Women Inmates Suffer Extreme Sleep Deprivation, Class Action Says

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A class action lawsuit filed in California alleges that women prisoners are forced to suffer extreme sleep deprivation in violation of their civil rights.

The lawsuit filed on behalf of several plaintiffs and others similarly situated claims that Alameda County jail officials are forcing women to go without sleep.

The inmates class action lawsuit alleges that these actions are exposing women to physical and mental illness.

The three lead inmates in the class action lawsuit argue that their pregnancies are being put at risk due to lack of sleep.

Those inmates claim that prisoners in the Santa Rita Jail are woken up every hour for numerous reasons including pill calls, employee training, and safety checks.

The inmates class action lawsuit says that these actions are violating their protection from cruel and unusual punishment by putting their health at risk. The women who filed the lawsuit say that they have already experienced negative impacts from the sleep deprivation.

The plaintiffs in the inmates class action lawsuit state that they have developed anxiety and depression, have had their immune systems compromised, and have suffered from impaired memory and speech directly as a result of the lack of sleep.

One of the women in the inmates class action lawsuit also argues that this is hurting her chance for a fair trial since she is not coherent enough to help her attorneys with the preparation for court.

She says that problems with concentrating and thinking have gotten worse over the two years she’s been in the Santa Rita Jail and that she also gets sick more frequently due to the lack of sleep.

Another plaintiff in the inmates class action lawsuit spends nearly every hour of the day in solitary confinement. She says that the sleep deprivation has negative impacts for her because she might be pregnant. She alleges that if this practice continues, she could be at risk for adverse birth events like pre-term delivery of a baby.

The inmates class action lawsuit states that the sheriff’s office uses night shifts to train new hires. During part of that training, the new hires enter the cells of inmates while heavily armed.

According to the inmates class action lawsuit, the prisoners are required to wake up and vacate their beds to lie face forward on the floor of the cells. Some of those inmates have even been handcuffed and removed from the cell and put in other locations throughout the jail.

The lawsuit also alleges that the sheriff’s office carries out hourly safety checks as required but that staff go too far during these checks.

Rather than simply looking inside cells, the inmates class action lawsuit states that the staff members use flashlights to wake up inmates and them scream and pound on the cells if the flashlight did not wake them.

The plaintiffs in the inmates class action lawsuit are represented by Yolanda Huang of the Law Offices of Yolanda Huang and by Dennis Cunningham.

The California Women Inmates Class Action Lawsuit is Tikisha Upshaw, et al. v. Alameda County, et al., Case No. 3:18-cv-07814-JCS, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, San Francisco/Oakland Division.