by Derek Gilna
GEO Group, the Florida-based private prison behemoth, and Tennessee corporation CoreCivic, are the targets of several lawsuits alleging that “voluntary” work programs at their facilities violate state minimum-wage laws, as well as the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, and other labor protection statutes. These lawsuits alleged that many of those detained in these facilities are undocumented immigrants.
Washington State alleged that GEO violated its minimum wage statute, which requires pay of at least $11 an hour, and sought recovery of wages owed to people confined by the company on civil charges. Colorado and California also sued GEO for requiring prisoners to work maintenance jobs for $1 a day, whereas the company receives $160 a month for each prisoner it confines.
Paul Wright, executive director of the Human Rights Defense Center, the parent company of Prison Legal News said, “This is a testament to their own greed. Instead of hiring somebody at minimum wage to do these maintenance tasks and housekeeping jobs, they would rather enslave these prisoners.”
David Fathi, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Prison Project, agrees, saying that although the 13th Amendment permits extracting labor at little or no pay from the criminally ...
by David Reutter
Pension funds for teachers are abandoning their investments in private prisons. The divestures follow an appeal by the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the nation’s second-largest teacher’s union, for public pension funds to liquidate their holdings in for-profit prison companies and other firms involved in immigrant detention.
The AFT specifically named General Dynamics, GEO Group and CoreCivic as companies to target for divestment. The organization reported that 28 hedge funds own more than $15 billion in stock in the three firms, with General Dynamics accounting for $10 billion. While General Dynamics is a global aerospace and defense company, it also plays a role in overseeing immigrant children who have been separated from their parents.
The AFT’s appeal was aimed at governmental policies that result in the detention of undocumented immigrants and family separation. Those policies existed under the Obama administration, and continued and were strengthened after President Trump took office.
In June 2017, New York City’s pension fund was the first public retirement fund to divest from private prison companies, dumping around $48 million in stock holdings. It cited human rights abuses related to “draconian” immigration policies. [See: PLN, Oct. 2016, p.48].
“You have these ...
by Scott Grammer
The Teachers’ Retirement Board of the California State Retirement System (CalSTRS) has decided to get out of private prison investments by dumping CoreCivic and GEO Group stock from its portfolio. About $12 million worth of stock is involved – which represents a fraction of the companies’ combined $4.57 billion market cap.
In a November 7, 2018 press release, Investment Committee Chairman Harry Keiley said, “The board conducted a review of the staff research. We agreed that the engagement efforts were thorough and listened to our expert investment consultants. Based on all the information and advice we were provided, the board decided to divest according to the policy criteria.” That decision occurred after officials visited detention facilities and met with senior management of both private prison firms.
The Chief Investment Officer for CalSTRS, Christopher Ailman, said there was an increased risk to the retirement system’s portfolio due to human rights violations at privately-operated detention centers used to house immigrants and their children.
In contrast, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) recently voted against divestment from private prisons. The agenda for a March 18, 2019 meeting of CalPERS’ investment committee stated, “as a California state agency, ...
by Ed Lyon
Scabies is the name for an infestation of tiny mites that burrow under a person’s skin and cause an itchy rash. They are spread by touching an infected person or an item of the person’s clothing or bedding. Crowded conditions, like those one normally encounters in prisons and jails, are highly conducive to the spread of the mites. With these facts in mind, it seems reasonable that medical staff who work with prisoners would be trained to identify and treat scabies.
The Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) contracts with Corizon Health, a for-profit company, under a five-year, $715.7 million contract to provide medical services at state prisons.
Prisoner Rebecca Smith at the Women’s Huron Valley Correctional Facility (WHVCF) contracted an unidentified skin rash in October 2017.
She learned to clip her fingernails short enough so she would be unable to scratch. “It itches like anything – it’s like the worst mosquito bite,” she said.
Corizon’s staff were able to diagnose a scabies outbreak that, by early 2019, had spread to hundreds of the 2,000-plus prisoners at the facility, all of whom had to be treated.
Dr. Walter Barkey, a private practitioner ...
by Ed Lyon
In 2014, a settlement was reached in Parsons v. Ryan, a lawsuit over healthcare in Arizona’s prison system. The state contracted with Corizon Health to provide medical services for the Arizona Department of Corrections (ADC), even though the company had been plagued with problems and lawsuits over its failure to provide adequate medical care to prisoners in other jurisdictions. [See, e.g.: PLN, Nov. 2018, p.60; Sept. 2018, pp. 26-27].
