The court's decision stems from the rebellious behavior of one Travis Haney.

According to court papers:

While being held at the District of Columbia Jail pending trial in another matter, appellant Travis Haney threw a lotion bottle at a correction officer's head, later threw a bottle of liquid that smelled like urine at another officer, and then later threw feces at another officer.

Haney was penalized with 60 days of "disciplinary segregation" and no privileges for his various flinging offenses, court records show. Prosecutors subsequently slapped him with three counts of assaulting a corrections officer for the same acts.

Haney's lawyers tried to get the charges thrown out, arguing that the "Double Jeopardy Clause bars his criminal prosecution because he has already been punished for those incidents," according to court papers. Under the Fifth Amendment, no person shall "be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb."

A trial court rejected Haney's motion, finding that "administrative discipline was not punishment for double jeopardy purposes."

On Thursday, the appellate court agreed: "We hold that the regulations in question here serve the purposes of regulating inmate behavior and maintaining order. These regulations expressly contemplate that administrative discipline may be imposed even if an inmate's conduct is also referred for criminal prosecution."

DOC spokesman Anthony Diallo says there was no incident or emergency at the jail. He says the two-week lockdown has been planned for months and is in effect so guards can perform random checks for contraband items, cigarettes and stuff like that.

Legal visits are still allowed. A law student at the jail today said inmates reported that the lockdown is not routine–something happened inside the facility–but the student said client confidentiality disallowed providing further info on what happened.

Ann Keep, director of the nonprofit Visitors' Service Center, says lockdowns do happen from time to time, sometimes precipitated by violence in the facility, but as far as Keep has heard this one is routine.

On a completely unrelated note, the City Paper on Sept. 22 reported on the DOC's efforts to suppress an emergency planning document sought via the D.C. Freedom of Information Act. The department said releasing the document would "encourage an act of terrorism" at the jail. Turned out the thing was readily available from the department's own website all along.

Sometime over the weekend the plan finally disappeared from Google's easily accessible cache of PDF documents. Of course, you can still get the document from the Washington City Paper's website.