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IU McKinney Professor Jessica Williams Schnelker has written an op-ed for The Hill about the religious liberties of incarcerated litigants, and the impact prison transfers can have on those claims.

The piece examines Damon Landor’s religious liberty case to show how prison transfers quietly undermine justice for many incarcerated litigants. Damon Landor, a Rastafarian in Louisiana, had three weeks left on his five-month sentence when he was transferred to a new facility. Landor had previously been permitted to wear his hair long or keep it under a rastacap. At the new facility, Landor showed prison guards a federal court decision saying that the state could not force Rastafarians to cut their hair. However, prison guards handcuffed him, held him down, and shaved his head. In addition to his claims for damages, Landor sued for declaratory and injunctive relief, but the district court ruled that it could not grant either because Landor had already been released. The case is currently under consideration by the U.S. Supreme Court, but lower courts ruled that Landor’s claim for damages failed as a matter of law.

“If a state can violate someone’s faith, transfer them, and face no consequences, does the Constitution effectively stop at the prison gate?” Professor Schnelker asks.

Professor Schnelker joined the faculty at IU McKinney in 2024 as a visiting assistant professor. She teaches Torts, Civil Procedure, Behavioral Analysis of the Law, and Professional Responsibility. She spent over 10 years as a trial lawyer and amassed extensive experience representing businesses, schools, and public entities in a variety of state and federal litigation, including Section 1983, Title IX, catastrophic personal injury, wrongful death, and employment matters. She now actively uses this experience to enhance her teaching and scholarship, studying how legal rules influence litigants' behavior and decision making.