Senior EditorPrison inmates who participate in peaceful protests do not violate prison rules, according to an April 22 decision from a California appeals court.
The ruling is a reaction to a Pelican Bay inmate named Jorge A. Gomez who went on a hunger strike in 2013. Gomez said his refusal to eat was an exercise in free speech, but prison officials argue otherwise. They say he violated a prison rule because, “significant disruptions of the normal operations” of Pelican Bay occurred when services were delayed and cancelled and personnel had to be reallocated to monitor hunger strikers.
Court documents say that during the 2013 mass hunger strike more than “1,400 inmates at Pelican Bay refused nine consecutive state-issued meals.” In the same court papers, prison officials contend that “an individual inmate may refuse food. But inmates may not organize a mass protest that disrupts prison programming.”
In making its finding, the court focused on the rule Gomez allegedly broke. It requires inmates to avoid “behavior which might lead to violence or disorder, or otherwise endangers facility, outside community or another person,” Title 15 of the California Code of Regulations, section 3005(a).
The court ruled prison officials did not give enough evidence to show “prison operations were thrown into disorder” because of Gomez’s hunger strike.
The court found “adjustments to workloads and services in order to contend with the hunger strike and work stoppage, and (prison official’s) statements do not indicate that the protest involved any violence or disorderly conduct.”
Because the court found Gomez did not violate a prison rule, his free speech claim was not addressed.
