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| Ill. Judge OKs Hunger Strike Right for Inmates |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 09/16/2002 |
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Prison inmates can choose to starve themselves rather than endure years of solitary confinement and that right outweighs the state's duty to keep them alive, a judge ruled. Two inmates have sometimes refused food to protest conditions at the maximum-security prison in Pontiac. Both are serving long terms for violent crimes and have been in solitary confinement because of bad behavior. In his ruling September 5, Livingston County Judge Harold Frobish allowed the prison to keep feeding the inmates until the state decides whether to appeal. 'They are in this cubicle 24 hours a day, and they read some and then they think. And that is all there is to do,' Frobish said. 'This is an existence where I find these defendants suffer from extreme sensory deprivation. I find it is a miserable existence. 'I find that if these defendants choose to die in these circumstances rather than live this way, that they should have a right to do so,' he concluded. Inmates John Barrell and Leon Snipes had burritos for lunch a day after the decision and the prison has not tried to force-feed them when they refused other meals, said Brian Fairchild, spokesman for the Corrections Department. The inmates' lawyer, Robert Travers, said inmates were protesting worsening conditions at Pontiac. |
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