by Kevin Bliss
The family of Roger Lee Wells will receive $1 million in compensation for his death on March 10, 2018, after he suffered several consecutive seizures without ever receiving proper treatment at the Cascade County Detention Center located in Great Falls, Montana.
Wells was arrested a week earlier ...
by Kevin Bliss
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published a report May 6 based on data gathered from 54 state and territorial health departments, claiming about 5,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 among prisoners in state and federal prisons, jails and detention centers.
Two weeks later, Reuters ...
by Kevin W. Bliss
Special interest groups are becoming more concerned with the government surveillance equipment provider, Special Services Group (SSG). As of early 2020, it had about $2.6 million in contracts with over a dozen U.S. agencies, including the FBI, CIA and ICE, selling covert surveillance equipment such as ...
by Kevin W. Bliss
On January 11, 2020, a group of about a dozen protesters gathered outside the administrative offices of the the Utah Department of Corrections (UDOC) in Draper. They were there to express their anger over a policy change, one that ended a five-year-old effort to segregate members ...
by Kevin W. Bliss
The COVID-19 pandemic has forced prisons across the country to alter the educational programs they offer. The change has highlighted the inequality in available technology between different state prison systems and revealed that many educators are concerned not only with education, but also with the prisoners’ ...
by Kevin Bliss
Waste disposal workers, called “hoppers,” of Orleans Parish went on strike May 5, 2020, demanding the city of New Orleans provide them with better personal protective equipment (PPE) and hazard pay due to the coronavirus outbreak, according to Pay Day Report. People Ready, contracted through Metro ...
by Kevin Bliss
The Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (ODRC) is being criticized for its mishandling of circumstances surrounding a prisoner’s release during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Kevin Cherry was released from Marion Correctional Institution (MCI) April 11, 2020. Three days later, he tested positive for COVID-19. Cherry said guards ...
by David M. Reutter
Detainees at CoreCivic’s Otay Mesa Detention Center (OMDC) in California were enthusiastic when told they would be issued face masks to protect themselves from COVID-19. The mood changed quickly when employees conditioned that issuance on the signing of a contract that held CoreCivic “harmless” from wearing ...
by Kevin Bliss
Hawaii’s Department of Public Safety (DPS) has now banned contact visits at three of the state’s correctional institutions: Oahu Correctional Community Center (OCCC), Maui Correctional Community Center (MCCC), and Halawa Correctional Facility (HFC).
The only way families and friends of those incarcerated there can see their loved ...
by Kevin Bliss
Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards had yet to act on a July 2019 recommendation by the state Board of Pardons and Parole to grant Gloria Williams’ request for commutation.
Williams is Louisiana’s longest incarcerated prisoner, the last of the three people sent to prison for a robbery ...
