The Pennsylvania Institutional Law Project (PILP) is pleased to announce that a settlement agreement has been reached in the case of three Black men placed in solitary confinement at the Lebanon County Correctional Facility for refusing to cut their hair. The men, who were being held at the jail pretrial, were placed in solitary confinement pursuant to a jail policy that prohibited braids, cornrows, and dreadlocks but permitted other forms of long hair. The three men are all Rastafarian and wear their hair in deadlocks in accordance with their religious beliefs.
"I felt who I identify myself as was not appreciated, and in return, I was punished for trying to maintain my identity. So I felt the message Lebanon County sent was that who I am as a person is not acceptable," said Leonttayy Pratt, one of the plaintiffs.
Lebanon County has agreed to eliminate its discriminatory hair policy and pay the plaintiffs, Leonttayy Pratt, Eric S. McGill, Jr., and Lamont Chambers, a total of $147,500.
In April 2020, after PILP asked a court to order Mr. McGill’s immediate release from solitary confinement, Lebanon County added a religious exemption to its hair policy and subsequently released the three men from solitary confinement. Mr. McGill spent fifteen months in solitary confinement, Mr. Pratt five months, and Mr. Chambers three months. During this time, the men were locked in their cells a minimum of 23 hours each day, subjected to near-constant illumination, and denied access to phone calls with loved ones except in the middle of the night. Confinement in such conditions is widely recognized to pose serious risks of psychological and physical harm.
“I was looking for a change in the policy of the prison because I didn’t want anyone else to go through what I had to go through,” said Eric McGill. “You’re locked down in the same cell for 23 hours a day. When you’re let out, it’s only for an hour and it was usually at midnight, so it was hard for me to call my family. The cell I was in had plexiglass over the bars and it was stuffy, so there was no ventilation. There were also no trash cans in there, so when you eat you just had to stuff your trash through a little hole out on the block and it would sit there for hours. And with all that, we were only given 5 minutes to shower. It was a real struggle.”
PILP asserted that Lebanon County's practice of punishing people who refuse to cut their dreadlocks violated the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), and the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment.
“There is increasing awareness in the employment and educational settings that discrimination based on hair texture is a form of racial discrimination and should not be tolerated,” said PILP supervising attorney Matthew Feldman. “Thanks to the courage and fortitude of our clients, jails and prisons should now also be on notice that if they enforce racist hair policies, they may face a federal lawsuit.”
“Every day in America, social, economic, and judicial injustices are an unfortunate norm for Black and Brown people,” said Lamont Chambers. “I am overjoyed by this settlement and cannot describe the relief I feel.”
Under the settlement agreement, Lebanon County Correctional Facility will no longer prohibit people from having dreadlocks, braids, or cornrows, regardless of their religious beliefs.
For more information related to these cases, please visit pailp.org/legal-docket/dreadlocks