by Sam Rutherford
The United States Courts of Appeals for the Ninth and Tenth Circuits recently held that the government may not immediately appeal a district court’s order extending to new factual scenarios that the exemption to governmental immunity first identified in Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal ...
by Sam Rutherford
As PLN reported, the New Mexico Corrections Department (NMCD) has for many years outsourced its constitutional obligation to provide healthcare to those it confines, contracting the service from private, for-profit corporations. The terrible cost of this arrangement to prisoners’ health—not to mention $8 million in lawsuit settlement ...
by Sam Rutherford
On July 18, 2024, a physician assistant employed by the Washington Department of Corrections (DOC) complied with an order to surrender his medical license by the state’s medical commission, which accused him of multiple instances of incompetent and negligent care of prisoners who were his patients.
Richard ...
by Sam Rutherford
On April 11, 2024, the Supreme Court of Washington held that the one-year statute of limitations (SOL) for bringing a lawsuit under the state Public Records Act (PRA), RCW 42.56.001, et seq., begins on the date that a state agency issues a final, determinative response to a ...
by Sam Rutherford
The New Mexico Corrections Department (NMCD) has long outsourced its constitutional obligation to provide prisoners adequate medical care to private, for-profit corporations with little incentive to do so. Before November 2019, a $41 million annual contract was held by Centurion Correctional Healthcare of New Mexico, LLC, which lost a battle to withhold documentation of legal settlements when PLN’s publisher prevailed in a suit for the records on September 16, 2024, as reported elsewhere in this issue. [See: PLN, Dec. 2024, p.19.]
Quickly growing since its 2011 founding, Centurion and related companies contract with local, state and federal governments in 15 states at 325 lockups. When Centurion took over healthcare for NMCD in June 2016, predecessor Corizon Health had been sued by state prisoners more than 150 times during its nine-year tenure. Another 24 suits were filed during Centurion’s first year, as PLN reported. [See: PLN, Nov. 2018, p.60.]
As PLN also reported, the Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC), nonprofit publisher of PLN and Criminal Legal News, filed a request pursuant to the New Mexico Inspection of Public Records Act in August 2020 that Centurion disclose all complaints and settlement agreements for cases in which the company paid ...
by Derek Gronquist reviewed by Sam Rutherford
The Public Records Act Manual for the State of Washington (2nd Ed. 2020), by Derek Gronquist, is a must have compendium for anyone, from the novice record requestor to attorneys experienced in public records litigation, interested in pursuing public records requests from governmental agencies within the state of Washington. It is by far the most comprehensive and complete encyclopedia of Washington public records law currently available.
Gronquist is an experienced pro se litigator who has successfully pursued public records cases at all levels of the state court system. He has drawn on his substantial experience to provide a well thought out and detailed guide on public records law and litigation in Washington.
The Manual is 534 pages long, broken into nine chapters that cover every aspect of the Public Records Act (PRA), Chapter 42.56 RCW, including but not limited to its history and purpose, the types of records subject to disclosure, statutory and case law exemptions from disclosure, instructions on how to initiate a records request, state agencies’ affirmative duties under PRA, record retention policies and how and when PRA requires agencies to respond to records requests, plus how to enforce PRA by ...
By Sam Rutherford
On March 11, 2022, the Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC), PLN’s publisher, filed suit in U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging that the Strafford County House of Correction (HOC) violated its rights under the First and Fourteenth ...
By Sam Rutherford
On February 25, 2022, the Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC), publisher of PLN and Criminal Legal News (CLN), filed suit in U.S. District Court for the District of Nebraska against Scott Frakes, Director of the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services (DCS), under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 ...
By Sam Rutherford
On February 5, 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed the summary judgment dismissal of a pretrial detainee’s federal civil rights claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, agreeing with the lower court that a jail guard was not guilty of failure to protect ...
Division I of the Washington State Court of Appeals has affirmed a trial court dismissal of an action challenging phone companies' failure to disclose the rates for collect calls made by Washington prisoners. Relief was denied because the plaintiffs did not bring the appropriate agency into the suit and did ...
