By Elizabeth Dinan
Portsmouth Herald, N.H.
BRENTWOOD, N.H. — A Rockingham County jail inmate filed a federal lawsuit seeking a court order for the return of his prayer rug, “not an extra towel like I was given in replacement thereof,” as well as unspecified monetary damages.
Moussa Traore filed the civil suit in the U.S. District Court of New Hampshire and describes himself, in the suit, as a sentenced inmate and a Unitarian. He claims being deprived of his prayer rug is a violation of his First Amendment rights and has caused him emotional stress and recurring nightmares.
Traore is asking for a jury trial “to determine a monetary amount that is just according to the trauma I have suffered and such other relief as is equitable and just,” as well as a copy of a guide the court provides for people filing claims without a lawyer.
Traore, 28, of the Bronx, New York, is serving an 8-month sentence for a Salem Circuit Court conviction on a felony charge of obstructing government administration, said Stephen Church, superintendent of the Rockingham County Department of Corrections. Church said Traore’s sentence ends Feb. 7 when, by prior arrangement, he’ll be picked up by officers and transported to Kentucky where he’s wanted on a warrant alleging his possession of burglary tools.
Church said Friday he had not seen Traore’s lawsuit but, generally speaking, the county jail does not restrict anyone from practicing any religion. He said because the jail houses inmates on a short-term basis, requests for religious items are reviewed on a case-by-case basis.
Church said prayer rugs can be ornate, meaning they can have monetary value or status attached to them, so prison officials have to be sure that doesn’t cause problems among inmates. He said prayer space is provided and it is common for inmates to be given an extra standard-issue blanket to use as a prayer rug.
Prayer rugs from the outside population are not allowed to be brought inside the jail and given to inmates, he said. If the county jail housed inmates for longer sentences, Church said, its policy would probably more closely match the state’s.
Jeffrey Lyons, spokesman for the New Hampshire Department of Corrections, said prayer rugs are allowed in state prison cells, under specific circumstances and conditions. He said prayer rugs specific to certain faiths can be kept in cells as personal property, but inmates must pay for them, they must come from approved outside vendors and be shipped to prisons by those vendors.
The state DOC has a list of faith groups, with allowed corresponding religious items, based on prior cases that were heard by a religious review committee. Lyons said no inmate who identified as a Unitarian has ever requested any religious item while incarcerated, so if a Unitarian did make a religious request, it would have to be reviewed before approval was granted.
The state DOC list of allowable religious items includes prayer beads, meditation bags and journals, as well as I-Ching coins for Buddhist inmates. Catholics are allowed a rosary, a medallion and a scapular. Islam and Muslim state inmates are allowed a medallion, a prayer rug, a skull cap, a strand of prayer beads and unscented Halal soaps from an approved vendor.
Native American state inmates are allowed to have one “native choker,” a beaded necklace with fetish, four feathers, a medicine bag with approved contents, a dream catcher and five bandanas which can be worn with a 3-inch fold “sweatband style.” The state DOC list says Jewish inmates are allowed a medallion, two yarmulkes, a prayer shawl of specific dimensions and either a set of phylacteries or a Tifillin bracelet.
Rastafarian inmates are allowed a medallion, Russian Orthodox state inmates are allowed prayer rugs and cushions and inmates who practice Siddha yoga are allowed a set of prayer beads, a meditation mat and a medallion.
All medallions must be shipped from approved vendors and can not exceed $50 in value, according to state regulations. Swastikas, iron crosses, or any medallion affiliated with gangs are prohibited.
Church said Traore is required to exhaust “administrative remedies” within the county DOC before filing a lawsuit and he did not do that. He added the county corrections department is “very well versed in religions.”
©2018 Portsmouth Herald, N.H.