ELIZABETH — Inmates frequently file lawsuits over prison conditions.
With nothing but time on their hands, those serving time often seek court redress for everything from bad food to claims of medical maltreatment.
Most cases are summarily dismissed. But Lester Alford, an admitted member of a vicious street gang serving a 50-year sentence for an execution-style murder — who claims the last eight years he has spent in solitary confinement violates his rights against cruel and unusual punishment — is about to get his day in court.
“He threaded the eye of the needle,” said Amy Fettig, senior counsel for the ACLU’s National Prison Project that advocates for inmates’ rights.
The state Attorney General’s office, in court papers filed in the case, declared there was “not a shred of evidence, much less substantial evidence, showing the restrictions were unnecessary or unjustified.”
But Alford’s charges that he was thrown into solitary without a proper hearing will be the subject of a rare review before a Superior Court judge in Union County come this July.
By any measure, Alford belongs in prison. Known on the streets as “Teflon,” Alford, who grew up in Newark, was sentenced in January 1996 for the shooting of 20-year-old Jamarl Abney in Elizabeth over a borrowed gun. The victim’s body was discovered in April 1994 by a cab driver at a service area on Schiller Street, near Exit 13A of the New Jersey Turnpike, shot in the eye, armpit, chest and thigh.
First placed in Northern State Prison in Newark, Alford, now 41, was transferred to East Jersey State Prison in June 2006 after officers found a forbidden cell phone on him while being searched prior to being transported to court. A corrections officer was suspended on charges he smuggled the phone into Alford after being pressured by relatives who were gang members.
At East Jersey State Prison, Alford was placed in administrative segregation, away from the rest of the prison population. Three days later, officers found letters in Alford’s cell stating that 13 guns had been stashed in four state prisons for use in simultaneous inmate uprising. The letters also referred to the planned assassination of then-Newark Mayor Cory Booker.
Four state prisons — Northern State Prison, East Jersey State Prison in Avenel, South Woods State Prison in Bridgeton and New Jersey State in Trenton — were placed on lockdown for a week during searches that found no guns. Days after the letters were found, Newark police began round-the-clock security for Booker.
There were never any reports of actual assassination attempts against Booker. Alford denies he made the threat and claims the letters stating threat were politically motivated.
Ever since then, Alford has been in a cell by himself, allowed out a few hours each week, and then only under strict surveillance, placed in isolation unit after corrections officials say he was caught with a cell phone yet again.
Alford says in his suit that his prison conditions are retaliation “for allegedly possessing cellular telephones.” He has charged the state with violating his right to a due process hearing on the allegations. He also claims the conditions amount to cruel and unusual punishment.
“I eat every meal that is served in my cell. If I am allowed to use the unit phone, I have to use it in my cell. I am not allowed to go to the law library, gym, or anywhere else inmates congregate. The conditions on the MCU unit (Management Control Unit) is one that can only be described as bleak, hopeless, and explosive,” Alford wrote in a letter earlier this month, responding to a letter from a Star-Ledger reporter.
The State Department of Corrections said Alford is not permitted to give interviews.
Alford filed his suit in 2009 on his own, without the help of a lawyer, three years after he was placed in an isolation unit at East Jersey State Prison in the Avenel section of Woodbridge. He has since submitted numerous motions and responses to motions from the state, including two attempts from the state Attorney General to get the case dismissed. After the suit was filed, Alford was transferred to the New Jersey State Prison in Trenton, but again placed in the Management Control Unit.
Nationally, the practice of solitary confinement has been coming under increasing scrutiny. A bill recently introduced in congress calls for a federal commission to study the use of solitary confinement in U.S. and state prisons, with the aim of recommending national standards to reform the practice and ensure it is only “used infrequently and only under extreme circumstances.” The American Civil Liberties Union calls prison isolation “cruel, expensive and ineffective.”
Lawsuits like Alford’s are not uncommon. Inmate-initiated cases are so numerous that in 1994, Congress passed the Prison Litigation Reform Act, establishing standards inmates had to meet before their cases moved forward.
“Federal court were overwhelmed with these cases,” said Martin Horn, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and a former head of corrections for Pennsylvania. “I got sued by an inmate because his underwear was too tight.”
He said those serving long sentences have the time to sit in prison and do research. “It’s a mistake to think that inmates are not smart,” he said.
Alford, in his letter to a reporter, complained of being worn down by the level of security he faces every waking hour. “I am not allowed out of my cell unless authorized , and even then I am under a unit camera watch as well as three booth correctional officers until I return to my cell.
Attorneys for the state acknowledge in court papers that Alford was under intense surveillance each time he was allowed out of his cell, including cavity searches when he exited and entered the cell. Each time he was let out of the cell, officers accompanied him, another officer from the Special Investigation Division who would videotape Alford while he was outside the cell.
“As a result of a serious risk Alford posed to the safety and security of the prison, the New Jersey Department of Corrections increased his security status,” lawyers wrote in response to the suit.
At the same time, they have argued in court papers that restrictions were justified.
But Superior Court Lisa Chrystal, in a ruling earlier this year, sided with Alford, allowing him to proceed with his lawsuit.
“The court finds that a genuine issue of material fact is suggested by these allegations, as they go beyond the mere transfer of (Alford) to another housing assignment,” Chrystal in wrote her Jan. 2013 opinion rejecting the state’s request to have the case thrown out.
The case is now before Superior Court Kenneth Grispin who has scheduled a trial for July 28.
Alford’s case has the Union County Sheriff’s Department consulting with other law enforcement agencies about tightening security in the courtroom, where Alford may be permitted to move about unshackled to present his case to a jury, and also may have other gang members coming to the courtroom to watch trial, said Sheriff Ralph Froehlich.
Alford, meanwhile, in his letter to a news reporter, said he understands that going to trial is “a great feat.”
He said others have told him that nobody has gotten this far without a lawyer.
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