Maybe he converted after. But if you're serving time for it, your religious rights, (including a proscription of eating meat), should be upheld if at all possible.
Polish prisoner compensated for non-vegetarian meals
I know that it probably costs them more, and juggling the dietary restrictions of several religions (i.e., Judaism, Islam, Seventh-Day Aventist (are there in SDAs in Poland?)) can definitely be a problem, but an effort should be made to accommodate if possible.
I know a lot of people will disagree with me on this. Hey, I don't really think prisoners are entitled to cable TV or the Internet. But although some prisoners have committed heinous crimes, they are not completely without basic rights; they are not animals. Food is a basic necessity, but our religion (or even our thoughts against religion, in the case of atheism) is an integral part of who we are. And the development of ethics should be encouraged in prisoners, who in many cases will rejoin society.
I don't think he would have had as good an outcome if he were a vegetarian for purely ethical rather than religious reasons. For example, I consider my diet ethical but it is not inherent in Paganism, so I could not have made the same argument.
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