Louisiana has the highest rate of incarceration in the world. We have 13 state prisons and a staggering 108 local jails. Our prisons rival Mississippi as the most abhorrent in terms of violence and horrible living conditions. People get killed in Louisiana’s prisons.

At the ACLU of Louisiana, we receive more than 80 prison complaints per month. The complaints we get include are about beatings from guards, inadequate medical care, squalid living conditions, and being denied access to a lawyer.

We believe that all people are entitled to basic rights and decency, including those accused or convicted of committing a crime.

We are the only organization in Louisiana with an attorney dedicated to investigating and litigating prison cases. The ACLU has been involved in several cases in the last year regarding abuse and neglect of prisoners and has investigated many more.

We struck a major victory in Acadia Parish, where the facilities were so overcrowded that inmates were sleeping on the floor in toilet water. The plumbing hadn’t been updated since the 1940’s, windows were boarded over, and there was exposed wiring. Inmates went months without seeing natural light or going outside. After suing on grounds that the prison did not meet Constitutional standards, the parish built a new prison.

Some issues at the top of our prison reform agenda include:

• Mistreatment of mentally ill prisoners. Often, jails treat inmates with special needs like animals, spraying them with Mace or throwing them in solitary confinement instead of providing proper medical care. These ultra aggressive tactics usually exacerbate their illness.
• Use of excessive force. We receive consistent complaints of guard violence toward prisoners. Men and women are regularly beaten and sexually assaulted in Louisiana jails and prisons. Violence by prison staff is unacceptable.
• Denial of medical care. Prisoners have a right to healthcare. We regularly hear from prisoners who are denied medicines, or kept from seeing a doctor. We’ve gotten complaints from deaf prisoners who cannot get translation devices, and inmates with HIV who are refused medication. We took on the case of a prisoner in protective custody who was stabbed during the Hurricane Katrina evacuation. When he asked guards to help him, they just laughed.