by J.D. Schmidt
OVER THE COURSE OF THE LAST TWO and a half years, Philadelphia’s jails appear to be failing on nearly every level, from staffing and security to medical and mental health care, occupational opportunities, library and recreation time, and even the provision of the most basic human needs ...
by Paul Wright
If this month’s cover story appears to be another case of déjà vu all over again, it is because we have been reporting on murder, mayhem and misery in the Philadelphia jail system for decades. As we have for many other large jail systems around the country. ...
by Jayson Hawkins
On December 26, 2021, a federal court dismissed a lawsuit filed by an epileptic former Illinois jail detainee after he accepted $1,425,000 to settle claims that he was denied medication and placed in an upper bunk from which he fell while suffering a seizure, leaving him with ...
by Kevin Bliss
Though a state investigation concluded a Mississippi prisoner had inside help making a short-lived escape in September 2021, no charges have ever been announced for officials at East Mississippi Correctional Facility (EMCF), the privately operated prison where he was held.
In fact, even as allegations of rampant ...
by David M. Reutter
On January 20, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held that the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) may make a post-incarceration decision to reduce benefits retroactively for a veteran imprisoned over the statutory minimum period, which is currently 60 days.
Before the ...
by Cooper Quintin and Beryl Lipton
This article was originally published by the Electronic Frontier Foundation on September 9, 2021. It is reprinted here, with permission.
No matter how many rights are taken away from people in prison, no matter how brutally they are treated, the prison industrial complex hasn’t ...
by Jacob Barrett
In a stunning decision reached on December 16, 2021, the Court of Appeal of the State of California, Third Appellate District, absolved the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) of any liability to warn a woman murdered by her paroled grandson that he might be dangerous. ...
by Mark Wilson
On January 26, 2022, a Muslim Nevada prisoner notched his second victory in as many months against state prison officials at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which upheld a lower court’s decision ordering officials with the state Department of Corrections (DOC) to allow ...
by Alan Gaynor
Mary Shelly’s first novel, Frankenstein, describes how one man creates a biological monster from parts of other creatures. Dr. Frankenstein, its creator, realizes his mistake and makes its destruction his mission. The sprawling network of detention centers operated for Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) ...
They can’t go to classes or prison jobs, and they don’t have tablets or televisions. But they do have radios.
by Keri Blakinger
This article was published in partnership with The Marshall Project, a nonprofit news organization covering the U.S. criminal justice system.
As soon as I drive past the East Tempe ...
by David M. Reutter
In a decision reached on February 4, 2022, the Michigan Supreme Court handed the state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) a light to shine on the detention of a native U.S. citizen and Marine Corps veteran who was apprehended by federal Immigration and ...
Tough-on-Crime Republicans Retaliate Against Rights Restoration Efforts
by Jenifer Lockwood and Panagioti Tsolkas
In February 2022, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) concluded an eight-month investigation involving the Alachua County Supervisor of Elections Office’s effort to register voters in the county jail. So far, the effort has resulted in ...
by Matt Clarke
On February 9, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit reinstated the claim of a Muslim federal prisoner allegedly frustrated in his attempts to observe his religion in prison, including denial of the opportunity to participate in group prayer five times a day.
Ahmed ...
by Matt Clarke
On February 14, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit reinstated the claim of a woman whose son fatally hanged himself in Louisiana’s Bossier Parish jail in March 2019. In doing so, the Court said that a district court erred in dismissing the case ...
by Matt Clarke
On January 21, 2022, the Vermont Supreme Court remanded a case to the state Department of Corrections (DOC) so that it could respond on the record to a prisoner’s allegations it improperly used his expunged convictions to make classification decisions that would ultimately affect his release, in ...
by Matt Clarke
In a settlement reached on March 1, 2022, Santa Fe County, New Mexico, agreed to pay $825,000 to resolve claims filed over the heroin withdrawal death of a detainee at the county’s Adult Detention Facility (ADF) six years earlier.
When Ricardo Jose Ortiz was booked into ADF ...
by Matt Clarke
On February 1, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit held that a district court committed clear error when it found that a severely mentally ill Illinois prisoner lied about being endangered in an attempt to “sneak around” rules that would prevent him from ...
by Panagioti Tsolkas
In Oregon Circuit Court for Deschutes County on November 16, 2021, the newly appointed Superintendent of the state’s Deer Ridge Correctional Institution (DRCI), Randy Ray Gilbertson, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of Interfering With a Peace Officer during a drunk-driving arrest in Bend two months earlier. ...
by David M. Reutter
Finding that two guards at Florida’s Bay County Jail (BCJ) did “essentially nothing to prevent” a pretrial detainee from committing suicide, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit affirmed a lower court’s denial of qualified immunity (QI) to them on February 15, 2022.
