On September 30, 2024, the Center for Constitutional Rights and The Promise of Justice Initiative sent a Special Communication Complaint to the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery; the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment; the International Independent Expert Mechanism to Advance Racial Justice and Equality in the Context of Law Enforcement (UN EMLER); and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights requesting immediate attention and intervention related to the practices of slavery, involuntary servitude, and other forms of forced labor of incarcerated persons in prisons in the United States – namely, in the southern States of Alabama and Louisiana.
International human rights standards have overwhelmingly cautioned states against perpetuating forced labor by and through punishments. Yet, today’s system of mass incarceration in the United States – with millions of people in prisons across this country, and the highest rates in the South – is exploiting imprisoned workers and forcing their labor through entrenched regimes of physical and legal punishment and psychological coercion. This Special Communication, including the Appendices, addresses these practices and their violation of various international and human rights standards, obligations, and laws.
In addition to recording and reporting this complaint to the United States and the Human Rights Council, we requested that these Special Procedures investigate, and visit, the Alabama Department of Corrections and Louisiana Department of Safety and Corrections to address said violations, ahead of the Fourth Session of the Permanent Forum on People of African Descent in April 2025. We further urged these Special Procedures to work with the expert members of the Permanent Forum to dedicate a session that addresses efforts by their mandates to abolish slavery and involuntary servitude of incarcerated workers in U.S. prisons, with a particular focus on prisons in the Southern region of the United States.
See the full Special Communication Complaint attached below.
