Ball v. LeBlanc
As part of our firm’s mission to fight for what’s right, we worked with the Promise of Justice Initiative represented three Louisiana death row inmates–Elzie Ball, Nathaniel Code, and James Magee–in an effort to end the torture by confinement in extreme heat of Louisiana death row inmates.
Louisiana had belt a brand new death row facility at the notorious Angola prison (Louisiana State Penitentiary) that was completed in 2006. The original plans, of course, called for airconditioning throughout the facility, as would be expected of a building in South Louisiana.
But during the course of construction, state prison officials decided that prisoners’ cells, to which they were confined for 23 hours per day, would not be airconditioned. All prison employee areas and administrative areas, however, would remain air conditioned.
The result, according to court ordered temperature and humidity monitoring: confinement of prisoners to cells for 23 hours per day where the minimum heat index routinely exceeded 88 degrees Fahrenheit and the maximum heat index hit the high 90s and occasionally exceeded 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
Working with the Promise of Justice Initiative, our firm brought suit alleging violations of the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment and federal disability discrimination laws. After years of litigation, including 6 bench trials and evidentiary hearings, 2 rounds of appeals to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal, and a petition to the United States Supreme Court, the prison finally agreed to maintain minimal safety measures for our clients, and ultimately agreed to provide minimal safety levels for other death row inmates.
The litigation produced several published orders and decisions, which are consistently cited to this day, including a 102 page injunction order, a 88 page sanctions order against the prison for evidentiary spoliation that ordered attorneys to show cause as to why they should not be disbarred, and two decisions from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal.