with a determination expected by the summertime of 2026.
Melissa Quinn is simply a authorities newsman for CBSNews.com. She has written for outlets including the Washington Examiner, Daily Signal and Alexandria Times. Melissa covers U.S. politics, with a absorption connected the Supreme Court and national courts.
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