Arizona Approves $12.3M Budget for Prison Inmates’ Class Action Settlement

The Arizona Legislature has approved a $12.3 million budget increase to help the Department of Corrections meet the terms of a class action settlement over claims it provided “grossly inadequate” medical, dental and mental health care that amounted to cruel and unusual punishment.

Arizona’s inmate health care system was so flawed, plaintiffs alleged, that it caused deaths and preventable injuries.

U.S. Magistrate Judge David K. Duncan of Phoenix approved the class action settlement on February 18. Under the agreement, the Arizona Department of Corrections was required to request additional state funds to increase staffing for medical and mental health care workers within its facilities.

Arizona lawmakers approved the fiscal year 2016 budget increase on March 7.

The money will help the DOC meet more than 100 health-care performance measures mandated by the settlement agreement that include the monitoring of inmates with diabetes, hypertension and other chronic conditions. All prisoners must also receive:

• Annual flu vaccinations;
• Immunizations required by the CDC for prisoners with chronic diseases;
• Annual colon cancer screenings for prisoners ages 50 to 75;
• Mammogram screenings for female prisoners age 50 and older; and
• Improved dental care.

In addition, prisoners in solitary confinement must be given more out-of-cell time for exercise, showers, medical care, mental health treatment, classification hearings or visiting. And all maximum custody prisoners must receive meals that meet the caloric and nutritional content of the meals given to other prisoners.

The Arizona Department of Corrections class action settlement does not apply to inmates in private state prisons.

Class Action Allegations

The settlement resolves a 2012 class action lawsuit (Parsons v. Ryan) filed by 13 inmates who claimed that emergency treatment and other medical care was often delayed or outright denied, and that it was difficult to obtain medications and medical devices. Plaintiffs said that their basic health needs were not met and that critically ill prisoners “begged prison officials for treatment, only to be told ‘be patient,’ ‘it’s all in your head,’ or ‘pray’ to be cured.”

They further claimed that some prisoners were kept in extreme isolation under inhumane conditions that frequently included inadequate nutrition and no outdoor exercise for months or years on end. Mentally ill prisoners were also denied therapy and psychiatric medication, they alleged, putting them and other inmates at risk for serious harm and even death.

“I personally have been involved in prison litigation for over 40 years, and I have never seen a worse example of inadequate medical and mental health care,” said Dan Pachoda, legal director for the ACLU in Arizona, which teamed with the American Civil Liberties Union, the Prison Law Office and several Arizona law firms to represent the prisoners.

The hotly contested case made its way to a federal appeals court last spring, which rejected efforts by the DOC to limit the lawsuit to just the specific claims of the named plaintiffs.

On June 5, 2014, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the district court’s order certifying a class and subclass of more than 33,000 inmates in 10 Arizona prison facilities.

The appeals court agreed with the lower court’s ruling that attorneys for the inmates had provided detailed references that supported their allegations of deficient health care, and also provided information that showed spending on certain services “had plummeted by 38%” even though there was no similar decline in the number of prisoners. According to Governor Ducey’s budget proposal, Arizona’s inmate population has grown by an average of 82 inmates per month since July 2012.

Taken together, the evidence suggested that injuries suffered by the plaintiffs were examples of “systematic failures” that would require a complete overhaul of the prison system’s health care policies – not simply correcting the problems of the 13 plaintiffs, the Court of Appeals said.

Four months after the DOC lost its appeal, the parties entered a settlement agreement on October 9, just days before the case was to go to trial – a move that potentially saved the state millions of dollars in legal costs.

In his approval order, Judge Duncan said the case would likely travel to the Court of Appeals again if it was not settled.

“If that happened, there would be further delay, and it is not unreasonable to conclude that this case that was started in March three years ago would be continuing for another two years past this time period,” said Duncan – time that would be spent “expending more money on battle rather than redressing needs.”

In addition to its own legal costs, the DOC will have to pay $4.9 million in attorneys’ fees to the plaintiffs as mandated by the settlement agreement.

Given Arizona’s state budget crisis, Judge Duncan said an expensive, long-drawn-out litigation would result in dramatic cuts. “And what that means is there will be fewer dollars to do things that need to be done.”

The class action settlement provides for ongoing monitoring and oversight by the prisoners’ lawyers to make sure the state is complying with its terms. The DOC will have 12 months to meet or exceed a 75% threshold for these performance measures. This will increase to 85% after two years.

The Arizona Prison Health Care Class Action Lawsuit is Victor Parsons, et al. v. Charles Ryan, et al., Case No. 12-00601-PHX-DJH, U.S. District Court, District of Arizona.