by David M. Reutter
The District of Columbia agreed to pay $13,302,500 to settle a class-action lawsuit related to the illegal arrest of 680 people. Those people were arrested on April 15, 2000 in connection with the protest against the Prison Industrial Complex during the International Monetary Fund-World Bank demonstrations. ...
by David M. Reutter
North Carolina’s Department of Corrections (NCDOC) has entered into a settlement agreement that allows prisoners to prepare for publication and receive compensation for manuscripts so long as the prisoner “authorizes a family member to handle all issues and correspondence related to the business aspect of publishing ...
by David M. Reutter
Those who have the black mark of a felony conviction face prejudice in the job market even when the economic picture is rosy. In these times of the Great Recession, that black mark has the ex-con jobless rate six times higher than those without a felony ...
In February 2010, former Okaloosa County, Florida Sheriff Charlie Morris pleaded no contest to state racketeering and money laundering charges related to an employee bonus kickback scheme that netted him thousands of dollars.
To enter the plea, Morris was transported from federal prison where he was serving a 71-month sentence ...
by David M. Reutter
A Pennsylvania federal jury has awarded $185,000 to a prisoner in a civil rights action alleging conspiracy, retaliation, obstruction of access to the courts and defamation of character.
Pennsylvania state prisoner Andre Jacobs prosecuted the lawsuit pro se. His complaint involved events that occurred at SCI-Western ...
by David M. Reutter
On February 4, 2010, the Washington State Supreme Court held that prisoners challenging prison disciplinary decisions do not have to make a prima facie case of prejudice to obtain review in a personal restraint petition. However, they still must show that the disciplinary hearing was so ...
by David M. Reutter
Three non-execution deaths on Georgia’s death row in as many months, including two suicides, resulted in a focus on conditions for condemned prisoners at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison. The response by prison officials was to end all contact visits with family and loved ones. ...
by David M. Reutter
The Washington State Supreme Court has held that a litigant who successfully gets an appellate court to vacate a prison disciplinary infraction and declare a statute unconstitutional is a prevailing party under 42 U.S.C. § 1988, entitling him to attorney fees. The Court further held that ...
by David M. Reutter
A February 2010 news report by The Tennessean, Nashville’s daily newspaper, revealed that juvenile offenders are regularly sexually abused at the Woodland Hills Youth Development Center.
The investigation followed a U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) study that found Woodland Hills had one of the highest rates ...
by David M. Reutter
Traditionally, the role of a chaplain in the correctional setting is to serve as a spiritual advisor to prisoners and help them meet the requirements of their religious faiths. Equally traditionally, chaplains have generally been from conservative mainstream Christian faiths and often proselytize among prisoners for those faiths.
There is some debate as to whether it is proper to have government-paid chaplains at prisons and jails, based on the premise that such arrangements violate the principle of separation of church and state. There is also dispute concerning whether chaplains – who are overwhelmingly Christian – can adequately address the religious needs of prisoners with many diverse faiths, including Islam, Judaism, Native American beliefs, Hinduism and Buddhism, among others, to say nothing of agnostics and atheists.
However, there is universal agreement that prison and jail chaplains should not abuse their role as spiritual leaders and use their positions of authority to fulfill their own deviant sexual desires. Such abuses do occur, albeit not with the frequency that other correctional staff victimize prisoners. [See, e.g.: PLN, May 2009, p.1].
While incidents involving sexual mis-conduct by chaplains are not common, they are indicative of a somber incongruity between the ...
