Litigation

After Charlie Washington was sentenced to death, it came to light that his trial attorneys had failed to investigate and present an avalanche of mitigating evidence that made a powerful case for life. Nonetheless, Alabama courts rejected Mr. Washington’s claim that he had received ineffective assistance of counsel, relying on egregious misunderstandings of how capital jurors process evidence. The MacArthur Justice Center, representing eight leading scholars, is urging a federal appellate court to heed the research on jury decisionmaking and vacate Mr. Washington’s death sentence.

Officer Xeng Lor shot our client, Xyavier Calliste, twice through the driver’s side door of his car as Mr. Calliste was leaving a parking garage at the Charlotte airport. Recognizing that Lor faced no imminent threat that would justify deadly force, the district court denied Lor summary judgment and qualified immunity. MacArthur Justice Center co-counseled with civil rights attorney Micheal Littlejohn Jr. to represent Mr. Calliste on appeal and ensure that he can go to trial to vindicate his Fourth Amendment rights.

Our client was criminally tried before a jury of only 6 of his peers, despite the fact that for hundreds of years the common law practice—and the practice in a vast majority of states and in the federal system—is a jury of 12. The MacArthur Justice Center is urging the Supreme Court to overturn its wrong and outdated precedent that allows for this practice, in violation of individuals’ Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial.

While incarcerated at a prison in Northern California, Mr. Simms received nasal surgery at a nearby hospital. Although he was lethargic and disoriented following the surgery, two prison officers rushed Mr. Simms back to the prison—ignoring his complaints that he was having difficulty breathing, coughing up blood and experiencing severe pain—so that they could get off work on time.

Imposing assessments on indigent persons that are beyond their ability to pay seriously threatens equal access to justice. This system results results in people saddled with burdensome fees that keep them ensnared in the criminal legal system.

Civil plaintiffs have an absolute right to voluntarily withdraw their cases. Yet, when Edward Spencer, an incarcerated plaintiff, did so, a federal district court later punished him by deeming that withdrawal a “strike” under the Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA). That was wrong.

Joseph Vidal sued New York prison officials for violating his procedural due process rights after he was unable to introduce key witness testimony during the disciplinary hearing that resulted in his placement in solitary confinement for nearly nine months.

People incarcerated at Algoa Correctional Center in Missouri – a nearly 100-year-old prison without air conditioning – are forced to suffer through inhumane and dangerously hot conditions every summer in violation of their constitutional rights. The MacArthur Justice Center is fighting for the health and safety of our clients by demanding that Missouri Department of Corrections maintain safe and humane conditions for people confined at Algoa.

In 2008, Mr. Bowe was convicted of a gun charge under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) and was sentenced to a mandatory consecutive term of ten years in federal prison. That conviction depended on Section 924(c)’s definition of a “crime of violence.” In 2019, the Supreme Court invalidated a key component of Section 924(c)’s definition, known as the “residual clause,” as unconstitutionally vague.

During July of 2024, medical staff at Marquette Branch Prison gave Mr. Taylor and another man at the prison the wrong medication, causing the other man to overdose and die. When Mr. Taylor sought to report what had happened, officers retaliated against him, and soon after a prison doctor sexually assaulted him while he was handcuffed during a teeth cleaning. Mr. Taylor brought a lawsuit in federal court, seeking relief for these abuses.