Nevada agrees to end discriminatory policies against prisoners
The Justice Department announced on Thursday that it had reached a settlement with Nevada after finding that the state’s prison system has discriminated against inmates with HIV and other disabilities.
The federal agency found that the state Department of Corrections violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by “unjustifiably isolating and segregating” prisoners with HIV in separate housing.
According to a statement from the Justice Department, the prison system also denied prisoners with mobility disabilities or other physical and mental health conditions housing in lower-level custody units and facilities.
The settlement agreement requires Nevada to amend its policies, practices and procedures to ensure that prisoners with HIV are not segregated “solely because of their HIV status,” and that prisoners with disabilities are not excluded from employment opportunities, lower-security facilities, housing placements and programs.
It also requires Nevada to train prison staff and prisoners on HIV and disability discrimination, designate statewide and prison-specific Americans with Disability Act coordinators, and implement an Americans with Disability Act grievance procedure for prisoners to use, the Justice Department said.
The agency also found that Nevada failed to keep prisoners’ HIV status confidential and denied them “equal employment opportunities,” such as jobs in food service positions, the Justice Department said.
“As leading public health and correctional authorities oppose the routine segregation of inmates with HIV as medically unnecessary, the department determined that NDOC’s policy had no legitimate health justification,” the Justice Department said. “Nevada has since taken steps to desegregate inmates with HIV and also cooperated with the department throughout the investigation.”
The federal agency found that by denying lower-level housing to disabled prisoners, the state “deprived them of an equal opportunity” to hold jobs in the prison system, participate in reintegration programs, or participate in programs to reduce their sentences, the statement said.
Some inmates were confined for “longer periods and in more restrictive settings” than they otherwise would have been, the agency said.
“The routine segregation of inmates with HIV is unnecessary, stigmatizing, and harmful, and the Department of Justice will enforce the ADA to stop such discrimination,” Pamela Karlan, the principal deputy assistant attorney general of the civil rights division, said in the statement. “Compliance with the ADA ensures that prisoners with disabilities have equal access to educational, rehabilitative, and other programs and opportunities available to other inmates.”
The Nevada Department of Corrections did not respond to a request for comment on the settlement.
Contact Katelyn Newberg at knewberg@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0240. Follow @k_newberg on Twitter.
