The US Supreme Court building in Washington, DC, on October 2. Tristen Rouse/CNN

Two things went very wrong when Damon Landor, a devout Rastafarian, was transferred to a prison in central Louisiana five years ago.

The first is that prison guards handcuffed Landor to a chair and shaved off the knee-length dreadlocks he had grown over nearly two decades. The second is that, minutes earlier, guards took a court decision requiring prisons to allow dreadlocks for Rastafarians and tossed it into the trash.

The Supreme Court will hear arguments in an important religious rights case Monday that will decide whether Landor – and other prisoners whose beliefs are violated – may sue prison officials for damages.

“In an instant, they stripped Landor of decades of consistent religious practice a

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