| 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 rely on donations from our supporters! |
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California Is First to Pay for Prisoner's Sex-Reassignment Surgery A 57-year-old convicted killer serving a life sentence in California is the first inmate in the United States to receive state-financed sex-reassignment surgery, the prisoner's lawyers said. California prison officials agreed in August 2015 to pay for the surgery for the inmate, Shiloh Heavenly Quine, who was convicted of first-degree murder, kidnapping and robbery for ransom and has no possibility of parole. Ms. Quine's case led the state to become the first to set standards that will allow other transgender inmates to apply to receive state-financed sex-reassignment surgery. It also prompted a federal magistrate to require California to provide transgender female inmates housed in men's facilities with more female-oriented items like nightgowns, scarves and necklaces. Ms. Quine's lawyers said on Friday that the sex-reassignment surgery had been performed at a hospital in San Francisco and that their client would be moved to a women's prison after being released from the hospital. Read More |
| Kansas: Butler County Jail sends inmates away because of large staff shortage If you look inside the Butler County Jail, things aren't as they should be. That's according to Butler County Sheriff Kelly Herzet. "The pods aren't being kept as clean as they need to be. We're not able to do our cell checks as thorough as we should," Herzet said. That, he said, could mean danger. "So I think in my mind and in my staff's mind that that leaves the inmate to have the opportunity to maybe make a shank, maybe make some homemade wine or hooch or whatever you want to call it." Herzet said it all comes down to the deputies inside the jail, or lack thereof. He said the jail is down 16 staff members, which is one third of the desired number of employees. "It's just at the point where we need to take some action until we can get some people hired," he said. That action is sending out-of-county inmates away from Butler County. Right now, Butler County contracts with several counties and agencies. For every inmate it houses from one of those places, Butler County gets a certain amount of money per day. Read More |
Nevada: Vegas Prosecutors Seek Help in Identifying Convictions Won With Faulty Drug Tests The Clark County District Attorney's Office in Nevada established a conviction review unit in October. In what appears to be one of its first efforts, the unit has been seeking information about problematic convictions resulting from one of the office's routine practices: accepting guilty pleas in drug cases that rely largely on the results of field tests done by police that can be unreliable. Daniel Silverstein, head of the newly formed unit, in November asked a statewide organization of defense lawyers for any information they had on cases that might have involved inaccurate field tests, and thus resulted in potentially wrongful convictions. Police place suspicious material into a pouch of chemicals that are supposed to change color to indicate the possible presence of illegal drugs. The $2 tests are used by police departments nationwide, and over nearly 30 years in Clark County they have helped produce tens of thousands of drug convictions for the possession or sale of cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana. In the vast majority of those cases, the field test results are never confirmed in a formal crime lab. Earlier this fall, ProPublica reported that the district attorney's office had long known that the tests were prone to error, and that the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department's crime lab had produced a study in 2014 detailing the vulnerabilities of the tests. The district attorney's office nonetheless continued to gain convictions in cases involving field tests, and collaborating with the Las Vegas police crime lab, even expanded their use to obtain convictions in cases of suspected heroin. The crime lab's study was not shared with the judges who approve plea deals. In October, the district attorney's office declined to answer questions about its practices involving field tests, and officials would not be interviewed regarding the recent actions taken by the conviction review unit. Silverstein, the conviction review director, responded by email: "At this time, I have no comment on this issue." Read More |
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Judge: Texas must give number of heat-related prison deaths A federal judge is ordering the state to disclose the number of heat-related deaths that have occurred since 1990 in Texas prisons, where less than a third have air conditioning in all housing areas. U.S. District Judge Keith Ellison at a hearing Wednesday in Houston gave the state 30 days to comply, but not before questioning why its lawyers had not provided the information sooner, the Houston Chronicle reported. The order comes as part of a federal civil rights lawsuit filed in 2013 that contends at least 13 inmates being held by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice have died of heat-related deaths since 2007, including 11 in 2011 when a heat wave brought some of the hottest temperatures on record. "We are not talking about how many widgets were sold out of a given factory," Ellison said during the hearing. "We are talking about human lives, and I would be very distressed if the answer is the TDCJ does not even keep count of how many people died of heat-related illness." The lawsuit argues more than 1,400 prison inmates, most of them elderly and disabled, are suffering "cruel and unusual punishment" by enduring extreme summer heat without air-conditioning. Read More |
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From the PLN in Print Archives Reforms at New Orleans Jail Slow to Materialize; Death Reporting Problematic Federal monitors overseeing implementation of a consent decree concerning conditions at the Orleans Parish Prison (OPP) in New Orleans said they were "very concerned" about the lack of progress in implementing the agreement's provisions. Forty-nine prisoners died at OPP between April 2006 and November 2016, including several deaths that were not accurately reported, and problems have persisted at a new jail that opened after OPP closed last year. As previously reported by PLN, after Sheriff Marlin N. Gusman, Mayor Mitch Landrieu and attorneys from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) finished haggling over costs and funding in a class-action lawsuit, a consent decree was reached in June 2013 to partially settle the case. The agreement required prompt action to reform unconstitutional conditions related to medical care, suicide prevention and safety