In 2023, the DOC terminated religious accommodation for meals. It replaced it with a policy that required religious celebrants to choose a meal from the DOC’s regular weekly menu for their holiday meal. This menu didn’t include halal meat or other religiously meaningful foods.  This legal action restores religious accommodations for meals and expands the options.

PILP brought this lawsuit on behalf of Anthony Happel, who was denied treatment for opioid use disorder when he incarcerated at Venango County Prison. 

The Pennsylvania Institutional Law Project, along with Disability Rights Pennsylvania, has filed a lawsuit on behalf of John Topper who is incarcerated in the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections. Mr. Topper is an individual with multiple disabilities, including Huntington’s Disease and psychiatric disabilities which have left him unable to speak or write.

PILP’s work challenging solitary confinement and other inhumane prison conditions includes representing individuals in appeals aimed at establishing new precedents that will benefit not only our clients but also other incarcerated people throughout Pennsylvania and beyond. 

The Pennsylvania Institutional Law Project has settled a lawsuit on behalf of Damion Davis, who was held for several months as an immigrant detainee at the Pike County Correctional Facility (PCCF) in Lords Valley, Pennsylvania. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) contracts with Pike County to detain immigrants in its jail.  

PILP and its legal partners filed a class action lawsuit alongside six incarcerated people challenging solitary confinement in the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections. Each plaintiff has documented mental illness diagnoses that have significantly worsened throughout repeated and prolonged periods of solitary confinement.  The conditions are so harrowing that many in solitary confinement attempt suicide multiple times.  The plaintiffs are seeking injunctive relief and damages.