A federal judge has dismissed a long-running lawsuit challenging the use of solitary confinement in Florida juvenile-justice facilities.
U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle on Thursday issued an order dismissing the case after attorneys for the plaintiffs and the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice reached an agreement to end it, according to court documents.
The documents do not detail the reasons for the agreement. But the dismissal came about a week after Hinkle ruled the case would not go forward as a class action.
After saying last year that the case could proceed as a class action, Hinkle ruled Sept. 2 he was “decertifying” the class action.
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“As this case has now evolved, the plaintiffs cannot establish the commonality required for a class action,” Hinkle wrote. “Determining whether any individual child has been kept in solitary confinement too long, or in unconstitutional conditions, or that a disability has not been accommodated, will require an individual analysis of each child’s treatment.”
The lawsuit, filed in 2019, alleged that the department’s practices violated constitutional prohibitions on cruel and unusual punishment and laws such as the Americans with Disabilities Act. It included two plaintiffs, identified by the initials G.H. and R.L.
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