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Criminal Justice and Prisons

Stop The Imminent Execution Of Innocent Prisoner Marcellus Williams

September 19, 2024 People's Dispatch. , , , ,
Marcellus Williams, 55 years old, is set to be executed by lethal injection in less than a week for a crime that he did not commit. Activists and supporters are fighting tooth and nail against the Missouri court system to save the life of a man who has been proven innocent by DNA evidence. In January of 2024, prosecuting attorney for St. Louis County Wesley Bell asked to vacate Marcellus Williams’ murder conviction based on “clear and convincing evidence” of Williams’ innocence. But despite this evidence, St. Louis County Judge Bruce Hilton denied Bell’s request to vacate and the state of Missouri is set to move forward with Williams’ execution on September 24.

Activists Call On Biden To End The Federal Death Penalty

August 14, 2024 Victoria Valenzuela, Waging Nonviolence. , , ,
Now that Joe Biden is a lame duck president, activists are holding him accountable to make good on his promise to end the federal death penalty during his remaining six months as president. Biden’s election campaign in 2020 had pledged to end the federal death penalty and incentivize the remaining 27 states that still allow executions to do the same. While he made history as the first president in the United States to openly oppose the death penalty, there has been no movement to actually end federal executions during his nearly four years in office. With six remaining months in office, activists are calling on Biden to close Terre Haute, the federal execution facility in Indiana, and commute the death sentences of the remaining 40 people on the federal death row.

A Judge Ruled A Louisiana Prison’s Health Care System Failed Inmates

July 28, 2024 Richard A. Webster, ProPublica. , , , , ,
Several months ago, in a lawsuit that was in its ninth year, a federal judge blasted the medical care at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. Many inmates hoped it would be a watershed moment. In her opinion, U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick excoriated the state for its “callous and wanton disregard” for the health of those in its custody. “Rather than receiving medical ‘care,’ the inmates are instead subjected to cruel and unusual punishment,” Dick said in her November opinion. The “human cost,” she said, is “unspeakable.” She then ordered the appointment of three independent monitors to devise and implement a plan to reform the system.

California Moves To Ban Forced Prison Labor

July 11, 2024 Giuliana Perrone, Inequality.org. , , , ,
If you’re looking for a rare bit of good news, look no further: California is finally taking steps to abolish slavery from its constitution by banning it in state prisons. On June 27, 2024, the state legislature passed the End Slavery in California Act, teeing up a statewide vote this fall on whether to end forced prison labor in the Golden State. As of now though, California remains among the 16 states that allow the forced servitude of its prisoners. California’s Constitution, like the 13th Amendment, bans involuntary servitude except as punishment for a crime. This new amendment would remove that exception, often dubbed the “slavery loophole.”

Multiple States Are Building New Women’s Prisons; Can They Be Stopped?

July 2, 2024 Sierra Dickey, Scheer Post. , , ,
Tiff Harrington spent 15 years of her life under Department of Corrections (DOC) supervision in Vermont, where she gave birth to two children while incarcerated at Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility—a prison with a particularly bad reputation. In 2019, Vermont DOC came under fire when Seven Days, a local independent newspaper, reported that guards at Chittenden Regional engaged in drug use and sexually abused the incarcerated women they oversaw. Public outcry only grew when an incarcerated woman named Penny Powers filed a whistleblower complaint against former Chittenden Regional “shift supervisor of the year” Daniel Zorzi, alleging he took her and another woman offsite to engage in drug use and sex.

Inmates Challenge Motion To Dismiss In Alabama Forced Labor Federal Lawsuit

June 12, 2024 Alander Rocha, Black Agenda Report. , , , , , ,
Incarcerated individuals in Alabama have filed a 214-page response  opposing a motion to dismiss their lawsuit accusing state prisons of using slave labor. The case involves multiple claims against state officials, private employers and local governments  alleging Alabama’s prison labor program system is a form of modern-day slavery. Each defendant filed motions to dismiss the lawsuit, claiming that counsel for plaintiffs did not state a legal claim in the lawsuit. “Despite Defendants’ strenuous efforts to dispute Plaintiffs’ well-founded allegations—a strategy that cannot justify dismissal of Plaintiffs’ claims at this juncture...

Doctors Demand Biden End Solitary Confinement In Immigration Prisons

June 7, 2024 Mike Ludwig, Truthout. , , , , ,
Hundreds of physicians and other health professionals are demanding the Biden administration end the use of solitary confinement in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) prisons. The letter comes after reports of multiple suicide attempts by immigrants incarcerated at a privately run ICE facility made national headlines. President Joe Biden pledged on the 2020 campaign trail to end solitary confinement in federal prisons “with very limited exceptions,” and time for change could be running out. Reliance on solitary confinement in ICE jails and prisons — the extremely dangerous and potentially deadly practice of isolating people in tiny cells for weeks, months and even years at time — would likely explode in scope if former President Trump wins the November election and attempts to implement an unprecedented crackdown on undocumented families.

