| Prison Legal News, a monthly print publication that covers criminal justice issues, is a project of the Human Rights Defense Center, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. |
|
WE STILL NEED YOUR HELP! In Case You Missed It - URGENT BULLETIN Last week, HRDC issued this urgent bulletin from Executive Director Paul Wright. Thank you to all who have already responded to this call to action with generous offerings of help. If you are just seeing this message please take the time to donate today. Every dollar counts, now more than ever. Hi Everyone, It is rare for HRDC to ask for a donation due to factors beyond our control. We have weathered earthquakes and hurricanes uneventfully in the past, we have twice moved our offices across the country and have never asked our supporters for money to help with those expenses. On Monday we were informed that the City of Lake Worth had purchased the building where our office is located (1013 Lucerne Avenue in Lake Worth, Florida) as part of a redevelopment project. On Tuesday we were served with a 60-day eviction notice. We currently have 14 full-time employees in our Florida office and a 20,000 book inventory, so our options for alternative office space are somewhat limited. Moreso on such a tight deadline. We are already talking to a real estate agent to explore our office possibilities, and the first thing they told us was what a good deal we had on our current office space and that we would be facing a significant increase in rent anywhere else we were able to move to in our area. We had been in our current office for over 4 years and had neither planned nor budgeted for a move at this time. Apparently, having the government as your landlord is a really bad idea for civil and human rights organizations like HRDC. I hope you can make a donation at this time to help us offset this unexpected expense. If you were already planning to donate, please consider increasing your donation. Thank you for your support! Paul Wright Executive Director, HRDC |
Jail standards should be public to protect inmates Most people consider prisons public facilities. Even for-profit prisons run by private companies operate under authority granted them by the government. And the government is ultimately responsible for inmates and their well-being. Which is why a surge of inmate deaths in Utah's county jails is a cause for concern. According to the most recent report available by the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, more inmates died in Utah jails in 2014 than in any other state. Data obtained by The Salt Lake Tribune indicate 11 inmates died in 2015 and 23 in 2016. When Utah legislators and prison-advocate groups like the American Civil Liberties Union started looking into the "why" of inmate deaths in Utah, county jails resisted. Many of Utah's county jails use standards created by Gary DeLand, a former director of Utah's Department of Corrections who now trains jail officials nationwide. DeLand also acts as an expert witness for jails when inmates or their families sue for wrongful treatment. DeLand claims his standards are protected from public scrutiny because they are prepared in anticipation of litigation and therefore are privileged work product. His claim is overreaching. Read More |
Colorado: Denver agrees to pay $4.6 million settlement to family of inmate killed in 2015 by sheriff's deputies The family of Michael Marshall, an inmate killed by deputies in 2015 in Denver's downtown jail, will receive $4.6 million from the city, pending City Council's approval. The settlement was announced Wednesday morning during a news conference at the Denver City-County building, but details were released earlier by the Kilmer, Lane & Newman law firm. City Council will be asked to approve the settlement on Nov. 13. The Marshall family expressed relief that they will not have to endure years of court battles to obtain justice. "Uncle Michael will be missed by our family," his niece Natalia Marshall said in a statement. "We will never get to see him at family dinners and on holidays. Nothing can replace him. We are glad that we can avoid several years of court battles to obtain justice, and we are glad that Denver is taking responsibility for what happened to Michael." The settlement also includes provisions that require changes to city policies and training and staffing at the Denver Sheriff Department, which manages the city's two jails. Read More |
Throughout today, Louisiana releasing more than 1,900 inmates early; here's why Starting at midnight and going throughout Wednesday morning, more than 1,900 convicted inmates are walking out of prisons across the state before their sentence is completed. It's the first step in a comprehensive criminal justice package aimed at prison populations that have made Louisiana a leader for having the nation's highest incarceration rate. The official release time at state prisons was 12:01 a.m., but Corrections Secretary James LeBlanc said Tuesday only those with rides will leave that early, otherwise it'll depend on when families arrive or bus schedules. But 82 percent of state prisoners were serving their sentences in parish prisons. Their release will be determined by the local sheriffs, he said. "Most of these will be midmorning releases," LeBlanc said. Under the new law, nonviolent offenders are eligible for "good time" release after serving 35 percent of their sentence - down from 40 percent before the change, which is retroactive. Read More |
| 
| Click photo to subscribe now |
|
