How the ADA Helps Inmates in Prison Control Their Addiction

Beth Schwartzapfel wrote an article shown on The Marshall Project called, “When Going to Jail Means Giving up the Meds that Saved your Life.” In this article many cases are brought about individuals who needed certain medications to survive their addictions but weren’t provided them. For example, the first individual they talk about is Geoffrey Pesce he was addicted to heroin and oxycodone. After losing everything he became dependent on daily visits to a methadone clinic trying his hardest not to relapse. One day he couldn’t get a ride to the clinic so he decided to drive on a revoked licence soon to be pulled over by a cop, which had him looking at close to 60 days in jail. This had him worried wondering what he would do without his addiction medication. Would he easily accept drugs from other inmates? Or would he crave it as soon as he was released? These were the thoughts that were going through his head about how to stay away from the drugs that once ruined his life. Most facilities ban the use of addiction medications for safety reasons, but Pesce wasn’t going to fall back into his addiction. He expressed his concerns in court saying that “I will lose control of my addiction, and I will relapse, overdose, and die”. A federal judge in Massachusetts sided with Pesce, making what attorneys say to be the first ruling of its kind. This cases changed how people recovering from opioid addictions are treated in jails and prisons, causing many lawsuits of the same concern to happen all over the country. The Americans With Disabilities Act was signed into law in 1990 banning discrimination against people with disabilities and requires that public places or services be accessible to all. This law included protections from those recovering from alcoholism and drug addiction. Sally Friedman, was an attorney with the Legal Action Center which advocated and argued for years that people on addiction medication in the criminal justice system should be protected. Being forced not to use these kinds of medications causing for a ton of issues to come about, the addicts will be released with a lower tolerance and an increased sense to use. Adding into the statistics that prisoners are 12 times more likely to die and 129 times more likely to die of an overdose. The reason for all the debate is because many believe that using opioids as medications substitute one addiction for another, the government and scientists call this misconception. Many facilities that were accused of not providing the medications to addicts in prison received a letter that they were under investigation. After the Pesce case many of the officials had a change of heart and had a handful of facilities begin providing the medication. Each facility is taking extreme precautions making sure that the inmates are taking the medications as they should and not passing them along to other prisoners. The ADA made it clear that being allowed to have these drugs is for a person in recovery and not for someone who is currently using drugs illegally, they are not seen as a “individual with a disability.” As they continue to do research on this issue, they will see what exactly and who the laws apply to. But as of now, after Pesce’s case it has put many sheriffs and correctional administrators around the country on notice. “Friedman of the Legal Action Center said, “this judge is basically saying that the vast majority of jails and prisons in this country are likely violating federal law.” I believe that this news article is significant based off of the effect it has on many people that are sent to prisons suffering from addiction, and how they can overcome it. Not many people would feel sympathetic when it came to people who face drug addictions but it doesn’t mean that we should just leave them to fend for themselves while in prison. The ADA’s decision to come up with the opportunity for recovering drug addicts to have the medication they need, saves the lives of many people.  The link to the article I decided to write about is provided below. 

https://www.themarshallproject.org/2019/01/29/when-going-to-jail-means-giving-up-the-meds-that-saved-your-life