In Washington state’s Spokane County, some people are serving more jail time for failing to pay court costs than they served under their original sentence.
Michael Lafferty was sentenced to less than 90 days for a third-degree assault conviction. Court costs and restitution assessed by the Superior Court totaled $2,207; ...
Morgan County, Missouri was in dire financial straits before contracting with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to house immigration detainees at the county’s jail. For a while things were great – Sheriff Jim Petty replaced his worn-out police cruisers with new SUVs, upgraded the local jail and hired more ...
Reviewed by Gary Hunter
Three stories, 90 pages, and infinite information about how rampant prison construction is destroying America. That’s what The Real Cost of Prisons Comix brings to the table.
The impact of unchecked prison construction has been a blight on American society for the past three decades. From ...
Across the nation, state and local governments are facing gaping holes in their budgets. As a result many are turning to cheap or free prison labor, and in some cases prisoners have taken the place of free-world citizens laid off due to budget cuts. State and local agencies have increasingly ...
A study, sponsored by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and released in December 2008, concludes that “Incarceration may not only affect those individuals incarcerated, but also those family members and friends left behind in the community.”
In a unique approach to the study of the disparity of physical ...
Last year, honoring the request of state Senator Juan “Chuy” Hinojosa, the Office of the Independent Ombudsman (OIO) of the Texas Youth Commission investigated the reason for the “alarming trend regarding adult certifications” of youthful offenders in Texas. What the OIO reported was a 31 percent increase, between 2007 and ...
South Carolina state prisoner Kevin Bell, 42, breezed through the last six years of his sentence with the help of local law enforcement officials. In 1996, Bell began serving a 13-year prison term for cocaine trafficking. Six years later he was sent to the Cherokee County Detention Center, at the ...
Five corrections employees at the Manhattan Detention Complex in New York City, also called “the Tombs,” were disciplined after it was learned that the jail chaplain in charge of Jewish affairs threw a lavish six-hour party for an Orthodox Jewish prisoner. Two of those employees later resigned.
Rabbi Leib Glanz ...
On January 22, 2009, Rikers Island, New York guards Michael “Mack” McKie and Khalid “Nel” Nelson were charged with enterprise corruption after it was learned they were using a group of prisoners to enforce discipline and extort other offenders at the Rikers facility for juveniles. A third guard, Denise “Mama ...
On May 19, 2009, Arizona state prisoner Marcia Powell, 48, collapsed after being left in an unshaded outdoor chain-link cage for four hours under a scorching summer sun. She later died. Temperatures at the Arizona State Prison Complex-Perryville had reached as high as 107 degrees that afternoon. The guards responsible ...
