by Ed Lyon
Charles B. Lemon, the former Sheriff of South Carolina’s Marlboro County, pleaded not guilty on February 6, 2024, to federal civil rights charges laid out in an indictment unsealed two weeks earlier. Lemon and former Deputy Dep. David A. Cook were both accused in a brutal assault ...
by Ed Lyon
With almost 122,000 prisoners, Texas has the largest state prison system in the U.S. According to a report on January 9, 2023, it appears to be the most fire prone system, as well.
Fire and safety spending by the state Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) rose from ...
by Ed Lyon
In February 2023, officials in El Salvador began admitting detainees to a new prison that is the largest in the world.
The prison, which has its own utilities, is isolated on 56 acres in the middle of a 410-acre plot of thick forest. The cells are spread ...
by Ed Lyon
New data released in December 2022 by the federal Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) showed a steady decline in prison population from 2011 to 2021 – nearly 25% overall. The number of people imprisoned today – 1,163,665 – reflects the largest slice of U.S. ...
by Ed Lyon
As retributive minded states likeTexas pursue ever more draconian measures and policies to deny housing to released prisoners (PLN, May 2021, pp. 34-35), California is beginning to enact measures and policies to assist released prisoners in obtaining housing.
Easing housing restrictions for the formerly incarcerated ...
by Ed Lyon
A state prison warden was arrested on August 30, 2022, on suspicion of driving under the influence in Cullman, Alabama. Jeffrey Baldwin was then placed on mandatory leave from his post at Elmore Correctional Facility (CF) by the state Department of Corrections (DOC). Thwarting any effort to ...
by Ed Lyon
On July 23, 2021, Magistrate Scott Sheets presiding in the Ohio Court of Claims approved a settlement, under which the state Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (DRC) agreed to pay $20,000 to a former state prisoner who claimed he was injured while incarcerated when he slipped and ...
by Ed Lyon
On February 28, 2022, Judge Patrick E. Sheeran of the Ohio Court of Claims approved a settlement under which the state Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (DRC) agreed to pay a prisoner $32,500 to resolve his claims that prison medical staff ignored post-surgery instruction and removed his ...
by Ed Lyon
After Pres. Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D) took action in August 2022 to forgive up to $20,000 in federal or federally insured student loan debt, nearly 22 million of some 44 million Americans affected rushed to sign up. Prisoners were not excluded from the plan, which was ...
by David M. Reutter and Ed Lyon
On September 6, 2022, the Richland County Court of Common Pleas granted an injunction in a challenge brought by four condemned South Carolina prisoners to 2021 state legislation making electrocution the default method of execution unless a prisoner opts instead for lethal injection ...
