How one man led the DOJ to investigate Arizona prisons

In 2021, Larry Dunlap noticed how visually impaired people were being treated at his Arizona prison: the prison did not provide them with necessary reading materials or equipment, such as walking sticks. Many were assigned an upper bunk, requiring them to climb up and down despite their poor eyesight.

“There were a lot of inmates who were placed on the top bunks and had no blind aid sticks and no reading materials,” Dunlap said. “I saw an officer punish a blind prisoner by moving him to an upper bunk.”

Dunlap said he heard the officer say he had placed the inmate on an upper bunk because of his “smart mouth.”

Dunlap has been incarcerated for almost thirty years and has always been deeply involved in prison life. He organizes events to promote positive race relations and to raise money for charities such as the Special Olympics and breast cancer awareness.

“I thought to myself, ‘No one should abuse anyone, especially the visually impaired,’” Dunlap said.

He said he tried to advocate on behalf of the punished but was reprimanded and threatened with administrative segregation, a form of solitary confinement.

After witnessing that first encounter, Dunlap began keeping track of the abuse he saw and speaking with visually impaired people to understand their experiences.

According to the Prison Policy Initiative, 40 percent of people in state prisons have disabilities. Tens of thousands of these people are deaf, hard of hearing, blind, visually impaired, deaf-blind, speech impaired or otherwise disabled in ways that affect communication.

These prisoners are protected by Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Actstating that no person with a disability shall be excluded from participation in services, programs, or activities, or subjected to discrimination by any public entity – including a state prison – on the basis of their disability.

Ultimately, Dunlap collected three years’ worth of handwritten documents based on the experiences of 35 individuals. These data formed the basis of a more than two-year investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice into whether Arizona’s state prison system had violated the law. ADA by discriminating against incarcerated individuals with visual impairments.

In 2021, Dunlap wrote letters to the Arizona Department of Corrections director, the state legislature and the attorney general, hoping to draw attention to the abuse he documented. He got no responses.

Then, in January 2023, in a last-ditch effort, Dunlap wrote a letter to the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, DC. Three months later, Adam Lewis, a disability rights attorney with the DOJ, contacted Dunlap by phone.

Dunlap said he told the attorney about the lack of programs and equipment for the visually impaired in all Arizona prisons where he had served time. In particular, he noted the lack of programs, Braille displays and other accessible reading materials.

After the call, Lewis asked for the names of anyone who claimed they were inadequately treated at the Cook Unit of the Arizona State Prison Complex, Eyman.

In July 2023, three months after Dunlap’s first conversation with Lewis, the DOJ sent a notice a public letter to the Arizona Department of Corrections Rehabilitation and Reentry, reporting their findings from an investigation into the prison system. It read in part: “ADCRR has violated and continues to violate Title II of the ADA through its discriminatory treatment of individuals with visual impairments.”

The DOJ and ADCRR reached an agreement settlement agreement to address the violations they identify. Under the agreement, which will last three years, ADCRR will employ an expert consultant to help review its policies and practices, train its staff and provide necessary accommodations, aids, services and assistive technology to people with visual impairments under her care.

But so far, Dunlap has been disappointed in the state’s attempt to correct its failures. In December 2023, ADCRR announced via email that a Braille program would be introduced soon. As of August 2024, we have seen no evidence of such a program at our facility.

“Once they start the program,” Dunlap said, “it can be a long ordeal to get the staff up to speed as they have little training in the role they are now serving.”

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