But we have found that the Act, along with the prohibition of legal services lawyers representing prisoners, is preventing prisoners from invoking the protections of the Constitution when they are subject to the sort of abuse, degradation and danger we have described here and in other instances of patently unconstitutional practices which no civilized society and no member of the Senate would condone, such as denial of essential medical care. Denying those in prison access to the legal system could have devastating consequences. The United States imprisons a larger percentage of its population than any country in the world. The prisons and jails in many states are seriously overcrowded and inadequately staffed. Some people are dying and suffering seriously bodily injury in these facilities.
Some prisoners live in constant fear of being assaulted, raped or killed.
Access to the courts is an important safety valve that allows prisoners to seek and obtain redress in a constructive, non-violent way when they are subjected to conditions and practices which are so egregious that they violate the Constitution. Under the Prison Litigation Reform Act, courts must dismiss the claims of prisoners who do not fully exhaust the prison's administrative procedures even though in many institutions those procedures are meaningless. Prisoners, who may be unaware of the procedures, illiterate or semi-literate and without the advice of a lawyer, may have as little as five days to seek an administrative remedy from prison authorities. They may not be able to get the forms or instructions on how to complete them within the five days. They may be prevented from pursuing administrative remedies due to logistical hurdles, such as being transferred between prisons during the pendency of an application for an administrative remedy.