“A position in the Missouri Department of Corrections is more than a job. It’s a calling. Corrections employees transform lives...”
—State of Missouri
That was the order barked at eight Muslim inmates worshipping in housing unit 4B of the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center (ERDCC) in Bonne Terre, Missouri, that chilly night of February 28, 2021.
The men had used their living quarters to pray hundreds of times since the chapel had been shut down due to COVID. But this time, they were surrounded by prison guards. They continued praying (interrupting one’s dialogue with God is seen as a sign of disrespect in Islam), but hurried to finish.
“There’s no praying outside the chapel!” shouted one guard.
The case raises serious questions about the treatment of Muslim inmates and the protection of their right to practice their religion.
According to a lawsuit filed in eastern Missouri’s US District Court by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the inmates were then handcuffed and pepper-sprayed before being hustled off—some barefoot—across a muddy field in freezing rain to the prison’s solitary confinement unit. There, they were left in cells for more than 15 hours before being allowed to shower and receive medical attention.
As one inmate described it: “My eyes are burning, my skin is burning, everything is burning, and all I could do was sit on this cold ground and ball up a little bit and pick a spot to stare at and try to zone out.”
The worshippers spent 10 days in solitary confinement before being released back into the prison population.
Carl Hart, the guard who first began pepper-spraying the men, had a history of Islamophobia, according to the lawsuit. Several years prior, prison officials relieved him of Ramadan meal delivery duty after he allegedly said, “I have PTSD from having been trained to kill Muslims in Afghanistan” and complained about having to “feed these motherf—kers.”
Federal laws, including the First Amendment, guarantee the right to religious freedom in prisons. Prison officials may restrict the free exercise of religion only to advance a “compelling governmental interest,” and must use “the least restrictive means possible.”
But in Missouri, policies around prayer and other religious practices are often vague or ambiguous, leaving much up to the discretion of correctional officers, who may harbor entrenched prejudices against Muslims.
A year and a half after the incident, in the summer of 2022, Hart was arrested for possession of child sexual abuse material. Six months later, he was indicted for a separate incident, involving beating a prisoner and assaulting him with pepper spray. In October 2023, he received a seven-year prison sentence for the two offenses.
CAIR’s filing accused the correctional officers of using excessive force, violating the men’s constitutional right to practice their religion and showing deliberate indifference to serious medical needs.
This month, a federal jury agreed on each of those counts, awarding the eight Muslim men $667,000.
The case raises serious questions about the treatment of Muslim inmates and the protection of their right to practice their religion.
“Being a Muslim in America should not lead to one being subjected to excessive force or religious persecution,” said Nadia Bayado, an attorney for the men. “I am overjoyed for our clients, and I hope this verdict brings them and their families solace.”
