Don’t Trust the Process: The Viability of Eighth Amendment Claims for Ultra-Processed Food Overconsumption in Prisons

Authors

Markus C. Johnson
Rita L. Rahoi-Gilchrest

Abstract

With the largest prison population worldwide, American prisons serve more food than anywhere else. To cut costs, American prisons overwhelmingly (or even entirely) serve prisoners ultra-processed foods, which, if overconsumed, have detrimental and long-lasting health effects. Prisoners taking issue with the food being served to them rely on the courts to counteract any inappropriate prison dietary practices, wielding the Eighth Amendment as a constitutional guarantee to be free from cruel and unusual punishment. But courts are failing to protect this constitutional guarantee by relying on precedent that is at odds with modern Eighth Amendment principles. Indeed, when it comes to prison dietary claims, courts currently rely on an antiquated legal standard that renders food constitutionally permissible so long as there is sufficient caloric content in prisoners’ meals. Applying this standard, courts take no issue with even the most disingenuous prison dietary practices— meaning that the overconsumption of ultra-processed food comes nowhere near an Eighth Amendment violation. This cannot stand. As this Article contends, the courts’ current caloric content standard for prison dietary claims is unworkable because it betrays the Eighth Amendment’s “evolving standards of decency” framework, as articulated by the Supreme Court in Helling v. McKinney. By (rightfully) applying the Court’s Helling framework to prison dietary claims, there is a possibility of ultra-processed food overconsumption in prison diets being considered an Eighth Amendment violation if courts find these diets to be against the current standards of decency. This Article then incorporates a communication frame, providing theoretical and practical solutions to address society’s excessive tolerability for ultra-processed foods— thereby giving prisoners a meaningful path to success in Eighth Amendment claims under Helling. Ultimately, this Article provides a workable path toward respecting and protecting prisoners’ Eighth Amendment rights and personal health by minimizing the provision of ultra-processed foods in prisons.

Repository Citation

Markus C. Johnson and Rita L. Rahoi-Gilchrest, Don’t Trust the Process: The Viability of Eighth Amendment Claims for Ultra-Processed Food Overconsumption in Prisons, 108 Marq. L. Rev. 763 (2025).
Available at: https://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/mulr/vol108/iss3/6