measures, staffing and classification of pre-trial detainees. [See: PLN, June 2014, p.44; March 2010, p.30]. Under the agreement, Gusman was to hire a consultant, restructure OPP's human resources department and hire a new human resources director; the Sheriff's office was also required to hire a classification manager and a staff member to develop new policies and procedures at OPP, and purchase and install $70,000 in computer equipment. Gusman hired Tracie Washington, an attorney and president and CEO of the Louisiana Justice Institute, as a compliance officer. In April 2015, Gusman appointed Carmen DeSadier as chief of corrections at OPP. She had previously worked as an administrator at Chicago's notoriously-violent Cook County Jail, where she had faced allegations of abuse. A new jail, the $145 million New Orleans Justice Center, opened in September 2015 to replace the aging OPP, which had been cited by the DOJ for numerous problems, including high levels of violence. However, on February 2, 2016, the federal monitors issued a report finding "absolutely unacceptable" levels of violence at the new facility. Additionally, jail staff were not reporting many of the violent incidents. Less than three weeks following the monitors' report, on February 19, DeSadier resigned from her position as chief of corrections. Previously, in July 2014, federal monitor Susan McCampbell had notified U.S. District Court Judge Lance M. Africk that "The monitors are very concerned that [the Sheriff's office] has not timely acted to implement provisions of the partial settlement agreement." She added, "The rationale for not moving forward with critical hiring/contracting is that only partial funding was provided." That argument was "unpersuasive," however, because the partial funding "was known to the Sheriff's office at the time the agreement was executed." Read More |
Human Rights Defense Center: Job Posting - 2 Staff Attorney Positions The Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC) is seeking a full-time staff attorney in both our Lake Worth, FL and Seattle, WA offices. HRDC is a nonprofit organization that advocates in furtherance of the human rights of people held in U.S. detention facilities. This includes people in state and federal prisons, local jails, immigration detention centers, civil commitment facilities, Bureau of Indian Affairs jails, juvenile facilities and military prisons. HRDC is one of the few national opponents to the private prison industry and is the foremost advocate on behalf of the free speech rights of publishers to communicate with prisoners and the right of prisoners to receive publications and communications from outside sources. HRDC also does significant work around government transparency and accountability issues by filing and litigating public records and Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) cases at the state and federal levels. Further, HRDC provides representation in cases involving catastrophic injuries to or the deaths of prisoners, and also litigates consumer class-actions related to the financial exploitation of prisoners and their families. All HRDC cases have a media component and often involve working with the affected communities. Our docket is national.
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Responsibilities: The attorney will primarily litigate Section 1983 and FOIA cases in Federal Court, and will also litigate cases under state public records laws. The attorney will be expected to handle all phases of complex civil litigation and maintain an active case load, although all cases at HRDC are handled cooperatively among all in-house attorneys. The attorney will be directly supervised by our Litigation Director and will work with in-house legal support staff. In most cases, the attorney will coordinate and work with co-counsel from various jurisdictions across the country. The attorney will occasionally be expected to travel to various jurisdictions around the country. HRDC works with the most skilled civil rights lawyers and firms around the country. Our opponents include state, local and federal agencies; private prison companies and companies that profit from mass incarceration. This is a full time, 40 hour per week job in our Lake Worth, FL and Seattle, WA offices; we are seeking one attorney for each office. Qualifications: A minimum of five years post-graduate experience as a full-time lawyer is preferred but exceptions will be made for exceptional candidates with less experience. The successful candidate will have excellent writing and analytical skills, experience litigating § 1983 cases, a demonstrated commitment to improving the criminal justice system, and a personal interest in the preservation and advancement of civil liberties and individual rights. Judicial clerkships are acceptable as experience. The attorney must be admitted to the Florida Bar for our FL office and the Washington Bar for our Seattle office; must be self-motivated, energetic and capable of working in a dynamic, fast paced environment; and able to adjust to shifting priorities. Pluses if they have experience with First Amendment, class-action or consumer related litigation. Attorneys are required to track their time for billing purposes and we maintain a 135-hour-per-month minimum billable hour requirement. Salary/Benefits: Salary is approx. $60-80,000 per year and will be set depending on experience. HRDC offers a benefits package including 100% employer paid group health and dental insurance. We offer a retirement plan with 5% employer matching grant; paid vacation and sick days and most federal holidays. We also offer disability insurance. Application: Send resume, cover letter and three references to Paul Wright, HRDC's Executive Director, at pwr...@prisonlegalnews.org . Please include your available start date. No phone calls, please. This position will remain open until filled. Please specify which office you are applying for. More Info Here |
Analysis: Sen. Jeff Sessions's Record on Criminal Justice This analysis provides a brief summary of Sen. Jeff Sessions's past statements, votes, and practices relating to criminal justice. Specifically, this analysis finds that: - Sen. Sessions opposes efforts to reduce unnecessarily long federal prison sentences for nonviolent crimes, despite a consensus for reform even within his own party. In 2016, he personally blocked the Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act, a bipartisan effort spearheaded by Sens. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), Mike Lee (R-Utah), and John Cornyn (R-Texas), and Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), and supported by law enforcement leadership. As Attorney General, Sen. Sessions could stall current congressional efforts to pass this legislation to recalibrate federal sentencing laws.
