News & Commentary

“I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked…” - Allen Ginsberg, “Howl”

The ACLU of Rhode Island announced today that the Barrington School District has dropped the lawsuit it filed in October against one of its own students who had successfully challenged before the Rhode Island Department of Education (RIDE) his three-day out-of-school suspension. Barrington’s lawsuit, which the ACLU had called “outrageous and shameful” when it was filed, had sought to overturn the RIDE decision and also demanded a recovery of attorneys’ fees from both the middle school student and RIDE. The ACLU called the suit’s dismissal “welcome but overdue.”

UPDATE 1/28/20: The Council affirmed the ruling, but directed the Commissioner of Education "to begin the process of revising current ELL regulations." Here is the statement from the organizations that had sought rejection of the ruling:

Bolstered by similar national trends, Rhode Island has enacted several positive and significant criminal justice reform measures over the past few years. Unfortunately, every step forward by the General Assembly seems to be accompanied by a step back.

Under a stipulation signed by R.I. Superior Court Judge Robert Krause and entered today, the RI Department of Corrections (DOC) will release from custody a man that ACLU of Rhode Island attorneys argued was unlawfully being held in prison despite a unanimous decision by the R.I. Parole Board to release him on supervised parole.

A habeas corpus petition filed today by ACLU of Rhode Island attorneys argues that an inmate is unlawfully being held in prison despite a decision by the R.I. Parole Board that he had demonstrated that he was qualified and ready for release on supervised parole.

A legal claim for damages has been sent today to the City of Pawtucket over a School Resource Officer’s (SRO) gratuitous and unlawful handcuffing and arrest of a 13-year-old African-American middle school honors student. The damages claim was submitted by ACLU of Rhode Island cooperating attorney Shannah Kurland as a required legal prerequisite to the filing of a lawsuit on behalf of the student, Tre’sur Johnson.

The 2019 Top 10. A completely unexhaustive list of (some of) the most absurd civil liberties violations we encountered this year. 

Responding to a lawsuit filed last week by the ACLU of RI, a federal judge has, with the State's consent, entered a temporary restraining order against the Department of Human Services’ continued use of procedurally deficient notices that have demanded SNAP recipients reimburse the state for overpayments that they purportedly received years earlier. The notice, the ACLU alleged in the lawsuit, failed to provide sufficient information for recipients to determine its accuracy.