Muslim Inmate’s Free Exercise Suit Over Being Served Pork Tossed

A civil rights suit by a Muslim inmate claiming his religious rights were violated when he was served four meals containing pork was properly dismissed, the Eighth Circuit said Friday.

Napoleon-Ahmed Mbonyunkiza failed to show that the four meals substantially burdened his free exercise rights under the First Amendment, the opinion by Judge James B. Loken said.

There’s a circuit split over whether a de minimis interruption of an inmate’s religious rights substantially burdens his beliefs, the court said. The Third, Sixth, and Tenth circuits say it doesn’t, but the Second and Seventh circuits say it may, it said.

The ...