Mr. Greenhill For more than three years, Alfonza H. Greenhill has persisted in battling Virginia prison policies that blocked him from practicing the strict Sufi branch of Islam. While he lost several preliminary rounds, the African-American inmate refused to give up and now has scored a signal victory for religious freedom for himself and other inmates when a federal appeals court in Richmond ruled that the U.S. Constitution and federal law is on his side. A three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Friday struck down the policies that barred the Red Onion State Prison inmate from growing his beard to four inches – the length of his fist, as he claimed the Quran requires — and from viewing via TV a mandatory one-hour Friday service known as Jumu’ah that the Muslim faithful are commanded to watch if they cannot be present physically. In a unanimous opinion written by Judge Paul V. Niemeyer, the appellate panel found that the state Department of Corrections policies impermissibly burdened the right of an inmate to practice his or her faith under the strict Religious Land Use and Institutionalized PersonsAct that Congress passed in 2000, as well as the First […]
