by David M. Reutter
On December 6, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed denial of qualified immunity (QI) to defendant officials with Pennsylvania’s Harrisburg Police Department (HPD) and the contracted medical provider for Dauphin County Booking Center (DCBC), PrimeCare Medical, in a suit accusing ...
by David M. Reutter
In a decision issued on December 11, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit said that the claim of a federal prisoner in Washington allegedly denied treatment for Hepatitis C did not require an extension of the government’s financial liability for violating ...
by David Reutter
On April 26, 2024, a long legal battle over his delayed Hepatitis C (HCV) treatment netted Georgia prisoner Ricky Johnson just over $15,000 from Defendant state prison officials and medical personnel. As PLN has reported, many prison systems have delayed HCV care due to the high ...
by David M. Reutter
In a suit filed in Kansas state court on July 31, 2023, former detainee Joshua Braddy accused private prison profiteer CoreCivic of negligence that resulted in his stabbing at Leavenworth Detention Center (LDC), a now-shuttered lockup formerly operated for the federal government.
Before it closed ...
by David M. Reutter
On December 18, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed the grant of summary judgment to Defendant officials of Cook County in a civil rights action alleging that surveillance cameras aimed at toilet areas in county courthouse holding cells violated detainees’ ...
by David M. Reutter
On December 13, 2023, the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado denied summary judgment to a jail guard who allegedly failed to protect a pretrial detainee from assault by another detainee. But the Court dismissed a municipal liability claim against Colorado’s Chaffee County, ...
by David M. Reutter
The Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) marked a critical step in condemning and curbing sexual assault and harassment in jails and prisons. Sadly, rape, groping and sexual harassment still occur regularly in America’s gulags, with guards often the perpetrators. Now a new provision in U.S. ...
by David M. Reutter
On December 19, 2023, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania ruled for a prisoner who claimed that the state Department of Corrections (DOC) violated his civil rights by upping the rate at which it docked his prison pay “without pre-deprivation notice and an opportunity to be ...
by David M. Reutter
On February 13, 2024, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York gave final approval to a settlement paying $8.9 million from the state to the family of Terry L. Cooper, Jr. a prisoner who died after a violent clash with state ...
by David M. Reutter
There’s something rotten with bail decisions in Prince George’s County, but as of March 29, 2024, the federal court for the District of Maryland isn’t going to do anything about it. That was the date it granted Defendants’ motion for judgment on the pleadings and ...
