ALC litigates on behalf of people whose rights have been violated in jail or prison, with particular emphasis on people with disabilities, those in solitary confinement, people serving long-term/life sentences, and political prisoners. We wield class action, impact, and accompaniment* litigation aimed at the criminal punishment system. 

We bring class action and impact litigation against police departments, jails, prisons, and the PA Department of Corrections, municipalities, and other institutions to demand and enforce less harmful conditions, and to extract financial resources from them (via settlements) and redistribute those funds to impacted people. We also sue to address police brutality, remove people from long-term solitary confinement and address other torturous conditions of confinement, challenge life without parole and other long-term sentences, challenge Americans with Disabilities Act violations, halt the medical neglect of incarcerated people, address toxic and dangerous environmental conditions in prisons and jails, and win freedom for ailing elders via the state’s medical transfer or “compassionate release” statute.

Our innovative legal strategies have resulted in the following wins:

• Won the opportunity to argue a pivotal case before the PA Supreme Court that could result in mandatory life without parole sentences being ruled unconstitutional for those convicted of second-degree murder (i.e. those who did not take a life or did not intend to take a life). (Commonwealth v. Derek Lee)
• Reached a landmark settlement in a massive class action lawsuit four years in the making, on behalf of all people with psychiatric disabilities incarcerated in PA’s second largest county jail system (Allegheny County Jail in Pittsburgh), to mandate adequate mental health care for everyone caged in the jail, and potentially force a reduction of the jail’s population if the jail does not comply.
• Ended the use of solitary confinement on Pennsylvania’s Death Row. (Porter v. PA DOC)
• Co-counseled litigation against Philadelphia’s police department resulting in the largest settlement in a mass protest-related case in the city’s history. (Smith v. City of Philadelphia)
• Co-counseled groundbreaking litigation that resulted in a settlement demanding the City of Philadelphia address the horrendous crisis of deaths in its jails, including winning a motion finding the City in contempt for the jails’ failure to comply with the settlement terms. (Remick et. al. v. City of Philadelphia)
• Achieved largest ever settlement against PA Dept. of Corrections, on behalf of an incarcerated person killed by excessive OC spray and medical neglect by corrections staff. (Busbee v. PA DOC)
• Set the two most important Eighth Amendment precedents in the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. (Palakovic v. Wetzel & Porter v. PA DOC)
• Won an end to 37 years of solitary confinement (one of the first court orders in the country ordering an end to such prolonged solitary) for Arthur Cetewayo Johnson a radical Black Liberation leader inside PA prisons, and then brought him home after 51 years of incarceration through a successful post-conviction appeal. (Johnson v. Wetzel & Commonwealth v. Arthur Johnson)
• Won the first-ever court order in the country mandating that prison officials provide path breaking, curative, direct-acting antiviral medication for hepatitis C to an incarcerated plaintiff in January 2017. Our client, Mumia Abu-Jamal, was treated soon after and cured of hepatitis C.

Current Cases

Completed Cases

*Accompaniment” signifies a theological and ethical approach emphasizing solidarity with and preferential treatment for the poor, marginalized, and oppressed, through a commitment to being present with them in their struggles.