U.S. Feds say they are lifting curbs on "shoe-bomber"

Source: Reuters

DENVER (Reuters) - One day after court documents disclosed that convicted "shoe-bomber" Richard Reid has been refusing food, federal authorities said on Wednesday they were lifting special restrictions on him at a U.S. prison.

The decision appears to give Reid what he is seeking in a lawsuit challenging the restrictions, which he claims prevent him from practicing his Sunni Muslim faith. Justice Department officials did not say, however, why they were lifting them.

Reid, 35, is serving three life sentences at the Supermax prison at Florence, Colorado, for trying to blow up a jetliner over the Atlantic in 2001. Court documents made public on Tuesday showed he had been refusing food for several weeks.

He began a hunger strike in March or early April and has been force-fed and hydrated, the court papers showed.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSTRE55A05820090611

If he wants to not eat then let him not eat.

If they are preventing him from practicing his faith that is something his lawyer should handle in the courts.

Why are there laws in place to keep inmates trying to kill themselves alive.
Especially one with 3 life sentences and no chance of parole.

they don't want to take a chance of being accused, once he dies, of having starved him.

who would have thunk it?

the repukes are dolts.

...is a moron. There was little chance that his plan would have succeeded.

However, let the fucker starve. It takes a lot of will to starve yourself to death. I am betting he does not have the stamina.

I mean this seriously. If prisoners are denied their 'right' to vote in an election, how can they have any 'right' to a religion in prison?

religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;

a felon's voting affects the nation. What does his praying or reading the Koran affect?

I could care less about his religion. I was just wondering how something as fundamental as voting (which he is not a citizen so it is moot in this case) can be denied, while other religion is okay. Basically, in prison, you lose all your freedoms, so why is religion exempted? Or maybe the powers that be are fine with Christian worship, but not Islamic in prisons.

burdens on free exercise of religion than it does about burdens on voting. Discriminating between religions, however, is not consistent with our Constitution at all.

Gawd, the whole subject of how we treat the "detainees" is so upsetting.