From the PLN in Print Archives Study Shows "Ban-the-Box" Policies May Result in Racial Bias by Employers Increasingly, criminal justice reformers are pushing for "ban-the-box" policies, ordinances and statutes, which are intended to eliminate from job applications the box that asks, "Have you been convicted of a felony?" [See: PLN, March 2017, p.26; Oct. 2014, p.46]. Many jurisdictions have adopted such policies, but a new study found they may help those with felony records while hurting people of color who lack criminal histories. Twenty-three states have passed ban-the-box laws for public government jobs; nine apply the law to private employers, too. In November 2015, President Obama directed federal agencies to remove the felony question box from their job applications. [See: PLN, Jan. 2016, p.41]. Sonja Starr, a professor of law at the University of Michigan, and Amanda Agan, a professor of economics at Princeton, conducted a study to determine the effectiveness of ban-the-box policies. The study examined callback rates for 15,000 job applicants seeking actual low-skill, entry-level positions in a variety of industries at 4,300 businesses. The job positions were located in New Jersey and New York, both before and after those states enacted ban-the-box laws in 2015. The fictitious applicants were 21-22 years old and randomly assigned race and criminal records with similar educational backgrounds and employment histories. They used real names suggestive of one race or another. Before ban-the-box laws were enacted, 39 percent of employers asked about the job applicants' criminal history. Of those, employers called black applicants back at a rate of 10.5 percent and whites at 11.2 percent. After the laws went into effect, the study found callback rates for blacks dropped but they rose for whites, widening the racial callback gap from 7 percent to 45 percent. Without criminal records as an initial indicator of who is a more attractive job candidate under ban-the-box policies, employers may be relying on demographic characteristics such as race and gender. The most recent statistics indicate black men born after 2001 have a 32% chance of serving prison time, compared with 17% for Hispanics and 6% for whites. Thus, employers may be guessing as to a job applicant's criminal history based upon those percentages, which translates into racial bias. Read More |
| 
| Click photo to subscribe now! |
|
Private Prison Offers $30 Million Bailout For Montana's Budget Woes Montana's only private prison has allegedly offered a $30 million dollar bailout to help the state with its budget woes. However, there's a catch. In order to receive the $30 million dollars from CoreCivic, the company that owns the prison, the Bullock administration would need to extend that company's contract for another ten years. "It's kind of an offer, an idea in the air," says Senate Finance and Claims Committee Chairman Llew Jones, a Republican from Conrad. Crossroads Correctional Center is in his district, and as a legislator, he received a copy of this proposal. "This is a potential that doesn't raise somebody's taxes," he says. "It potentially does not require someone be cut. So hopefully this will be part of the negotiation going forward." Read More |
|
Woman admits posing as lawyer, bilking NY prison inmates Officials say a 48-year-old woman has admitted to passing herself off as a lawyer while bilking hundreds of New York prison inmates out of more than $20,000. The state Attorney General's Office says Antonia Barrone pleaded guilty to a scheme to defraud and will serve 16 months to 3 years in state prison. She has also been ordered to pay nearly $270,000 in restitution and fines. Officials say Barrone created a fake persona as a parole attorney named Mario Vredenburg and swindled $23,000 from 400 state inmates and their families through a business called the NYS Prisoner Assistance Center, which purported to specialize in parole cases. Read More |
Can Screen Time Reduce Prison Time?
Madera County sits at the center of one of the world's most productive agricultural regions, surrounded by the flaxen expanses of California's Central Valley. Here, like anywhere in the country, teens get picked up by police for involvement in gangs, drugs, truancy, and violence. Madera County Juvenile Detention Facility is where most of them wind up. The MCJDF has the vibe of a high-security middle school, whatever that might say about either. At the center of each block are the bolted down benches and tables familiar to many prisons. Not so familiar is the sight of adolescent inmates, earphones in and faces aglow as they gaze contentedly into their Android tablets. The MCJDF is part of a growing trend across the U.S. to put tablets in the hands of inmates. It's billed as a way to create learning opportunities where they are often lacking, thereby reducing recidivism and maximizing the limited educational potential of prison facilities. "In many cases I think tablets are trying to solve some good problems," said Ethan Zuckerman, director of the Center for Civic Media at MIT [and HRDC board member], where he teaches a class called Technology and Social Change. "Historically, when communications technologies are brought into American prisons, they're used to exploit the prison population. And so the question really comes down to, will this be introduced in a way that is good for prisoners?" "I don't think the companies peddling tablets are interested in education for prisoners so much as seeking better ways to exploit prisoners and their families by monetizing human contact," said Paul Wright, Director of Prison Legal News. "These are hedge fund-owned companies whose purpose is to make money for their owners ... I would think otherwise if they were selling the tablets to the government rather than paying for it off the backs of prisoners and their families."
Read More
|
Please note that the content of our newsletter mainly consists of news reports from third-party sources. We are not responsible for the accuracy or content of third parties, nor do their statements or positions necessarily reflect those of HRDC/PLN. Our newsletter content is for informational purposes only. |
|
|