The ...
by Anthony W. Accurso
The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) for the State of New York released a report on January 4, 2022, concluding its “Investigation of New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision [DOCCS] Incarcerated Individual Drug Testing Program,” following reports that DOCCS punished 1,600 prisoners ...
by Mark Wilson
On January 18, 2022, the federal court for the Western District of Washington approved a class-action settlement awarding 76 juvenile offenders a total of $1,357,665, or $500 a day for their solitary confinement at two adult jails in King County. The court also approved a $50,000 award ...
by Kevin W. Bliss, Matt Clarke, Ashleigh N. Dye and Keith Sanders
As the COVID-19 pandemic recedes from the headlines, its full effect on prisoners and detainees is coming into clearer view. One of the first glimpses was provided in a December 2021 report by the federal Department of Justice ...
by Anthony W. Accurso
In an opinion reached on December 6, 2021, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit upheld a district court’s ruling that a federal prisoner’s disciplinary sanctions were valid so long as there was “some evidence” to support the underlying violations. Importantly, where the evidence ...
by David M. Reutter
In September 2021, after closing out a $10 million settlement in a class-action suit alleging its county jail violated the privacy rights of detainees by making their expunged criminal records available online, Bucks County, Pennsylvania was left with about $80,000 in unclaimed funds when fewer claims ...
by Keith Sanders
As a federal lawsuit proceeds against Kentucky’s Franklin County filed by a former jail detainee forced into sex by a former guard, a state court judge who found the man criminally liable for the detainee’s sexual assault gave him an unusual choice at his sentencing on January ...
by Ashleigh N. Dye
Settlement agreements totaling $177,500 were approved in the winter of 2021-22 by the Board of County Commissioners of Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, resolving claims by a pair of former detainees at the county jail who were allegedly assaulted by guards.
The first agreement was approved on December ...
by David M. Reutter
Fresh off a court victory that held “state contracts with a public entity” require private firms hired by the Vermont Department of Corrections (DOC) to release records relating to legal actions and settlements, PLN’s publisher, the Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC), sued Centurion of Vermont ...
by Mark Wilson
“Guaranteed income is a wayto recognize everyone’s inherent dignity,” declared an op-ed in Florida’s Gainesville Sun on November 5, 2021.
Penned by Mayor Lauren Poe (D) and Kevin Scott, a fellow at local anti-poverty non-profit Community Spring, the op-ed announced a pilot program that pays “justice-impacted” people ...
by Benjamin Tschirhart
On August 18, 2018, Milan Jackson was riding on Caltrain near the rail system’s stop in Redwood City, California. At some point Jackson, who suffers ADHD and autism, lay down on the train floor, not foreseeing the dire consequences of this innocuous action: He was arrested by ...
by Jacob Barrett
On September 9, 2021, the Oregon Court of Appeals affirmed the assault conviction of a prisoner based on statements he made during a jail disciplinary proceeding, agreeing with him that they were obtained under “compelling circumstances” requiring Miranda warnings he wasn’t given but concluding nonetheless that admission ...
by Benjamin Tschirhart
California’s San Luis Obispo County reached a settlement on February 10, 2021, agreeing to pay $35,000 to resolve wrongful death claims filed by the widow of an elderly man with dementia and mental illness who died of an embolism in the county jail on November 6, 2017, ...
by Ed Lyon
Two high-profile prisoners made nonfungible token (NFT) sales of some prison memorabilia in December 2021, adding to both the notoriety and bottom line of Michael Cohen, one-time personal lawyer to former President Donald J. Trump (R), and Ross Ulbricht, founder of the dark web’s “Silk Road” site. ...
by Jacob Barrett
On February 25, 2022, the Supreme Court of Idaho reinstated a negligence claim lodged by a former prisoner against Ada County after he fell when ordered to descend from the top bunk of his cell for roll call while held at the county jail.
Suffering a head ...
by David M. Reutter
On June 10, 2022, the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services (DCS) agreed to pay $40,000 and make several policy changes to resolve a lawsuit filed by the Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC), publisher of PLN, challenging the agency’s publications policy.
HRDC sued DCS in federal ...
by Chuck Sharman
On June 27, 2022, the Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC), the nonprofit that publishes PLN, filed suit in federal court for the Northern District of Indiana under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, accusing St. Joseph County Sheriff William J. Redman of violating the firm’s First Amendment and ...
by Matt Clarke
On February 9, 2022, the Supreme Court of Arizona ruled that a defendant who asserts attorney-client privilege for communications made from jail to his attorney, including text messages, video visits and phone calls, may not rely on a blanket exception but must make a prima facie showing ...
by Matt Clarke
On June 10, 2022, a final settlement agreement was approved in a federal class-action lawsuit challenging the safety from COVID-19 of detainees held for federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in California’s Yuba County Jail (YCJ) and Mesa Verde Detention Center (MVDC). The settlement will protect around ...
by Kevin Bliss
The Florida Department of Corrections (DOC) entered into another agreement with Disability Rights Florida, Inc. (DRF) on November 8, 2021, denying it had breached an earlier 2017 agreement regarding treatment of disabled prisoners, but promising to make several changes to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act, ...
by Matt Clarke
On December 23, 2021, the Supreme Court of Ohio held that a state court of appeals erred when it denied a state prisoner’s motion for statutory damages against the Cleveland Police Forensic Laboratory (CPFL) for improperly withholding public records he requested. The Court then set the damage ...
by Keith Sanders
On April 21, 2022, the Massachusetts Parole Board voted unanimously to grant parole to state prisoner William Allen, nine days after taking another unanimous vote to parole another Bay State prisoner, Thomas Koonce, on April 12, 2022. Both men were serving sentences for first-degree murder, and their ...
Loaded on
Aug. 1, 2022
published in Prison Legal News
August, 2022, page 63
Alabama: On June 3, 2022, a guard was arrested for having sex with a prisoner at Alabama’s Pickens County Jail, according to a report by WTVA in Tupelo, Mississippi. The guard, Marquita Booker, 28, was fired after her arrest, which followed an investigation that earlier in the week uncovered evidence ...
by Ashleigh N. Dye
A disabled woman, who suffers from a severe seizure disorder, ended up spending eight weeks hospitalized in a coma with a black eye and bruises, after spending ten days in Texas’ Tarrant County Jail.
Kelly Masten, 38, was sent to the jail after her grandmother and ...