As part of the Parsons settlement, the ADC set up a monitoring board to oversee Corizon’s contractual performance. Time would prove the company was no better at providing medical care to Arizona prisoners than it was anywhere else, and as a result the Parsons case was eventually reopened.
U.S. District Court Judge Roslyn Silver appointed an expert to review the ADC’s healthcare system operated by Corizon amid allegations by multiple whistleblowers that the for-profit company was skirting state auditors, violating regulations and risking the lives of prisoners who relied on the firm for medical care.
Jose Vallejo, a former police officer and prison guard, was employed as a licensed vocational nurse at ADC’s State Prison Complex-Eyman in Florence for two years, beginning in ...
by Chad Marks
In a lawsuit filed on January 29, 2019, Securus Technologies, Inc., one of the nation’s two largest prison telecom companies, accused the Florida Department of Corrections (FDOC) of ignoring provisions of the Florida Constitution when exercising budgeting and appropriation powers, and doing so at the expense of prisoners and their families.
Securus had provided prison phone services to the FDOC for over a decade. The company also owns JPay, which provides money transfers, video calling and other services for Florida prisoners. In December 2018, the FDOC awarded a 10-year telecom contract to the company’s main competitor, Global Tel*Link (GTL).
In its lawsuit, Securus claimed the contract was improper because it had offered the best value to the state as required by Florida procurement laws. It lost the FDOC contract, Securus argued, because GTL agreed to provide $150 million worth of goods and services to the state’s prison system that the Florida legislature had decided not to fund.
Securus contended that its reply to the FDOC’s invitation to negotiate (ITN) showed that it was the top-ranked vendor by the Department’s evaluation team, as it offered the best phone services and lowest calling rates, which serve to promote ...
by Matt Clarke
In January 2019, the Dallas Morning News reported that Louisiana-based private prison company LaSalle Corrections, which operates eight jails in Texas, employs a former Texas Ranger whose son oversees that law enforcement agency. The Texas Rangers are responsible for investigating deaths at seven of the eight LaSalle-operated jails in the Lone Star State.
The facilities operated by LaSalle have long been criticized for violating jail standards and using undertrained staff. Deaths at the company’s jails have resulted in multiple lawsuits.
The increasing number of deaths in Texas jails led the state legislature to pass a law in 2017 requiring counties to have an outside agency investigate prisoner deaths. Most counties designated the state’s top law enforcement agency, the Texas Rangers, as their investigative agency with the approval of the Texas Commission on Jail Standards.
Nothing much was made of those decisions until the Dallas Morning News informed the Commission that LaSalle’s director of governmental affairs was Bob Prince – a former Texas Ranger whose son, Randall Prince, is now the deputy director for the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) and in charge of overseeing the Texas Rangers after having served as chief ...
by Ed Lyon
Estrella Tenorio was a nurse’s aide/medical technician employed by for-profit contractor HealthCare Partners, Inc. (HCP). HCP specializes in providing medical services to prisoners. Tenorio’s first assignment was at a jail located near Las Vegas, New Mexico. Her mother was a state prison employee and her father ...
Loaded on
April 2, 2019
published in Prison Legal News
April, 2019, page 34
On March 5, 2019, the Private Corrections Institute (PCI), a nonprofit citizen watchdog organization, announced its 2018 awardees for individual activism and organizational advocacy against the for-profit prison industry.
PCI opposes the privatization of correctional services, including the operation of prisons, jails and other detention facilities by companies such as Nashville, Tennessee-based CoreCivic (formerly Corrections Corporation of America) and Boca Raton, Florida-based GEO Group, which trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbols CXW and GEO, respectively. PCI also opposes privatization of prison and jail medical, mental health, transportation, food, commissary and probation services, under the rationale that criminal justice should not be profit-driven.
Therecipient of PCI’s 2018 award for exceptional individual activism against the privatization of correctional services was Judy Greene, director of Justice Strategies (www.justicestrategies.org).
An expert on prison privatization, Judy has long advocated for an end to for-profit prisons. Justice Strategies, founded in 2003, is “a nonprofit research organization dedicated to providing analysis and solutions to advocates and policymakers pursuing more humane and cost-effective approaches to criminal justice and immigration reform.” It has produced a number of reports, including studies related to privatized immigration detention centers and prisons.
“I am very honored by this ...
by Derek Gilna
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections (DOC) have agreed to pay $15,000 to the estate of a mentally ill prisoner who was killed after being attacked by another prisoner in February 2015.
The March 2018 settlement ended a suit brought ...
