ACLU of Arizona Sues County Officials Over Inhumane Confinement of TB Patient
CONTACT: media@aclu.org
PHOENIX, AZ – The American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona today filed a
lawsuit on behalf of Robert Daniels, a tuberculosis patient who has been held in
the jail ward at the Maricopa Medical Center for the past nine months, charging
that treating a severely ill patient like a criminal is inhumane and
unconstitutional.
“Individuals quarantined because of public health risks
are held under civil rather than criminal laws,” said Daniel J. Pochoda, ACLU of
Arizona Legal Director. “Robert Daniels is a sick patient who has been detained
for non-punitive purposes and public health officials are legally and morally
obligated to treat him in a humane manner.”
Daniels was placed in quarantine
at the jail ward of the county hospital in August 2006. He was diagnosed with an
extremely drug-resistant strain of tuberculosis (TB) that he will probably live
with for his entire life, even if he becomes non-contagious. At a hearing in
July 2006, Daniels was involuntarily committed after Maricopa County Public
Health Department officials claimed he was a serious public health risk for not
wearing a mask while visiting a local convenience store. One month later he was
thrown in jail.
“I’m slowly dying in this room,” said Daniels, who has
a wife and daughter in his native Russia. “I didn’t realize how serious
this was, and I regret that, but nothing justifies the kind of treatment I’ve
received in here. The solitary confinement starts to mess with your head and it
has taken a serious toll on my body.”
In its complaint, the ACLU argues that
the county has failed to implement procedures on how to humanely quarantine sick
patients for lengthy periods of time, and in an effort to cut costs deliberately
failed to explore alternative locations in which to quarantine Daniels. Maricopa
County Sheriff Joe Arpaio publicly stated that in the interest of security he
would treat any person housed in the jail ward in the same manner as all other
jail inmates.
Like jailed inmates accused of crimes, Daniels is subjected to
intrusive strip searches and he is unable to receive any visits from family and
friends. He isn’t permitted to exercise or walk outside, and has no access to
social or recreational activities like the Internet. He has been outside only
once in the past nine months, and was shackled hand and foot. The lights in his
cell are required to be kept on at night, and video cameras record his every
move. He can’t see through the frosted windows in his room and wasn’t able to
shower or call anyone until a few weeks ago.
“It’s psychologically damaging
to exist in a vacuum without meaningful activities or opportunities to interact
with others,” said ACLU of Arizona cooperating attorney Linda Cosme. “By placing
Robert Daniels in these deplorable conditions, the county clearly has no
intention of helping him get better. For years, they’ve been aware of the need
to create an adequate quarantine area for extremely ill patients, yet they’ve
chose to ignore the needs of some of the most vulnerable people in Maricopa
County in favor of harsh, jail-like conditions for people who are sick and
accused of no crimes.”
Further, Cosme said, there is little
evidence that Maricopa County has followed state law, which requires the county
to provide Daniels with the least restrictive environment for the
quarantine.
“The power to forcibly
detain and confine a person is an extraordinary power and, like all government
powers in a civilized democracy, can never go unchecked,” said Barry Steinhardt,
Director of the ACLU’s Technology and Liberty Project. “Quarantine and isolation
must be last resorts that are employed only after less restrictive alternatives
have been employed and failed, or are impossible to use under the
circumstances.”
While the ACLU is not challenging or questioning the
county’s decision to place Daniels in quarantine, the organization’s lawsuit
charges that the conditions of his confinement are not conducive to the
successful treatment of his illness and that the county failed to follow
professional standards for confining patients with drug-resistant TB patients.
“Voluntary quarantine at home is usually the most extreme scenario that we
typically encounter, so this is a very rare case,” said George J. Annas,
Chairman of Health Law Department at the Boston University School of Public
Health. “There are no real protocols for treating extensively
drug-resistant TB, but that doesn’t justify treating him like anything but a
sick patient in a hospital.”
The ACLU argues in its lawsuit that the county
is violating Daniels’ Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights to due process and
equal treatment and has substantially deprived him of his fundamental rights to
liberty, travel and privacy. The ACLU also asserts that county health
officials have violated Daniels’ rights under the Americans with Disabilities
Act of 1990 (ADA). Because Daniels has a contagious and drug-resistant
form of TB, he has a serious, long-term physical impairment and is considered a
disabled person under the ADA guidelines.
The ACLU is asking the court to
issue a preliminary injunction forcing the county to provide Daniels with
“reasonable accommodations” in a hospital ward that are helpful for his mental
and psychological well being, including giving him additional privacy, allowing
him to walk outdoors and interact with family members and friends, and providing
him with access to a computer.
The ACLU also is asking the court to require
the county to adopt policies with specific guidelines for implementing the least
restrictive environment for contagious people and to require the state to
provide adequate funding to appropriately quarantine people with long-term,
contagious illness.
The ACLU’s lawsuit, Daniels v. Robert England et al.,
was filed late this evening in federal district court in Phoenix. (Case No:
2:07-cv-1080). The complaint is attached in .pdf format.
To read a statement
on the ACLU’s views on a recent quarantine case in Atlanta, go to:
www.aclu.org/privacy/gen/29932prs20070530.html
To
read the ACLU's comments on the CDC's proposed rules on the quarantine of
travelers, visit: www.aclu.org/images/asset_upload_file960_25244.pdf
A
Q&A on the Model State Emergency Health Powers Act is online www.aclu.org/privacy/medical/14857res20020101.html