LEGAL CAPACITY OF PRISONERS TO SUE OR BE SUED: A CASE FOR EXPANDING THE SCOPE OF LEGAL DISABILITY

Abstract

The law recognizes that prisoners retain their constitutional rights that are not inconsistent with the reason and conditions of their imprisonment. In particular, prisoners are considered to retain the right to property and the right to have access to the courts for the protection and defense of their residual constitutional rights. And under the law, prisoners who possess the requisite mental and intellectual abilities are deemed to have legal capacity to sue or be sued. But in reality, prisoners are effectively disabled from exercising the right or legal capacity to institute civil action or enter defense for the purpose of protecting or defending their right to property. This article critically examines the legal capacity of prisoners to sue or enter defense when sued in civil action that involves their right to property or other proprietary interests. The article proposes an expansion of the scope of the existing concept of legal disability to admit of prisoners as suffering a legal disability by reason of incarceration. The focus of the article is a recondite area of prisoners’ right in Nigeria as such its main objective is to attract and develop academic discourse for policy considerations towards protecting prisoners’ fundamental rights and proprietary interests.