Litigation

Proceeding without counsel, Ms. Balsewicz filed an action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, alleging that the sergeant violated her Eighth Amendment right to freedom from cruel and unusual punishment by failing to protect her from a substantial risk of serious harm. The district...

Together with our partners at the University of Chicago Immigrants’ Rights Clinic, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the New York Civil Liberties Union, we are challenging the constitutionality of this unprecedented scheme of domestic indefinite detention. We are also challenging the grossly unfair procedures the government has used, under which the government made the...

The lawsuit states that the City’s history of unlawful refusals became more widespread following the COVID-19 pandemic and the recent citywide protests over police brutality and racism.

Alan Beaman spent over a decade in prison after being wrongfully convicted of the 1993 murder of his ex-girlfriend. The MacArthur Justice Center represents Mr. Beaman in his lawsuit against the City of Normal and the three former Normal police officers who orchestrated the wrongful conviction.

A coalition of Wisconsin voters and organizations that work to mobilize Wisconsin voters sued state election officials for violating federal laws that protect the right to vote. The suit asks the court to remedy Wisconsin’s failure to implement measures to ensure that all Wisconsin voters will be able to freely and safely participate in the...

A transgender woman currently housed at Danville Correctional Facility, a medium security men’s prison, has filed a federal lawsuit against the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) after being repeatedly subjected to sexual harassment and assault by both prisoners and IDOC staff. The complaint has been filed anonymously under the name “Tay Tay,” at the request...

An emergency class action lawsuit has been against Cook County Sheriff Thomas Dart, asking for the immediate release of medically vulnerable people in the Cook County Jail in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis.

In Missouri, the Parole Board is running an assembly-line parole process that pushes people back into our prisons without any real legal protections. In many instances, alleged parole violators are tricked or pressured into waiving their right to a hearing and being returned to prison without any process at all.

  But, in Ohio, if a person is jailed in the days leading up to Election Day after the deadline to request an absentee ballot there is literally no way for them to cast a ballot. Even while it disfranchises jailed voters in this way, Ohio makes special accommodations to deliver ballots to people who...

Over 4,600 individuals, roughly 600 of whom are currently in pretrial detention, are waiting for an attorney in the State of Missouri. These individuals have been charged with crimes and qualify for a court-appointed attorney but are being forced to wait for an indeterminate amount of time for one to become available due to an...