Deason Center Attorneys Secure $1.5M For Overdetained Texans

DALLAS (SMU) – Attorneys at the Deason Criminal Justice Reform Center are part of a litigation team that secured a $1.5 million settlement for more than 100 formerly incarcerated individuals who were detained in Smith County Jail. The case alleged Smith County, Texas violated the 14th Amendment rights of dozens of former prisoners by holding them for weeks beyond the end of their sentences.

“This is a story about a county prioritizing its own convenience over the rights and interests of the people it’s supposed to be serving,” Deason Center Policy Attorney Nathan Fennell said. “Smith County is legally obligated to handle this better and faster, but nobody cared enough to try.”

The 14th Amendment calls for timely release from imprisonment but the Center’s lawsuit— filed with civil rights law firm Loevy & Loevy, and civil rights attorney Akeeb Dami Animashaun — alleged the jail consistently held “individuals for days and weeks after they [were] entitled to release.” The 2023 lawsuit, Hughes et al. v. Smith County, Texas, called the county’s release process an “inadequate, disjointed, paper-based system” that lacked deadlines, tracking mechanisms, and basic communication.

Smith County is responsible for sending basic information to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice to ensure release, but it routinely failed to send this paperwork in a timely manner. The county also had no way of prioritizing individuals who were nearing their release date.

This settlement highlights an illegal incarceration problem taking place all across the country, including in Texas, Louisiana, and New York. Loevy & Loevy is part of a separate litigation team representing a class of individuals challenging Louisiana’s pattern of illegally imprisoning thousands of Louisianans past their release date, at taxpayer expense. “Overdetention is a systemic issue across many criminal systems, violating the constitutional right of countless individuals by denying them their freedom,” said attorney Meg Gould of Loevy + Loevy. “We are proud to work on behalf of people who deserve to have their rights vindicated.”

The Deason Center’s Nathan Fennell credits the Texas Jail Project for discovering the overdetention problem at the Smith County Jail. Executive Director Krishnaveni Gundu says, “We're visiting people inside. We're hearing from people inside. We're hearing from their families,” and added that it feels like, “no one's really keeping track of anything.”

The settlement will be distributed to the 102 class members based on the number of days they were detained past their lawful release dates. The Deason Center is the country's only academic research center dedicated to the Sixth Amendment right to counsel. The Center advocates for data-driven, practical, and principled reforms that protect individual rights and improve the fairness and efficiency of our criminal justice systems. The Deason Center's litigation team works to hold the government accountable and defend the constitutional rights of accused people.

The Deason Criminal Justice Reform Center at SMU Dedman School of Law brings a stats and stories approach to criminal justice reform. The Center collects, analyzes, and assesses the hard data about criminal legal policy. Combining these data with the stories of people who live, work and struggle in the criminal legal system, the Deason Center makes a compelling case for reform. The Center supports data-driven criminal justice research that has utility across multiple jurisdictions and helps criminal legal stakeholders develop and implement best practices.

The School of Law at SMU was founded in 1925. It was named Dedman School of Law in 2001 in honor of Dallas benefactors Nancy and Robert H. Dedman, Sr., and their family. SMU Dedman Law enjoys a national and international reputation of distinction. It is among the most competitive law schools in the country for admission and one of the most successful in the placement of its graduates.

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