§ 1983 Suit Challenging New York's Blanket Parole Denial "Policy" Survives Motion to Dismiss
by John E. Dannenberg
The U.S. District Court (S.D. N.Y.) denied the New York State Division of Parole's ("Board") motion to dismiss a civil rights complaint brought by ten New York state prisoners who alleged that ...
by John E. Dannenberg
The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals held that known dangerous prison working conditions can give rise to an Eighth Amendment cruel and unusual punishment claim, even where the prisoner ?volunteered? for the job. The court also held that the supervising prison official was not entitled ...
Strictly construing the U.S. Supreme Court's "some evidence" rule, the California Court of Appeal held that where one cellmate had secreted contraband razor blades in his cell property, his cellmate could be infracted for them as well.
Richard Zepeda, incarcerated at Calipatria State Prison, petitioned the Imperial County Superior Court ...
by John E. Dannenberg
The Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals held that the payment of $1,619 in costs owed to Michigan state by an unsuccessful prisoner litigator could not be deducted from his prison trust account at a rate faster than that approved for collecting unpaid Prison Litigation Reform ...
by John E. Dannenberg
America’s lockups are turning from prisoner dumping grounds into infectious disease breeding grounds. Isolation is intended to be the punishment inflicted by society upon prisoners. But concentrating prisoners in the process of isolating them, and then denying them adequate medical care, is having the perverse effect ...
by John E. Dannenberg
The National Center for Disease Control (CDC) updated its 1996 standard guidelines for effective prevention and control of tuberculosis (TB) in detention facilities by issuing fifteen new recommendations in 2006.
These were necessary because TB is still spreading in the United States, often multiplying in jails ...
"State Secrets Privilege" Forecloses CIA-Detainee?s Kidnapping and Torture Suit
by John E. Dannenberg
The Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has upheld a district court's dismissal of a civil rights action filed by a foreign national who was (apparently mistakenly) kidnapped and spirited away by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) ...
Connecticut: Victims' Privacy Protection Saves Some Sex Offenders From Public Registration
by John E. Dannenberg
In Connecticut, some convicted sex offenders' names will not show up on the state's public online registry. Under penal statute Section 54-255, courts may place certain sex offenders instead on a secret registry available only ...
by John E. Dannenberg
Using its investigative powers under the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act (CRIPA), 42 U.S.C. § 1997, the U.S. Dept. of Justice (DOJ) investigated conditions at the Terrell County, Georgia jail (Terrell).
There it found unconstitutional conditions related to medical care, mental health care, protection from ...
Arch Gen Psychiatry Vol. 64, pp.277-284, March 2007
Reviewed by John E. Dannenberg
Motivated by recent reports of U.S. human rights abuses in military prisons, the three psychiatrist authors studied ill treatment during captivity, including psychological manipulations, humiliating treatment and forced stress situations, and upon finding them indistinguishable from torture ...
