Case: Out of Court Settlement between the United States and the Massachusetts Trial Court

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Case Summary

On March 24, 2022, the U.S. Department of Justice signed an out of court settlement agreement with the Massachusetts Trial Court to ensure that the Commonwealth's drug courts did not discriminate against people taking medication to manage opioid use disorder. After receiving a complaint that some drug courts in Massachusetts had prevented participants from using prescription medications like buprenorphine or methadone to manage opioid use disorder, the Department's Civil Rights Division opened…

After receiving a complaint that some drug courts in Massachusetts had prevented participants from using prescription medications like buprenorphine or methadone to manage opioid use disorder, the Department's Civil Rights Division opened an investigation into the court system. When the investigation began is unclear, however, the settlement noted the Department and the Commonwealth had been communicating about the drug courts’ policies since the Fall of 2019. During the investigation, the Department found that some drug courts either required participants to stop using these drugs or required participants to switch the drugs they were taking. Though the Commonwealth denied wrongdoing in the public settlement agreement, these actions would violate the American with Disabilities Act (ADA) because opioid use disorder is a covered disability.

In the agreement, the Commonwealth agreed to post and abide by a policy that it had developed along with the Department and finalized in January of 2020. The policy stated that decisions regarding opioid disorder management medication be made only by medical professionals and required drug court staff not to express preferences about medications or order participants to use or abstain from a particular medication. The Commonwealth agreed to monitor its drug court system for compliance with this policy, to route future complaints about ADA violations to a central office for investigations, and to require the chief justices of its courts to report annually about the number of such complaints received and the results of those investigations. The Department was allowed to review the Commonwealth’s compliance with the agreement for one year, meet with state officials to discuss compliance after six months, and receive the first annual report of complaints and investigations.

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Summary Authors

Jonah Hudson-Erdman (4/10/2022)