Groups Look To Bail Out Mothers, Caregivers In Pretrial Detention

May 12, 2024 Ralph Chapoco, Alabama Reflector. , , , ,
Yolanda Johnson’s nightmare began in the summer of 2021. As she recalls, a former boyfriend pushed her around, hitting an area on her body where there were previous burns. She threw hot water at him and brandished a knife to get him to back away. “He was much bigger than I was, and I was trying to defend myself,” Johnson said in a recent interview. “I wasn’t really trying to stab him, but I poked him enough to back off of me.” No one called the police, and Johnson left. A few days later, she returned. “When I did come back, I guess the neighbor or somebody must have called and said that I was there, and they came and wrote my name, and took me in,” Johnson said.

US Military Contractor Finally Goes On Trial For Abu Ghraib Torture

April 20, 2024 Kevin Gosztola, The Dissenter. , , , , ,
A civil trial against CACI Premier Technology, a United States military contractor that allegedly engaged in torture at Abu Ghraib prison, begins today in Alexandria, Virginia. Nearly 16 years ago, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) filed a lawsuit on behalf of four Iraqi torture survivors. CACI repeatedly sought to derail the case through various legal maneuvers. One Iraqi torture survivor was dismissed from the lawsuit, and CACI International successfully had their company removed as a defendant.

Lawsuit: Alabama Is Denying Prisoners Parole To Lease Their Labor

April 19, 2024 Kim Kelly, In These Times. , , , ,
Working in the freezer at Southeastern Meats, a meatpacking facility based in Birmingham, Ala., ​“was the worst job I’ve ever had in my entire life,” Lakiera Walker tells In These Times. Her 12-hour shifts were spent inside a refrigerated building as cold as 30 or 40 degrees, and she had to beg or borrow warm clothes from her friends and family because the employer didn’t provide any. She couldn’t even take solace in the idea that she was saving up money for her future, because the prison where she spent the rest of her waking hours was taking a 40% cut on top of various fees.

The Slow Death Of A Prison Profiteer

April 12, 2024 Dana Floberg And Morgan Duckett, Scheer Post. , , , ,
Last week, the nation’s largest prison and jail telecom corporation, Securus, effectively defaulted on more than a billion dollars of debt. After decades of preying on incarcerated people and their loved ones with exploitative call rates and other predatory practices that have driven millions of families into debt, Securus is being crushed under the weight of its own. In March, the company’s creditors gave the corporation an eight-month extension to pay up, urging its sale to a new owner to stave off an otherwise imminent bankruptcy.

Genocide Ixil Case

April 9, 2024 NISGUA. , , , , , ,
On April 5th, 2024, the oral and public debate against former military officer: Benedicto Lucas García, accused in the Ixil Genocide case and driven by the Association for Justice and Reconciliation (AJR), was resumed by the High-Risk “A” Court. The Public Ministry stated in its opening arguments that it will prove that during the period from August 16, 1981 to March 23, 1982, Manuel Benedicto Lucas García is responsible for genocide, crimes against humanity, forced disappearances, and massacres against at least 844 identified victims for this case, which will be proven through witnesses and experts’ testimonies. It also emphasized that behind these 844 names are entire families who were massacred.

Ola Bini Sentenced To A Year In Prison; Ecuadorian Court Overturns Acquittal

April 9, 2024 Tanupriya Singh, People's Dispatch. , , , ,
A court in Ecuador has sentenced Swedish software developer and digital rights activist, Ola Bini, to one year in prison for “Attempted Non-Consensual Access to a Computer System”. The ruling by two out of three judges of the Provincial Court of Pichincha overturned the unanimous verdict issued by the Court of First Instance (trial court) in Quito in January 2023, which had declared Bini innocent. The acquittal had come nearly four years after Bini was arrested in April 2019, the same day as his friend, WikiLeaks founder and journalist Julian Assange was seized from the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

Incarcerated Organizers Complete Eight Weeks Of Prison Shutdown

April 3, 2024 Natalia Marques, People's Dispatch. , , ,
On March 30, for the eighth week in a row, a group of activists gathered outside of St. Clair Correctional Facility, near Birmingham, Alabama, to show solidarity with incarcerated organizers, who have been refusing to engage in prison labor since February 6. Organizers want to sustain the shutdown, which entails a full stoppage of all labor inside the prisons that prisoners are forced to do, for at least 90 days. The organizers, led by the Free Alabama Movement, are living under the boot of the most violent state prison system in the United States—a nation know for having the largest prison population in the world and regularly employing torture and archaic methods of execution against its prisoners.

Survivors Of Sexual Assault In Juvenile Detention Are Speaking Out

March 27, 2024 Mansa Musa, The Real News Network. , , ,
The prevalence of sexual violence in the US prison system is so widespread and accepted that it’s often made the butt of jokes in popular culture. Yet the reality is that countless survivors of the prison system carry the scars and traumas of sexual abuse—and for many, the perpetrators of these crimes were the very prison staff charged with their protection. Juvenile victims of the prison system are no exception. In Maryland, several adult survivors of sexual abuse as juveniles in state custody have filed a class action lawsuit demanding justice.
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