Emergency Application Filed for Categorical Reprieve of Ohio’s Prisoners
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine asked to grant the release state prisoners to preserve public health and civil rights during COVID-19 pandemic.
In April 2020, we submitted an emergency application for reprieve to Ohio Governor Mike DeWine and the Adult Parole Authority, requesting the immediate release of prisoners within Ohio’s Prisons. This Emergency Application for Categorical Reprieve was designed to mitigate the unprecedented risk to the health and safety of both people in Ohio’s prisons and the surrounding communities caused by the current global COVID-19 pandemic.
This emergency application was submitted by attorneys Jacqueline Greene and Sarah Gelsomino of Friedman, Gilbert + Gerhardstein, and Kimberly Kendall Corral and Megan Patituce of Patituce & Associates, LLC.
The harm of maintaining densely populated prisons puts incarcerated people, prison employees, and all Ohioans at risk. The request for reprieve asked the State to protect the human rights of prisoners by significantly reducing prison populations in order to flatten the curve of COVID-19 statewide, minimizing the burden on local health care systems.
According to the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections 2019 Annual Report, more than 15,000 people in Ohio’s prisons are considered medically vulnerable, indicating a high risk of serious, life-threatening COVID-19 complications. Data related to COVID-19 in Ohio shows that people in prison are especially vulnerable to COVID-19 and that prison-wide outbreaks will overrun the capabilities of prison health care facilities and local health care providers, diverting already-scarce treatment and personal protective equipment resources away from residents and hospitals.
“The State has taken great strides to protect Ohio’s population, but people in Ohio prisons and the surrounding communities remain in grave danger,” says Jacqueline Greene, partner at FG+G. “Immediate release of prisoners from Ohio’s prisons is necessary to flatten the curve of the effects of COVID-19 for the entire state.”
“We are on the cusp of a major humanitarian crisis within our prisons,” states Sarah Gelsomino, partner at FG+G. “The Governor has the power to act now to save lives.”
“What we’re hearing from our clients inside Ohio prisons is that, despite efforts from ODRC [the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction], the current conditions in prison do not allow for any realistic measures for health and safety,” says Kimberly Kendall Corral, attorney at Patituce & Associates. “Our clients are afraid and have no means to protect themselves.”