Written by Don Byrd
A Native-American inmate in Texas has waited 4 years to obtain a small lock of his deceased parents’ hair to stay connected with their spirits according to his religious beliefs. The state has refused William Chance’s request, citing security concerns, leading him to file suit under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act. After the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the state’s motion to dismiss that claim, Chance’s case is headed to trial in January.
USAToday reports on the case today.
Chance does have a “medicine bag” approved by Texas prison officials that includes an 8-inch strand of horse hair threaded through a hawk’s wing bone. According to court documents, those items were procured though vendors approved by the prison system.
Attorney Scott Medlock, who handled Chance’s case, said it was “odd and very strange” the prison agency would allow Chance to have natural items such as horse hair, but refuse his request for his parents’ hair.
“He’s not making this stuff up,” Liz Grobsmith, a Northern Arizona University anthropologist with expertise in Native American religions and how they’re practiced in prisons, said Tuesday. “One of the most common basic items in the medicine bundle is a lock of the deceased’s hair.”
I am not familiar with all of the facts of this case, but this sounds like a classic circumstance where RLUIPA and principles of religious liberty should have an impact. Clearly, officials allow ceremonial locks of hair. The stumbling block here seems to be the rule that the materials must be procured through approved vendors.
The report indicates the lock of hair in question is 4 inches long and about the width of a pencil lead. While security is a compelling government interest in a prison setting, and courts tend to defer to prison officials in matters of security, is a blanket rule requiring items to come from approved vendors, *regardless of the nature of the item* the least restrictive way of achieving that objective?