- Drug convictions made up 40 percent of Sen. Sessions's convictions when he served as U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Alabama - double the rate of other Alabama federal prosecutors. Today, state and federal law enforcement officers have begun to focus resources on violent crime, and away from archaic drug war policies. But Sen. Sessions continues to oppose any attempts to legalize marijuana and any reduction in drug sentences. As Attorney General, Sen. Sessions could direct federal prosecutors to pursue the harshest penalties possible for even low-level drug offenses, a step backward from Republican-supported efforts to modernize criminal justice policy.
- Unlike many Republican legislators, Sen. Sessions supports the use of "civil asset forfeiture," which allows police to confiscate property from people who may not even be accused of a crime. Sen. Sessions could strengthen this practice at the federal level, or vocally oppose any congressional efforts to end it.
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Louisiana: Lawsuit alleges Angola officials punished prisoner who talked to journalist A lawsuit filed in federal court today alleges prison officials at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola retaliated against a prisoner who talked to a journalist investigating the jail. According to the lawsuit, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Louisiana by the New Orleans-based MacArthur Justice Center, prisoner William Kissinger was sent to solitary confinement in the Elayn Hunt Correctional Center after talking to a reporter from the Baton Rouge Advocate about prison conditions and financial irregularities at Angola in 2015 and 2016. The solitary confinement unit is commonly referred to as "the dungeon," according to the lawsuit. "In the Dungeon, Kissinger had no access to any item other than a mattress," states the lawsuit. "He did not have bed sheets or any toiletry items. He was not even afforded a toothbrush. He received toilet paper every other day. He was allowed out of his cell for 15 minutes per day and was shackled with hard restraints, resulting in cuts to his wrists." On the day he was moved to the Elayn Hunt Correctional Center, Kissinger was denied a copy of the investigation report and had no way to defend himself before the prison disciplinary board, according to the MacArthur Justice Center. "William Kissinger has a clear right to talk to the news media about conditions inside the prison," MacArthur Justice Center Co-Director Katie Schwartzmann said. "Louisiana has the nation's highest incarceration rate, and the prison corrections system consumes a large portion of our state budget. We deserve to know what happens behind the walls of our state correctional facilities." Read More |
We Can't End the HIV Crisis Unless We Get Serious About Sexual Health in Prisons According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, HIV diagnoses dropped by 19 percent from 2005 to 2014. The statistics suggest education, condoms, and PrEP (a pill that, when taken properly, reduces the risk of HIV infection by over 90 percent) have worked to prevent the spread of the virus. A closer look at the numbers, though, reveal a troubling trend: While diagnoses for all gay and bisexual men increased slightly by six percent, they skyrocketed by 87 percent for African American and Latino gay and bisexual men. Although diagnoses fell for all women, rates of transmission for African American women remained several times higher than rates for white women. In 2014, African Americans received 44 percent of new HIV diagnosis. Researchers have pinpointed several reasons for the disparity, namely a lack of access to services that provide education and STI prevention materials in poor, black neighborhoods. Increasingly, researchers and HIV advocates are also singling out another potential cause of transmission: incarceration. A growing body of research suggests that prison and jails can be some of the biggest risk factors in HIV transmission, and that's led some researchers to ask why jails' and prisons' federal, state, and county-level administrators aren't doing more to stop the virus's spread. "HIV prevention in prisons and especially in jails, is egregious," says Jason Lydon, the community minister of Black and Pink, a nonprofit that advocates for LGBTQ prisoners. "The refusal to give prisoners PrEP or condoms, it's a human rights violation." HIV rates in prisons are five to seven times higher than in the general population, according to the Center for HIV Law and Policy. The first reason is simply demographics: African Americans have much higher rates of incarceration and also have higher rates of HIV, as do trans women of all races. Prison populations also skew young, and young people are at a higher risk of HIV infection than older Americans. According to Lydon, another reason for the high rates is that the same factors that cause people to be at increased risk for HIV transmission-like working as a sex worker or using intravenous drugs-also are associated with an increased risk of imprisonment because they're criminalized behaviors. All of that together means that in a given year, 25 percent of all Americans who have HIV will be incarcerated according to a study performed by Dr. Russell A. Brewer. Read More |
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