According to the London Sunday Times, via This Is True:

Britain feels very sorry for its prison inmates. A total of 198 inmates who were imprisoned and had to go through “cold turkey” withdrawal from heroin and other drugs sued the government, claiming the withdrawal was “assault”. They also argued “trespass” since they did not consent to not being allowed to use drugs in prison. Because government lawyers predicted the government would lose the cases, the Home Office awarded each of the inmates up to 5,000 pounds (US$9,800) to settle the suits.

And we thought stoopid, frivolous lawsuits were a special prerogative of the United States!

[tags]lawsuits, prisoners, drugs[/tags]