Judge orders takeover of health care operations in Arizona prisons after years of poor care

Federal Judge Orders Takeover of Arizona Prison Healthcare System After Years of Violations

A federal judge has ordered the unprecedented takeover of Arizona’s prison healthcare system, citing the state’s continuous failure to provide constitutionally adequate medical and mental health care to inmates, despite nearly 14 years of litigation.

U.S. District Judge Roslyn Silver issued the ruling Thursday, determining that an independent receiver must be appointed to oversee the system that serves approximately 25,000 inmates in Arizona’s state-run facilities. The decision follows her 2022 verdict that found Arizona had violated prisoners’ constitutional rights by providing inadequate care that led to preventable suffering and deaths.

In her order, Silver did not mince words about the state’s persistent failures: “This approach has not only failed completely, but, if continued, would be nothing short of judicial indulgence of deeply entrenched unconstitutional conduct.” She emphasized that prisoners continue to face “an intolerable grave and immediate threat of continuing harm and suffering” due to systemic deficiencies throughout healthcare administration in the corrections system.

The state and attorneys representing prisoners have been given 60 days to submit a list of candidates to run health and mental health care operations across the prison system. The Arizona Department of Corrections did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the ruling.

David Fathi, one of the attorneys representing the inmates, called the decision a “life-saving intervention” that brings hope for ending the “preventable suffering and deaths that have haunted Arizona’s prison system for over a decade.”

The order marks a critical turning point in a long-running legal battle over healthcare in Arizona’s prisons. The state had previously committed to overhauling its medical and mental health services in a 2014 settlement agreement. However, corrections officials were repeatedly accused of failing to implement the promised changes, ultimately resulting in $2.5 million in contempt of court fines against the state.

Judge Silver eventually revoked the settlement agreement, explaining that corrections officials had demonstrated little interest in making the required changes. Following a 2022 trial, Silver ruled against the state and issued an injunction requiring authorities to fix the constitutional violations in their prison healthcare system.

While the corrections department has claimed significant progress in recent years, including expanded treatment access, increased staffing, and new medical housing units, attorneys for the prisoners argued these improvements were insufficient and requested the more drastic remedy of a receivership.

“The state lacks the leadership to comply within a reasonable amount of time,” prisoner advocates argued, while corrections officials countered that the opposing side refuses to acknowledge their progress and “focus on the reputation and circumstances of the past rather than recognizing or even supporting the good work of the present.”

This is not the first time a federal court has intervened so dramatically in a state prison system. In 2005, a federal judge seized control of California’s prison medical system after finding that approximately one inmate per week was dying due to medical neglect or malpractice.

The Arizona lawsuit specifically addresses conditions in state-run facilities and does not cover the nearly 10,000 people incarcerated in private prisons for state convictions.

The receivership represents one of the most significant federal interventions in state prison operations and signals the court’s determination that Arizona’s corrections system requires extraordinary measures to ensure constitutional standards are met. Healthcare advocates hope the appointment of an independent receiver will finally bring meaningful reform to a system that has resisted court-ordered changes for more than a decade.