A former Oregon jail guard was sentenced to probation for sexually abusing a female prisoner after pleading guilty to a misdemeanor charge; his defense attorney blamed the incarcerated victim while the prosecutor defended the light sentence. The guard, Eddie James Miller, 60, was later accused of sexually harassing a co-worker. As previously reported in PLN,
On June 6, 2013, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals held that a prisoner was not entitled to credit toward his federal sentence for time already served on state charges. In March 2007, Charles Lee Elwell was arrested in Iowa. A federal indictment was issued against him several days later; Elwell was transferred to federal
By Zeeshan Aleem / Policy.Mic Hardly a day goes by without a member of the media or policy world pronouncing that America’s education system is in dire straits. There are constant laments over how poorly the U.S. fares by international standards, its failure to produce literate students, and its unsightly levels of racial segregation. There’s a massive
By Dianne Frazee-Walker 25-year-old Kyle has lived in Salida, Colorado most of life. He has also been involved with the court system for almost half of his life. His first brush with the law occurred at age 14 for just being a kid. Riding a dirt bike was the gateway to his path of being
By Dianne Frazee-Walker American prisoners and wild mustangs roaming the Arizona desert have a lot in common. The most obvious mutual denominator inmates and these untamed beasts share is there are too many of them. There are about five prison programs in the U.S. that bring prisoners and horses together to tame each other and
By David M. Reutter The Second Circuit Court of Appeals held in September 2013 that the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) does not create a private right of action against state officials in their individual capacities. Anthony Washington, incarcerated at New York’s Woodbourne Correctional Facility, filed suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983
By Gloria Romero and Rishawn Biddle / Sacramento Bee As the nation focuses on the state of the union and how we make ourselves a better nation, one fact is inexplicably never addressed: If we are to get people back to work, we need to have not only jobs available but trained workers available to
By Michael Brodheim In May 2013, a California appeals court invalidated regulations promulgated by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) regarding how the state executes condemned prisoners. The appellate court held that the CDCR had “substantially failed to comply” with the procedural requirements of the state’s administrative rules; the decision prohibits the state
Prisoner Visitation and Support (PVS) is the only nationwide, interfaith visitation program with access to all federal and military prisons and prisoners in the United States. Sponsored by 35 national religious bodies and socially-concerned agencies (consisting of Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, and secular organizations), PVS seeks to meet the needs of prisoners through an alternative
Finding a job and somewhere to live are probably the two most critical factors determining whether a released offender will do well or end up back in prison. In the United States, up to 90% of those who are sent back to prison are unemployed. In the U.K., the one-year recidivism rate for released offenders