News & Commentary

The ACLU of Rhode Island filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit today on behalf of local journalist, Philip Eil, who has been stymied for more than three years in his effort to obtain access to thousands of pages of public evidence from a major prescription drug-dealing trial. The lawsuit, against the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), seeks a court order to release the documents, a declaration that the DEA has wrongfully withheld and redacted documents, and an award of attorney fees. Filing the suit were ACLU volunteer attorneys Neal McNamara and Jessica Jewell, from the law firm of Nixon Peabody.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island has raised deep concerns about the hiring practices of the City of East Providence and the East Providence School Department’s failure to address allegations of discrimination against minority employees and applicants.

Despite decades of progress toward gender equality, in Rhode Island today gender-exclusive student events that are specifically held for girls or boys with the active support of elementary schools help to perpetuate blatant gender stereotypes. Almost invariably, the girls’ events, organized by parent-teacher groups and publicized by the schools, are dances, with another gender-stereotyped event, like a pajama party, occasionally taking their place. By contrast, and just as invariably, the events arranged for boys involve almost anything but dancing, are wide-ranging, and focus on purportedly male-friendly activities like sports and arcade games.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island today issued a report calling on state and municipal leaders to examine policies, practices and procedures that lead to discriminatory treatment of black Rhode Islanders, from elementary school through adulthood. The ACLU report, titled “The School-to-Prison Pipeline in Black and White,” offers a brief but systematic examination of racial disparities in Rhode Island, and how those interconnected disparities can lead to a lifetime of unequal treatment. The report, presented in a series of twelve charts, comes as the nation celebrates Black History Month, and grapples with recent events that have pushed racial disparity issues back into the forefront.

In response to a lawsuit filed this week by the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island, the Division of Motor Vehicles agreed to the entry of a court order today that will require the agency to first adopt regulations through a public process before using a new database designed to identify and possibly take action against uninsured drivers.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island today urged the Westerly School Committee to reject a proposal that would require committee members to support all committee decisions, limit members’ ability to discuss committee matters in public and establish consequences for violating these restrictions.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island filed a lawsuit today against the Division of Motor Vehicles for implementing a database designed to identify uninsured motorists without first establishing any regulations to prevent the improper disclosure of drivers’ personal information, avoid mistaken registration revocations, or to otherwise ensure that the program is properly administered by the private out-of-state company contracted to run the program.

The ACLU of Rhode Island issued the following statement in response to news reports today that RIPTA has refused to provide any information about its use of security cameras to monitor Kennedy Plaza.