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Criminal Justice and Prisons

Baltimore’s New $1 Billion Jail Will Be Most Expensive State-Funded Project

March 27, 2024 Ben Conarck and Pamela Wood, Black Agenda Report. , , , ,
Nearly nine years after former Gov. Larry Hogan shuttered the old Baltimore City Detention Center, a new centerpiece facility for the city’s pretrial jail population is poised to rise from its ashes. But it’s going to cost you. The Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services, which has run the city’s jail system for decades, is pushing ahead with ambitious plans for the Baltimore Therapeutic Treatment Center — a sort of hybrid jail, hospital and mental health and substance use treatment facility for people facing criminal charges.

Last Days Of Julian Assange In The United States

March 16, 2024 Matt Kennard, Consortium News. , , ,
Babar Ahmad was extradited from Britain to the United States in 2012 on charges of providing material support to terrorism because of two articles published on his website backing the Taliban government in Afghanistan. He spent eight years fighting the extradition, but when it eventually happened he flew across the Atlantic on an executive jet from RAF Mildenhall in Suffolk. He had no idea what was coming next. “I think it was, like, a 12-seater plane,” Ahmad tells me. “Three sections of four seats. So there’s two big seats facing each other. Big, square, comfortable leather seats.” Outside it was pitch black.

Assange And The Sickness Of US Prisons

March 14, 2024 John Kiriakou, Consortium News. , , , ,
Many of us nervously await news from the High Court of England and Wales on the fate of Julian Assange, hoping against hope that he won’t be extradited to the United States.  At the same time, we’re preparing for the worst. Julian has well-documented medical problems, including a small stroke while incarcerated two years ago.  He has consistently received subpar medical care at Belmarsh Prison in the U.K.  If anything, that will worsen once he arrives in the United States. I’ve written recently and extensively about prison medical care in the U.S.  It’s terrible.

Unequal Before The Law

March 12, 2024 Stephanie Woodard, In These Times. , , , ,
Federal charges ordinarily cover matters of national reach: immigration, voting rights, racketeering. Not in Indian Country. Tribal members frequently find themselves in federal court for all sorts of allegations— not just serious crimes, such as murder, but lesser offenses, like burglary. Once in federal court, they face sentencing guidelines that are stiffer than if they were tried in state court, where non-Native cases are generally heard. Diversion, probation and other mitigation actions, typical of state courts, are also less common, as is a jury that includes their peers, which is to say, other Natives.

US Activist Gets Prison Term In German Campaign To Oust US Nuclear Bombs

March 11, 2024 David Swanson, World Beyond War. , , , ,
Susan Crane, of the Redwood City, California Catholic Worker, has been sentenced to 229 days in prison in Germany for daring to interfere with the U.S. nuclear weapons stationed at Germany’s Büchel Air Force base, southeast of Cologne. Crane participated in six nonviolent go-in actions, confronting the air force system on base which routinely trains to drop the U.S. H-bombs on targets in Russia,[1] most provocatively this winter in operation “Steadfast Defender 24” — which was launched in the midst of NATO’s war in Ukraine.

Assange’s Draconian Prosecution

March 5, 2024 Mary Kostakidis, Consortium News. , , , , ,
In the final moments of the hearing on Feb. 21, Ben Watson KC representing the U.K. home secretary, admitted additional charges could be laid against Julian Assange in the U.S. that carry the death penalty, such as aiding and abetting treason. Asked by the judge whether there is anything that can be done to prevent a death penalty being imposed, he replied: “It would be very difficult to offer assurances to prevent the death penalty from being imposed.” (Since Assange is charged with a federal and not a state crime he could get a death sentence no matter if the state he is tried in, in this case Virginia, has a death penalty or not.)

How To Resist The Deliberate Medical Neglect Of Our Political Prisoners

February 29, 2024 Julia Wright, Black Agenda Report. , , , ,
Dr Joy James asked a crucial question on a Guerilla University podcast which she co-hosted with Kalonji Changa on February 13th, 2024: " How does one organize a resistance against the medical assassination of our elders behind bars?" As abolitionists, we believe that there is no resistance without testimony and in this case without first person singular testimony about the reality of the hidden and daily torture of death by incarceration that Mumia Abu-Jamal calls slow death row. The common denominator that links all our political prisoners is slow death row.

Prisoners, Unions Sue Alabama, Alleging ‘Modern-Day Slavery’

February 27, 2024 Mansa Musa, The Real News Network. , , , , , ,
A group of current and former prisoners have sued the state of Alabama with the support of two unions who have signed on as co-plaintiffs, the Union of Southern Service Workers, and the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union. The lawsuit claims that Alabama’s system of prison labor amounts to a “modern-day form of slavery” that generates massive profits for private businesses and revenues for the state by forcing incarcerated people to work for little or no pay. Jacob Morrison and Adam Keller join Rattling the Bars to discuss the lawsuit and the importance of the fight for prisoners’ rights to the overall labor movement.

