Inmates unable to see solar eclipse — a ‘religious event’ — sue NY corrections system
A statewide lockdown of New York prison facilities will prevent inmates from watching the upcoming solar eclipse, according to a new federal lawsuit, which argues the measure violates inmates’ constitutional rights to practice religion.
Six inmates — an atheist, a Baptist, a Muslim, a Seventh Day Adventist and two men who practice Santeria — are suing the department in charge of the state’s prisons in the hopes that they will be allowed out in the prison yard to view the total solar eclipse April 8.
“Many religions recognize the significance of this historic eclipse, and we are advocating for everyone’s right to observe it,” Chris McArdle, one of the attorneys representing the men, told McClatchy News in a statement April 2.
Despite the inmates’ differing faiths, the men have expressed that the eclipse “is a religious event that they must witness” while incarcerated at Woodbourne Correctional Facility in Sullivan County, New York, according to a complaint filed March 29.
After April 8, the next opportunity to see a total solar eclipse from the U.S. will be in 2044, according to NASA.
A “lockdown memo” issued by the New York Department Of Corrections and Community Supervision on March 11 says “there will be no incarcerated movement” in all state prison facilities “from 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.” during the eclipse April 8, the lawsuit says.
Inmates are typically allowed outdoors for recreation during the timeframe, according to the complaint, which says there was no lockdown during the last solar eclipse visible in the state in 2017.
Before the memo was issued, Jeremy Zielinski, the inmate who’s atheist, requested Jan. 28 to view the solar eclipse in accordance with his faith. The religious request form was granted March 8, the complaint says.
He was incarcerated at Woodbourne Correctional Facility in 2016 following a rape conviction, department records show. After he was convicted, he was sentenced to serve 14 years and six months in prison, according to the records.
Zielinski “firmly believes that observing the solar eclipse with people of different faiths is crucial to practicing his own faith,” the complaint says.
However, the subsequent requests of four of his fellow inmates and plaintiffs were denied March 14, according to the complaint. The request of the man who is a Seventh Day Adventist has gone unanswered, the complaint says.
DOCCS spokesman Thomas Mailey told McClatchy News in a statement April 2 that “the department does not comment on pending litigation” and “religious requests related to viewing the eclipse are currently under review.”
In regards to the memo issued by DOCCS Acting Commissioner Daniel F. Martuscello III about “operational changes for the eclipse,” Mailey said all DOCCS facilities will run on a holiday schedule.
Staff and inmates who will be able to see the eclipse from their housing units will receive eclipse safety glasses, according to Mailey.
The six inmates’ lawsuit names the DOCCS, Martuscello, DOCCS Superintendent David Howard and Danielle Glebocki, the department’s deputy superintendent for program services, as defendants.
“The state’s refusal to recognize religious freedoms casts a dark shadow on us all,” McArdle told McClatchy News.
His clients seek “expedited injunctive relief” and demands that the DOCCS allow Zielinski and the other plaintiffs to watch the eclipse April 8, the lawsuit shows.
Several regions in New York state will be in the solar eclipse’s “path of totality” April 8, according to the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation. When the moon briefly passes between the sun and the earth, it will cause the sky to go dark.
Court records show the DOCCS’ answer to the lawsuit is due April 22, two weeks after the eclipse.
Before then, the lawsuit wants the court to declare that the inmates’ “religious exercise has been illegally burdened and issue an order prohibiting further illegal violations of religious exercise.”
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