The US Supreme Court released this picture of Damon Landor along with other files. image: supreme court
A devout Rastafarian wanted to sue prison staff after they detained him and cut off his dreadlocks. The US Supreme Court has now dismissed his lawsuit.
June 24, 2026, 7:04 p.mJune 24, 2026, 7:04 p.m
The Supreme Court ruled against former inmate Damon Landor on Tuesday. How CNN reports, the court ruled 6-3 that Landor cannot pursue his lawsuit against prison employees in the US state of Louisiana.
The decision is notable because the court’s conservative majority has often ruled in favor of religious claims in recent years. In this case, however, the court sided against the plaintiff.
Dreadlocks cut off despite court ruling
Landor is a devout Rastafarian and had grown his dreadlocks for almost two decades. Shortly before the end of his sentence for drug possession, he was transferred to a prison in Louisiana. There, guards tied him to a chair and cut off his hair down to his knees, CNN reports.
Landor had previously presented prison staff with a court ruling that allowed prisoners to wear dreadlocks for religious reasons. However, the guards threw the document away, according to court documents.
Landor invoked a federal law intended to protect the religious freedom of prisoners. He wanted to hold the responsible officials personally liable.
Majority sees no basis for lawsuit
The majority of the Supreme Court did not follow this argument. Judge Neil Gorsuch wrote that Congress had not provided a sufficiently clear basis for individual prison employees to be personally sued for damages in such cases.
The decision could also make it more difficult for members of other religions to assert their rights in prison by suing for damages.
The court’s three liberal justices clearly disagreed. Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote that prisoners like Landor could be left without effective legal redress in the future, even for obvious violations of their religious freedom.
Criticism of the decision
Civil rights organizations sharply criticized the verdict. The organization Americans United for Separation of Church and State accused the court of being significantly more generous with Christian plaintiffs than with members of other religions.
Landor’s case was initially considered promising because the Supreme Court had repeatedly strengthened religious freedom rights in recent years. The court ruled in favor of religious parents, a praying football coach and a Catholic foster care organization, among others.
In the case of the Rastafari prisoner, however, the conservative majority now drew a line. For Landor, this means that despite the treatment being harshly criticized by several courts, he cannot demand compensation from the officers involved. (mke)