Early Release Debacle Prompts Nevada Prison Director's Resignation
by Matthew T. Clarke
Jackie Crawford, director of the Nevada state prison system since May 2000, announced her resignation from the $116,000-a-year position on September 15, 2005. The announcement cited health issues -- a worsening back problem -- as the reason for …
by Matthew T. Clarke
According to a report released by the U.S. Department of Justice?s Bureau of Justice Statistics in April, 2006, the U.S. spent a record $185 billion for police protection, detention, and judicial and legal activities in 2003. This represented a 418% unadjusted increase over 1982 justice expenditures. …
by Matthew T. Clarke
In a ground-breaking decision the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit held that the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations (Vienna Convention) created individual rights to consular notification that may be enforced in a civil action. Thus, the Seventh Circuit allowed a former state prisoner who …
by Matthew T. Clarke
On June 29, 2006, e federal judge in Georgia granted class-action status and a temporary restraining order (TRO) suspending enforcement of some provisions of Georgias sex offender residency law (SORL), Ga.Code.Ann. § 42-15.
The SORL was passed in 2006 and included provisions prohibiting registered sex …
by Matthew T. Clarke
On June 28, 2006, Colorado assessed $126,000 in fines against Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) for persistently understaffing two Colorado private prisons. The Colorado Department of Corrections (DOC) also awarded contracts for new private prisons and the expansion of current private prisons to CCA and …
by Matthew T. Clarke
Recently, the Newton County Correctional Center (NCCC), a private prison in Newton, Texas run by the Boca Raton, Florida-based Geo Group, has experienced several incidents involving the out-of-state Idaho prisoners housed there. These incidents included a non-violent protest involving 85 prisoners, an escape, and the …
by Matthew T. Clarke
U.S. businesses and Wall Street investment companies have begun a campaign to get the Justice Department to reign in federal prosecutors in business crime cases. The effort by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Securities Industry Association and Bond Market Association focuses on prosecutors pressuring companies …
by Matthew T. Clarke
Texas has a unique form of civil commitment for sexual predators which allows outpatient treatment and requires most of the civilly committed to live at a halfway house. A committed man's recent escape from a Dallas halfway house brought the Texas model into question.
Seventeen …
by Matthew T. Clarke
On June 28, 2006, the Supreme Court held that violations of the Vienna Convention on Consular Notification (Convention) do not require exclusion of evidence from a criminal trial and are subject to procedural default rules.
Moises Sanchez-Llamas, an Oregon state prisoner and a citizen of …
European Court of Human Rights Voids UKs Blanket Bans On Prisoner Voting
by Matthew T. Clarke
On October 6, 2005, the European Court of Human Rights issued a Grand Chamber Judgment holding that Britains blanket ban on incarcerated prisoners voting in elections violated Article 3 of Protocol No. 1 …
