Their baaack! And this time with both barrels. Ida (now Republican state representative from Mercer Island) Ballasiotes and her fellow victims' rights cronies have reintroduced the so-called "three strikes and you're out" initiative. In addition to Citizens' Initiative 593, this group and a bunch of reactionary legislators have introduced House ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 2
Samuel Brown is a New York state prisoner. Brown was convicted of three counts of felony murder arising from an armored car robbery in upstate New York by the Revolutionary Armed Task Force. Brown became an FBI informant and was later tried and convicted.
This case is Brown's federal habeas ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 2
Incarceration rates in the United States and Canada are on the rise. Overcrowded conditions are being felt by more and more prisons. Despite all this, the number of prison escapes and homicides has decreased. Fifty state systems, the District of Columbia, and the federal Bureau of Prisons responded to a ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 2
FBI Director William S. Sessions announced that 24 law enforcement officer were killed feloniously in the line of duty during the first six months of 1992, a sharp reduction from the 44 officer slain during the first half of 1991. Another 29 officers were killed by accidents that occurred during ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 3
Authorities in Georgia said they have intensified an investigation into alleged sexual abuse at a Georgia women's prison after 14 current and former state corrections employees were indicted on rape and sexual assault charges.
A grand jury returned the indictments after prosecutors laid out the accusations in graphic detail. The ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 3
A projected 38 percent increase in the states prison population within the next five years has prompted Governor Douglas Wilder to propose a $111.7 million prison construction project. The proposal includes construction of a 1,046 bed women's prison, a 697 bed men's prison, a 100 bed maximum security juvenile facility, ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 3
William Jenkins, a former assistant corrections commissioner pleaded guilty in January to charges that he extorted money from a janitorial supplies company which served the city's jails. Jenkins, who was responsible for the Corrections Department's assets management, is scheduled to be sentenced March 19, 1993. Prosecutors said Jenkins received $24,000 ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 3
New York City commissioners claim that for the last several years prisoners have paid jail guards to smuggle guns in to them, whereupon they shoot themselves and then sue the city for failing to protect them. A city official claims "There are at least five lawsuits presently pending against the ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 3
Roger Buehl is a Pennsylvania state prisoner on death row. In 1990 Buehl requested permission for a special one time visit in order to marry his girlfriend, Deborah Ayres. Prison officials denied the request citing a 1985 incident where Ayres had been caught smuggling three balloons of marijuana to another ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 4
In February, 1990, several Iowa prisoners were placed outdoors without hats or gloves for an hour while guards searched their living unit. The temperature was about 30 degrees F. The prisoners did not suffer any long term injury from the experience. The prisoners filed suit and the district court ruled ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 4
Spencer Parker is a pretrial detainee in Texas. While awaiting trial in the jail's minimum security section he was moved to the violent offenders section in retaliation for arguing with a guard. As a result of the transfer he was assaulted and lost his right eye and was denied proper ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 4
Michael Murphy is a Missouri state prisoner who filed suit claiming his religious rights had been infringed by prison officials. At the time he filed suit he earned $30 a month at his prison job and had $53 in his prison account. To file his suit he sought, and was ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 4
Warren Bass is a Jewish New York state prisoner. Despite the recommendation of the prison rabbi that Bass was sincere in his religious beliefs and should receive a kosher diet, prison officials refused to provide Bass with a kosher diet. Bass filed suit under § 1983 claiming the denial of ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 5
Tyrone Chavers is a Wisconsin state prisoner. He filed suit under § 1983 after prison officials confiscated his lawbooks. This case is the district court's ruling on Chavers' In Forma Pauperis (IFP) request. The defendants had not yet been served in the case.
The court held that Chavers had adequately ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 5
L. Markham is an Indiana state prisoner. He lost 243 days of earned good time in a series of disciplinary proceedings. Under Indiana DOC regulations prisoners can appeal the loss of good time credits to prison officials within 10 days of the hearing, which Markham did not do. Indiana state ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 5
Varees Smith is a Wisconsin state prisoner. He was infracted for allegedly charging another prisoner to do legal work. He filed suit under § 1983 claiming his due process rights were violated when a disciplinary hearing was held without notice and he was not allowed to present witnesses or evidence ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 5
Four Missouri state prisoners were repeatedly raped by other prisoners. Before and after the rapes they were unable to check into Protective Custody (PC). They filed suit against prison officials claiming the rapes violated their eighth amendment rights. After a trial, the jury awarded the plaintiff's nominal damages of $1. ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 6
Jail prisoners in the Harris County Jail, Texas, filed suit against county and state officials claiming that overcrowding at the jail violated the eighth amendment. The district court found that it did and that both state and county officials had acted with deliberate indifference towards jail prisoners.
The defendants appealed ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 6
Louise Nolley is an HIV+ prisoner held in the Erie County Jail in New York. She filed suit under § 1983 contending that various jail practices violated her rights. The objectionable practices included: automatically segregating HIV+ prisoners; denying HIV+ prisoners law library and religious service access; and placing red stickers ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 6
Anthony Harris was a pretrial detainee in the Cook county jail (Chicago). He is legally blind. While at the jail he repeatedly requested medical treatment for his blindness and frequent eye infections. He also requested special handicapped housing to prevent dangerous situations. Jail officials ignored his requests. As a result ...
On March 16, 1992, the Washington DOC signed a contract with AT&T (American Telephone and Telegraph) for the latter to provide telephone services to all the prisons in the Washington prison system. AT&T in turn has subcontracted with three Local Exchange Companies (LEC's) to provide local telephone service.
The contract ...
From the Editor
Welcome to another issue of PLN. We are still working on our 1994 prison calendar and we still need graphics and drawings. Any prison artists interested in participating should send us a copy of their work for us to check out, if we want to use it ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 8
The phone company has found a way to dump union workers, save big money and exploit the labor of prisoners, all at once. According to reports from the Communications Workers, AT&T is contracting out telemarketing jobs to firms that provide labor practically free through the prison system. The company is ...
In past issues of PLN we have reported on events in Peru affecting the political prisoners of the Communist Party of Peru (PCP). In May of 1992 the Peruvian government stormed the Canto Grande maximum security prison killing and wounding dozens of PCP prisoners; many were killed after surrendering to ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 9
On January 12, 1993, Venezuelan police used tear gas to quell a riot in Fort Tiuna of about a hundred soldiers and civilians, who were tried for rebellion for their participation in a November 27, 1992, coup attempt. The riot was crushed with tear gas by police and Virginia Contreras, ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 10
Last October over a thousand people attended the International Tribunal of Indigenous Peoples and Oppressed Nations in the USA. The event, sponsored and organized by a coalition of 30 organizations, was part of the counter-Columbus quincentennial activities throughout the country. The Tribunal put the U.S. Government on trial for internationally ...
Loaded on
April 15, 1993
by RK
published in Prison Legal News
April, 1993, page 10
by R.K., McNeil Island, WA
In response to J.D., Lompoc CA, "Article Clarification" Vol. 3 #12, December 1992:
I understand J.D. being pissed off about 80% of the population not taking part in the strike. But when I think back to all the strikes I took part in since the ...
