By Gary Ridley
MLive
FLINT, MI — An attorney for an imprisoned Michigan sex offender claims that inadequate dental care in the state’s prison system has caused inmates to lose teeth and struggle to eat as they sometimes wait years for dentures.
Attorney Daniel E. Manville, director of the Michigan State University College of Law Civil Rights Clinic, and Farmington Hills attorney Robert Gittleman filed a lawsuit Monday, April 28, in Flint U.S. District Court on behalf of Robert Johannes asking a federal judge to step in and force the Michigan Department of Corrections to provide better dental services to inmates in its custody.
The lawsuit is seeking class action status, which Manville said could include thousands of prisoners, after he claims the MDOC displayed a practice of denying dental care to its inmates and a lack of timeliness for the care that it did provide.
“Prisoners do not have voices,” Manville said. “The only voice they have is through lawsuits.”
Full story: Inmate lawsuit in Flint claims poor dental care in Michigan prisons left him struggling to eat