|
|
| Court: Female officers do not violate male prisoners' rights |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 11/03/2003 |
|
A Louisiana inmate who claimed that having female officers patrol his housing unit violated his constitutional rights lost his appeal to the 5th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. Billy Wayne Sinclair is serving a 90-year sentence for the 1965 murder of a Baton Rouge convenience store clerk. In upholding a lower court's decision, the court ruled that the "use of female officers to supervise the living areas of Sinclair's unit occasions nothing more than a brief postponement of the necessary functions of urination and/or defecation, rather than the unnecessary and wanton infliction of pain required for a constitutional violation." Sinclair's wife, Jodie, said her husband filed the suit after female officers began writing up inmates for exposing themselves when they were only going to take a shower or using a toilet. The court also said the prison has a right to hire who it wants and must do so with equal opportunity employment in mind, meaning it cannot exclude women. Sinclair was originally sentenced to death, but his sentence was reduced to life in prison in 1972 after the U.S. Supreme Court voided then-existing death penalty laws. Gov. Buddy Roemer commuted his sentence to 90 years before leaving office in 1992. Sinclair now has a release date of 2011. |
advertise
|
privacy policy
|
add URL
|
about us
|
terms/disclaimer
|
contact us
|
join our team
|
help
Comments:
No comments have been posted for this article.
Login to let us know what you think