by David M. Reutter
In a January 2022 report by the Fines and Fees Justice Center (FFJC), a national hub for the movement to reform criminal justice fines and fees, researchers documented the costs of private probation and found that “monetary sanctions…create substantial challenges for individuals on private probation.” The ...
by David M. Reutter
On January 13, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court granted a writ of certiorari to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit to review its dismissal of an appeal from a Maryland prison supervisor to a $700,000 jury verdict for a detainee whom his subordinate ...
by David M. Reutter
Confronted with the appeal of a defendant who died on November 10, 2022, the Supreme Court of Louisiana reversed its own precedent and refused to abandon his prosecution. With that, the Court decided that the doctrine of abatement ab initio is “obsolete and inconsistent with our ...
by David M. Reutter
On November 30, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed a $30,001 jury award and a fee award over $248,000 to a Minnesota jail detainee who alleged she was falsely imprisoned by Anoka County’s discriminatory policy of referring all foreign-born arrestees to ...
by David M. Reutter
California’s Superior Court for Sacramento County issued a Writ of Mandate on September 30, 2022, ordering the state Department of Correction and Rehabilitation (CDCR) to “immediately cease” transferring prisoners under a controversial new housing policy.
This case was brought by state prisoner Israel Villarreal. His petition ...
by David M. Reutter
On August 10, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit reversed a district court’s grant of summary judgment to employees of the Michigan Department of Corrections (DOC) in a case accusing them of failing to protect a prisoner who suffered a fatal overdose ...
by David M. Reutter
In an opinion issued on November 22, 2022, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts held that urine is not a “noxious or filthy substance.” Therefore, the Court affirmed dismissal of vandalism charges against a detainee for urinating on a jail’s floor.
Angel O. Perez Narvaez was ...
by David M. Reutter
In a precedential ruling displaying galling cowardice, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit ordered summary judgment on November 9, 2022, against a group of sex offenders whose class-action suit claimed their civil rights were violated when the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections (DOC) denied ...
by David M. Reutter
On November 7, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit held that a Virginia prisoner successfully pleaded that a policy of the state Department of Corrections (DOC) substantially burdened his religious beliefs. That sent the case back to the district court to determine ...
by David M. Reutter
On May 3, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed summary judgment for defendant jailers in a lawsuit seeking damages for a Utah detainee’s suicide. Not only bad for the survivors of the unfortunate man, the case also offers a lesson in ...
