The Pew Charitable Trusts, a non-profit, non-governmental organization, recently reported on the mixed results of “Scared Straight” programs, which are intended to deter juveniles with a history of bad behavior from entering the criminal justice system by having them visit prisons or jails to see first-hand the consequences of breaking ...
Antonio Hinojosa, serving a 16-year sentence in California’s prison system, was deemed a “validated” gang member by prison officials, effectively stripping him of future good-time credits and extending the length of his sentence. He filed a pro se petition for habeas relief, was denied at the state court level and ...
Immigration rights advocates are suspicious of a new government-funded program administered by GEO Care – a division of the GEO Group, one of the nation’s largest for-profit prison companies – that supplies cell phones to low-risk undocumented immigrants. Officials maintain that the $11 million cell phone program, reported by the ...
In a term with relatively few major criminal cases on its docket, the U.S. Supreme Court held that its previous decision in Johnson v. United States will have retroactive application on petitions for collateral review. In Johnson, the Court found the “residual clause” portion of the Armed Career Criminal Act ...
The family of Robert Ramirez, who died while in the custody of Oxnard, California police officers, was awarded over $2 million in damages by a federal jury. According to the family’s lawsuit, on June 23, 2012, Ramirez was “beaten with excessive force by Defendant(s) ... and was denied access to ...
Ian Cooke, a Connecticut state prisoner, filed a federal action under 42 U.S.C. 1983 to protest his lack of medical and psychiatric treatment while he was in custody awaiting trial, has settled with the Connecticut Department of Correction (DOC) and will receive cash and art supplies. Cooke had alleged that ...
At a time when both federal and state governments are struggling to pay their bills, a new government report by the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General (OIG) reveals that Medicare has improperly paid out millions of dollars for prescription drugs provided to incarcerated prisoners. Prisoners ...
by Derek Gilna
A 57-page report issued under the auspices of a federal district court in Plata v. Brown strongly criticizing the Central California Women’s Facility (CCWF) has highlighted the problems that the overcrowded California prison system has experienced in providing proper medical care to those under their custody and ...
Sometimes the federal government just can’t help itself. At a time when the majority of Americans still feel that their country is headed in the wrong direction, and have expressed their weariness of the “war on Drugs,” the Department of Justice (DOJ) has asked for a $236 million budget increase. ...
A new report by a national prisoner-rights organization says that once again the state of Texas led the nation in 2013 in exonerations, with 13 cases, and Illinois and New York were not far behind with 9 and 8, respectively. Although this is the highest figure in 25 years according ...
