Federal judge stripped Arizona prison agency of control over inmate healthcare, ordering receivership

On February 19, 2026, U.S. District Judge Roslyn Silver ordered the healthcare system in Arizona's nine state prisons into court receivership, an 83-page order finding that the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry (ADCRR) had violated 131 of the 154 compliance standards imposed under the April 2023 permanent injunction in Jensen v. Thornell. Silver wrote that "after nearly 14 years of litigation with defendants having not gained compliance ... this approach has not only failed" to produce constitutionally adequate care. Court-appointed monitors had found the department relying on nurses as primary providers for complex patients, staffing only 11 board-certified physicians against a required 28, timely completing just 3% of specialist referrals, and abandoning a staffing pilot program after eight days.

The order authorizes an independent receiver to assume complete control of medical and mental health care across the roughly 34,000-person prison population, with authority to hire, fire, and set compensation for healthcare staff, renegotiate or terminate the department's roughly $300 million contract with NaphCare, control the healthcare budget, and override department administrators on healthcare matters. ADCRR was directed to help propose receiver candidates within 60 days.

Director Ryan Thornell called the receivership "exorbitantly expensive" and "unnecessary," arguing the order disregarded the department's investment of $1.3 billion and hiring of 1,340 healthcare staff since 2023, and said the agency would pursue "an aggressive appeal." The case traces to a class action originally filed in 2012 and a June 2022 ruling that found the department's healthcare system unconstitutional; a permanent injunction followed in 2023, and a federal judge later found ADCRR continuing to defy that injunction into 2026, denying the department's bid to lower physician-staffing standards.

Updates

2026-03-20 — ADCRR filed notice of appeal with the Ninth Circuit [4, 5]

The Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry filed a notice of appeal against the receivership order with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, saying it "strongly disagrees with the Court's decision" and would pursue "an aggressive appeal." No ruling on the appeal, and no stay decision, had been reported as of this writing.

2026-07-17 — Judge formally appointed Annette Chambers-Smith as receiver [6]

U.S. District Judge Roslyn Silver appointed Annette Chambers-Smith, former director of the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, as receiver over ADCRR's healthcare operations. The five-year appointment carries a $500,000 annual salary and gives Chambers-Smith authority to hire, fire, and set pay for healthcare staff, control the healthcare budget, and renegotiate or terminate vendor contracts, including the roughly $300 million NaphCare contract. ADCRR said it would appeal and seek a stay of the appointment from the appellate court.