Pennsylvania jail confiscated inmates’ toilet paper and soap, cut power and heat, a lawsuit alleges

A Pennsylvania jail retaliated against inmates suspected of smoking synthetic marijuana by punishing entire cell blocks — confiscating legal paperwork, withholding necessities like toilet paper, soap and warm clothing, and cutting power and heat, inmates allege in a federal lawsuit filed Tuesday.

Top jail officials waged an escalating, monthlong campaign of collective punishment, imposing “near-total deprivation” and violating the constitutional rights of people incarcerated at Dauphin County Prison, a 1,000-person lockup outside the state capital of Harrisburg, the lawsuit says.

“For DCP to launch this campaign of mass torture is abominable. Their actions violate the Constitution and basic human decency,” said Margo Hu, staff attorney for the Abolitionist Law Center, which is representing the plaintiffs. “People in Dauphin County Prison have been advocating against the facility’s depraved conditions for years. It is past time Dauphin County be held responsible for the harm they have been inflicting.”

A message seeking comment was sent to the Dauphin County Prison Board.

County Commissioner Justin Douglas, who took office after the 2023 jail crackdown, said Tuesday he has been “deeply disturbed” by the allegations since they first surfaced in local media reports several months ago.

“I believe it is essential to let this process play out fully. If any inappropriate actions occurred, it is important that there are appropriate consequences,” he said.

The abuses described in the lawsuit took place in November and December 2023 in the jail’s restricted housing unit, where inmates are typically held for breaking jail rules and where jail officials believed synthetic drugs were being used.

The jail responded by confiscating inmates’ tablet computers, eliminating their access to religious texts, legal mail and other materials, and shutting off communications with anyone outside the jail, the lawsuit says. Jail officials are accused of seizing personal hygiene products and locking detainees in their cells nearly round-the-clock, permitting only one 15-minute shower every three days. Power and heat were cut, and some inmates sliced open their mattresses to keep warm as temperatures outside dipped below freezing, the suit alleges.

Most of the affected people were pretrial detainees. When one of the inmates, 27-year-old Kani Little, complained about the conditions, a dozen guards in riot gear assaulted him, slamming him to the ground and spraying him with chemical irritant, the lawsuit asserts.

Little and two other plaintiffs are seeking monetary damages on behalf of all detainees kept in the restricted housing unit at any time between Nov. 16 and Dec. 19, 2023. Dauphin County, the warden, the chief deputy warden and other jail officials and guards are named as defendants.

Dauphin County has a “widespread and well-earned reputation as a troubled prison facility,” the plaintiffs’ lawyers wrote in the filing. More than 20 people have died in custody at the jail since 2019, the lawyers said, and the rate of overdoses is disproportionately high.

“I’ve seen so many people die in DCP that I was scared I was next,” one of the plaintiffs, James Patterson, said in a statement released by the Abolitionist Law Center. “I kept talking to staff and no one wanted to listen. They all had their hands in this, none of them protected us, and they all need to go.”