By Chris Zoukis A study released by the Institute for Municipal and Regional Policy, and in conjunction with the National Resource Center on Children and Families of the Incarcerated, debunks commonly cited statistics concerning children with incarcerated parents, calling the statistics “unsupported by the data and potentially stigmatizing[.]” According to the study, “It has been
A 55-year-old mother of seven died in a Pennsylvania jail cell on June 7, 2014, while serving a 48-hour sentence for failure to pay truancy fines and court costs that totaled about $2,000. Eileen DiNino was jailed by Berks County District Judge Dean Patton for debts that had been accruing since 1999. The truancy violations
Solitary confinement remains one of the most archaic punishments in the prison arsenal. Given the advances in our understanding of mental illness and penal rehabilitation over the last thirty years, it’s shocking that it has taken as long as it has for California penitentiaries to come to the conclusion that completely isolating a prisoner for
This past week saw the handing down of an important ruling in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals regarding the rights of prisoners, specifically a prisoner’s right not to be sexually abused by prison officials. If you’re questioning how this could even have been a question before the Supreme Court, don’t worry, you’re not alone.
The escapes and ultimate death and capture of inmates Richard Matt and David Sweat, respectively, were supposed to have prompted a clean-up in the Clinton Correctional Facility. There were suspensions, leaves, and retirements aplenty as myriad failures in prison protocol were revealed. The FBI also launched an investigation into the facility’s operations over accusations of
A few weeks ago I wrote about the passing of a landmark revision to the United Nations’ “Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners.” In it, I questioned why the United States, a key player in the revision process, had remained so quiet since the announcement, positing that the silence was in large part due
For 55 years, the international community has used the “Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners” as a guideline for structuring their criminal justice and penal systems. The document had never been amended (aside from one additional rule in 1977), let alone revised, until this year. On May 22nd, the United Nations ushered in
A North Carolina prisoner with a history of mental illness who was found dead in a transport van after being transferred to another prison died due to dehydration, according to the North Carolina Medical Examiner’s Office.
However, the state pathologist who conducted the autopsy on Michael Anthony Kerr, 54, said records provided by the Department of Public Safety were so scanty and incomplete that she was unable to determine whether his death was accidental, a suicide or a homicide.
Prison records indicate that Kerr was held in solitary confinement for 35 days prior to his death and had spent the last five days of his life handcuffed and largely unresponsive. Prison officials repeatedly turned off the water to his cell because he had flooded it, and put him on a diet of milk and nutraloaf. The milk was later ordered withheld.
“They treated him like a dog,” said Kerr’s sister, Brenda Liles.
There’s a storm brewing in the prison-industrial complex. It’s been simmering for decades, but a lawsuit was recently launched by inmates and families in Virginia against Global Tel*Link (GTL) sees it set to boil over as inmates and their families have grown tired of paying the price for the wages of a corporate war. The
Excerpt from original article published in The Huffington Post on May 27, 2015. NZ’s Newest Prison Permits Inmates to Use Cell Phones, Computers, and Tablets. In an era where American prison administrators are losing the battle against illicit cell phone usage in our nation’s prisons, and lawmakers are creating draconian criminal statutes to punish offenders, New
We have profiled every prison within the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
Learn about each prison’s location, security level, educational and recreational offerings, and much more.
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