A recent federal court ruling upheld a nearly decade-old lower court ruling finding that the Alabama Department of Corrections fails to provide adequate mental health care to incarcerated individuals. However, that same ruling walked back several requirements imposed by the lower court to address mental healthcare in the state’s prisons.

A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a 2017 district court finding that conditions within the state’s prisons as it relates to mental healthcare violate the Eighth Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment, reaffirming the lower court’s finding that ADOC’s mental healthcare is “horrendously inadequate.” In their opinion, the judges called suicide rates in Alabama prisons “staggering” blaming “the Department of Corrections’ deliberate indifference to the serious mental healthcare needs of its inmates.”

This ruling is the latest in a drawn-out legal battle relating to mental healthcare conditions in Alabama state prisons. A lawsuit filed in 2014 alleged that inmates were not receiving adequate mental healthcare, citing high suicide rates in Alabama prisons as exemplary of the issue. A report from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics counts 10 suicides in Alabama’s state and federal prisons from 2010-2014 — the year the lawsuit was filed. That number more than doubled from 2014-2019, when 26 suicides occurred.

In 2017, U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson ruled against the Alabama Department of Corrections in that lawsuit. In his ruling, Thompson called for monitoring of state prisons by outside experts, as well as increasing staffing in order to more adequately screen and monitor inmates who may be suffering from mental illness.

A 2020 investigation and report into conditions in Alabama’s men’s prisons from the U.S. Department of Justice mirrored Thompson’s findings, saying that conditions in the state’s men’s prisons violate the Eighth Amendment by failing to provide safe living conditions for its inmates. The report called the violations “severe” and “systemic” and cited understaffing, overcrowding and a number of other factors in creating these conditions.

Since then, ADOC has failed to meet staffing directives laid out in Thompson’s ruling. The department currently employs roughly 1,600 corrections officers that meet the requirements of the ruling — 2,000 officers short of the requirements in the ruling. 

ADOC continued to challenge Thompson’s ruling, appealing the case in January 2022 — leading to the recent circuit court ruling. 

The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ opinion cites similar issues as Thompson’s ruling: severe overcrowding, understaffing — especially of mental health professionals — and failure to identify inmates with mental health needs.

However, that ruling also invoked a legal standard called the “need-narrowness-intrusiveness” requirement, which stems from the 1996 Prison Litigation Reform Act, to scale back some of the requirements outlined in the Thompson ruling. This standard means that court-ordered reforms must be narrowed to address issues raised in a lawsuit, while being as least intrusive as possible to the prison system. 

Using this requirement, the circuit court walked back a requirement to suicide-proof all cells in the ADOC system. The court also removed incarcerated women from the court order, saying that conditions at the Julia Tutwiler Prison for Women did not present a “substantial risk of serious harm”. The state agreed to make reforms to Tutwiler in 2015 after the U.S. Department of Justice found evidence of sexual harassment and abuse of inmates within the prison.

The circuit court also reversed Thompson’s staffing requirement that ADOC “must fill all mandatory and essential posts” in its prisons. 

“The need for staffing is still a great need and is still an important concern,” Latasha Dejarnett, a senior staff attorney with the Southern Poverty Law Center who represented the plaintiffs in this case, told Alabama Reflector. “What we, the plaintiffs, will have to show is that there are mental health concerns that exist throughout the prison that require staff to be able to respond to that.” 

Alabama top stories in brief

Federal law inspired by Alabama teen signed by Trump

• Lulu’s Law, a federal law named after Alabama teen Lulu Gribbin, was signed into effect by President Donald Trump last week.
• The law authorizes emergency alert messages that can be sent to cell phones in the vicinity of a shark attack, warning beachgoers of the attack.
• The legislation mirrors an Alabama law that was passed by state lawmakers last year, which created a similar alert system for Alabama’s coastal counties.
• Gribbin survived a shark attack off the coast of Florida in 2024. Gribbin lost a portion of her left arm and right leg in the attack.

In second year, more than 34,000 students getting $174M in CHOOSE Act funds

• Alabama approved more than 34,000 students to receive CHOOSE Act funds — the state’s school voucher program — for the 2026-27 school year. This is the second year of the CHOOSE Act program.
• This year, more than $174 million in funding was distributed, according to the Alabama Department of Revenue. A total of 48,927 students applied for funds this year.
• The CHOOSE Act provides funding to subsidize private or home school education. The act grants $7,000 vouchers for approved students attending a participating private school, as well as $2,000 vouchers for students in home school programs.
• 61.3% of applicants this year were new applicants. 
• Other data released by the Department of Revenue showed that most applications — 21,351 applications — were for private school tuition. Data also shows that most applicants, 66.3%, were white.

Alabama AG defends Auburn baseball’s Christian uniforms

• Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall last week defended the Auburn University baseball team’s use of Christian imagery on some team uniforms as well as coach-led prayer.
• Marshall was responding to criticism from the Freedom From Religion Foundation, which sent a letter to Auburn legal counsel Jaime S. Hammer last month, arguing the team’s use of Christian imagery violates constitutional separation of church and state.
• The team’s current practice uniforms feature the phrase “Jesus Won” on the front and a cross on the back. Head coach Butch Thompson also leads the team in prayer before games and practices. 
• The team also employs former Auburn outfielder Mason Maners as a team chaplain.
• “Freedom From Religion’s latest crusade is a swing and a miss. Coaches and athletes don’t lose their religious rights just because they attend a public school,” Marshall said in a written statement released last week.
• Marshall asked the Freedom From Religion Foundation to withdraw its letter to Auburn’s legal counsel.

Jennifer Conway appointed to Board of Pardons and Paroles

• Gov. Kay Ivey last week appointed Jennifer Conway to fill a vacancy on the Alabama Board of Pardons and Paroles.
• Conway is a special agent for the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and has worked for the agency in Alabama since 2003. 
• Conway is filling the spot on the three-member board previously held by Darryl Littleton, who stepped down from the board in January to serve as the deputy director of administration and law enforcement services for the Alabama Bureau of Pardons and Paroles.
• Board members serve a six-year term. Conway will serve out the remainder of Littleton’s term until June 30, 2027. Then, she may be reappointed by the state’s next governor.

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