Muslim defendant can sue over hijab removal

[alp227]

(03-15) 17:38 PDT SAN FRANCISCO -- A law guaranteeing religious freedom to prisoners applies to a courthouse holding cell where sheriff's deputies ordered a Muslim woman to remove her headscarf, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.

The 11-0 decision by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated a lawsuit by Souhair Khatib against Orange County, where officers made her take off her hijab for security reasons while she was held in the cell to await a court hearing.

The law, passed by Congress in 2000, prohibits the government from imposing a "substantial burden" on prisoners' religious practices unless officials can show a compelling need for the restrictions.

The Obama administration joined Khatib in arguing that the law applied to courthouse holding cells.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/15/BAEO1IC5VP.DTL

[JuniperLea]

1. Good!

That woman must have been horrified.

[guruoo]

2. Horrified?

Put out, pissed off, disgusted maybe, but horrified?

[JuniperLea]

3. Yes, horrified!

She lived her life according to her beliefs, and she believed very strongly that no one, especially STRANGE MEN, should see her face.

People who take their religion very seriously feel horrified when they break religious laws. That is why we have laws about food labels. That is why we have had lawsuits based on improper labeling of food. Jewish kosher laws come to mind. Kosher eating means you can't even use a plate for meat that was once used for dairy... I didn't know that one myself until clued in by my cousin in Israel who made the mistake and learned from it.

[guruoo]

4. She didn't break it, technically speaking, as she wasn't allowed a choice in the matter.

[JuniperLea]

5. Splitting hairs isn't going to make her feel any better...

And the person who ate from the dairy plate unknowingly was horrified when she found out... even though it wasn't her fault. She had led a kosher life all her life to that point.

I think being forced to break a law is even more horrifying, actually.

[guruoo]

6. Another part of the dark side of religion

People have actually killed themselves over religious superstitions.
It's sad.

[JuniperLea]

7. Yep, no doubt about that...

I grew up raised by an Irish Catholic grandmother who lived next door to an Italian Catholic family. We were really like one big family, and it was wonderful. Then one of the girls next door came up preggers... and the whole family moved. Almost overnight. It was so very, very sad!

[provis99]

8. the hijab isn't religious, it's cultural.

It has nothing to do with Islam, it just happens that some countries that are Islamic also have the hijab as a cultural artifact. She shouldn't be allowed to get away with this on religious grounds.

[tortoise1956]

9. I think you all missed the real problem with this post...

First of all, the Koran does NOT require women to wear the hijab. custom and law differs on this from one country to another, and between major divisions of Islam as well. With this in mind, I hold that removing it for security reasons is not a substantial burden in the religious sense, just as taking a rosary from a devout Catholic would not be a substantial burden.

Now on to the truly troubling part of this story. She and her husband were convicted of a misdemeanor crime (receiving welfare over payments) and sentenced to probation and community service. When they went to court to request an extension on the time limit for doing the community service, their probation was revoked and they were thrown in jail for "most of the day". When they were finally brought back into court, the extension was granted and they were released.

:wtf: !?!?!?!

Obviously their request was not unreasonable, or it wouldn't have been granted in the end. So why did they have to sit in jail? Was this some type of piss-poor attempt at teaching them a lesson about not finishing their community service on time? If so, it was pretty idiotic.

This is a clear abuse of judicial power, one that is much more profound than the hijab issue. How is it that no one is kicking this judge's ass? Am I the only one that finds this reprehensible and scary?