D. K. Williams, Warden, et al. v. Rafiq Sabir, et al.

Petitioners D.K. Williams and Herman Quay are former federal prison wardens. Each maintained a preexisting policy that limited group prayer of three or more inmates to the prison chapel. Respondents are inmates who claim that the policy violated the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (“RFRA”). The Second Circuit affirmed the denial of Petitioners’ motion to dismiss based on qualified immunity. When assessing qualified immunity, this Court has “repeatedly told courts … not to define clearly established law at a high level of generality.” Ashcroft v. al-Kidd, 563 U.S. 731, 742 (2011). Yet the Second Circuit denied qualified immunity based on the entirely generic truism that it was clearly established that “substantially burdening prisoners’ religious exercise without justification violates RFRA.” App.12. The panel concluded that the requirement not to formulate the law at a high level of abstraction does not apply to RFRA claims. App.28. The questions presented are:

1. Are RFRA claims exempt from the normally applicable qualified immunity requirement not to define clearly established law at a high level of generality; and

2. Was it clearly established that a policy limiting group prayer of three or more inmates to the prison chapel violated RFRA?