Yursil Kidwai, a man incarcerated in New Jersey alleges in a federal class-action lawsuit that jail officials secretly monitored privileged conversations between him and his lawyer while he was awaiting trial, the Gothamist reports. His lawsuit also accuses jail officials and prosecutors of regularly doing the same to others incarcerated in the Hudson County Correctional Facility. Kidwai is asking the court to mandate that county officials stop monitoring and recording attorney-client calls and to implement training and policies that ensure the practice doesn’t continue. His suit also asks for monetary damages.
The lawsuit does not challenge the outcome of Kidwai’s criminal case, though he alleges that prosecutors used information shared in those calls to help build a sexual assault case against him. As his case was going through discovery, where prosecutors hand over information to defendants, prosecutors inadvertently gave Kidwai a copy of a memorandum from a detective, summarizing calls between him and his lawyer. He ended up taking a plea deal and is currently serving a six-year prison sentence.
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