The Show Trial Against Julian Assange

February 25, 2024 Fabian Scheidler, Scheer Post. , , , , , ,
“Those who tell the truth need a fast horse,” says an Armenian proverb. Or they need a society that protects the truth and its messengers. But this protection, which our democracies claim to offer, is in danger. As a journalist, Julian Assange has published hundreds of thousands of files documenting war crimes committed by the USA and its allies in Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo and elsewhere. The authenticity of the documents is beyond question. However, none of the perpetrators have been brought to justice or convicted.

This Is Why Coming Home From Prison Is So Difficult For So Many

February 20, 2024 Mansa Musa, The Real News Network. , , ,
The US has one of the highest prisoner recidivism rates in the world: over 70% of incarcerated people who are released from prison in the US will be rearrested within five years of their release date. That is not an accident. Our system of mass incarceration sets people up to fail as they leave the prison system and try to reintegrate into society. That is why organizations like Hope for Prisoners in Nevada are working to provide returning citizens with the resources and support they need to rebuild their lives and maintain their freedom. In this episode of Rattling the Bars, Mansa Musa speaks with Jon Ponder, founder and CEO of Hope for Prisoners.

How Target Funded A ‘Tough On Crime’ Prosecutor’s Office

February 14, 2024 Marjaan Sirdar, Unicorn Riot. , , , , , , ,
Target Corp. pioneered the Community Prosecution Program in the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office (HCAO) more than two decades ago during the era of mass incarceration. As part of a broad anti-crime campaign that employed new advanced technology and reshaped the criminal justice system in Minneapolis, the program had particularly devastating effects on Black residents. In 2004, a public-private partnership consisting of Target, the Downtown Council, Hennepin County, and the City of Minneapolis launched a sweeping surveillance collaborative in downtown Minneapolis called the SafeZone, as illustrated throughout Unicorn Riot’s years-long investigative series.

Solidarity With Mass Prison Strike In Alabama

February 12, 2024 Center for Constitutional Rights. , , , ,
The Center for Constitutional Rights stands in solidarity with the Free Alabama Movement (FAM) and incarcerated people in Alabama who announced a mass prison strike today. We unequivocally support the organizers’ demands for legislative reforms—including repealing the Habitual Felony Offender Act, abolishing death by incarceration (also known as life without parole), and reversing the near complete abandonment of parole—and their call for an end to the torture and dehumanizing treatment exacted on incarcerated people by the State of Alabama. Our solidarity with Alabama prison organizers dates back to the 1970s with our support for the Atmore-Holman Brothers’ Defense Committee.

It’s Known As ‘Death By Incarceration’; People Want To End It

February 12, 2024 Victoria Law, Portside. , , , ,
“My life is either going to be a testimony or a warning,” said Derek Lee. Lee was speaking on a video chat from behind the walls of SCI Smithfield in central Pennsylvania. Now 35 years old, Lee has been imprisoned since he was 29. If nothing changes, he will grow old and die in prison. In 2016, a Pennsylvania court sentenced Lee to life without parole for a burglary two years earlier that ended with his accomplice fatally shooting the homeowner. Lee was not involved in the killing, but he was convicted of second-degree or felony murder—an unintentional death that happens when the defendant is committing a felony. In Pennsylvania, that means an automatic sentence of life without parole (LWOP).

Like Prison Visiting Rules, Use Of The Espionage Act Is Arbitrary, Punitive

February 11, 2024 Jeffrey Sterling, Scheer Post. , , ,
In Mid-December 2023, Charles Glass, the esteemed writer, journalist, broadcaster, and publisher visited with Julian Assange, an inmate at Belmarsh Prison in the U.K. Assange has been confined there since April, 2019. He is awaiting his final appeal to quash U.S. efforts to extradite him to face some of the same Espionage Act charges I was confronted with. Glass chronicles the visit in a recent piece in The Nation. His account took me right back to prison. Glass’s visit with Assange could have been a visit with me. I fondly remember Charles Glass. He wrote to me while I was in FCI Englewood, the prison I was bound in after being convicted of violating the Espionage Act in 2015.

Held For 1,000 Days Since Approval For Release From Guantánamo Prison

February 10, 2024 Andy Worthington. , , ,
In the first of a new series of profiles of men held at Guantánamo — specifically, the 16 men (out of the 30 still held) who have long been approved for release by high-level US government review processes — I’m focusing on Uthman Abd Al-Rahim Muhammad Uthman, a 43-year old Yemeni citizen, who, today, has been held for 1,000 days since the US authorities first decided that they no longer wanted to hold him. Uthman arrived at Guantánamo on January 16, 2002, five days after the prison opened, when he was just 21 years old, and, as a result, he has been held for over half his life at Guantánamo. The photo is from his classified military file, released by WikiLeaks in April 2011, and dating from April 2008, meaning that he would have been 27 years old, or younger, when it was taken.
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