Guards Kill Inmate By Scalding Him In Shower

Prison Guards Who Scalded Inmate to Death Avoid Punishment  breakingbrown.com
 Kulture Kritic says:
 May 24, 2014 at 10:57 am
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Brutality: Officers Avoid Charges After Scalding Mentally Ill Black Inmate To Death With Hot Water Until His Skin Peeled | Prestige Cable News says:
 May 28, 2014 at 8:33 am
   “I can’t take it no more, I’m sorry. I won’t do it again,’’ Rainey shouted, the inmate said.
 Saddest of all, Rainey was only a month away from the end of his sentence when guards turned the hot water to the highest setting and boiled him to death in the shower.
Rainey’s autopsy, causing investigators to call off the inquiry.
 “Two years is a very long time to wait to find out why your brother was found dead in a shower,” Rainey’s brother, Andre Chapman, told the Herald.
 Psychiatrist George Mallinckrodt has worked for Dade prison’s ward for the mentally ill and filed a complaint with the Department of Justice accusing correction officials of abusing mentally ill inmates.
 Investigators have decided that there is not enough evidence to reach any determination as to the cause of Rainey’s death. The inmate who heard Rainey screaming was never interviewed by state investigators.
http://breakingbrown.com/2014/05/prison-guards-who-scalded-inmate-to-death-avoid-punishment/

Sheriffs @ Wesy Valley Abusing Inmates

Document: More San Bernardino County jail deputies under investigation for alleged inmate abuse
West Valley Detention Center in Rancho Cucamona.
By Doug Saunders, The Sun and Joe Nelson, The Sun
Posted: 04/12/14, 5:50 PM PDT | Updated: 3 weeks, 4 days ago
SAN BERNARDINO >> In addition to four sheriff’s deputies who already have lost their jobs at the West Valley Detention Center in Rancho Cucamonga, the FBI and sheriff officials are investigating several other deputies in the San Bernardino County jail system for alleged inmate abuse, according to a document obtained Saturday by this newspaper.
The document, consisting of minutes from an internal Sheriff’s Department staff meeting distributed Wednesday, revealed that one employee had resigned, two or three were going to be terminated as a result of an FBI investigation, and several other deputies were still under investigation.
The FBI is investigating possible civil-rights violations of inmates at the center in March, FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller said Friday.
She said the case will ultimately be submitted to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles for consideration of criminal charges.
As of Thursday, four deputies assigned to West Valley Detention Center were no longer employed by the department, but according to the document, several more employees also may be terminated, pending the outcome of the investigation by the FBI and Sheriff’s Department.
Sheriff’s spokesman Randy Naquin said Saturday he couldn’t comment due to the nature of the investigation.
On Saturday, sheriff’s officials declined to comment on allegations of misconduct at the other county jails.
Sheriff John McMahon ordered an administrative investigation after allegations surfaced March 5 about the possible abuse of inmates at the Rancho Cucamonga jail, according to a sheriff’s news release on Friday.
“I will not tolerate any misconduct by department personnel,” McMahon said in a statement. “These allegations are being taken very seriously and this department is determined to get answers.”
The news comes in the wake of a jail abuse scandal in Los Angeles County in which 18 current or former sheriff’s deputies have been accused of abusing inmates at the Men’s Central Jail.
U.S. Attorney Andre Birotte Jr. said the alleged incidents did “not occur in a vacuum” and that the pattern of behavior of which the defendants are accused had become “institutionalized.”

http://www.sbsun.com/general-news/20140412/document-more-san-bernardino-county-jail-deputies-under-investigation-for-alleged-inmate-abuse
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May 9th
http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Federal-Lawsuit-West-Valley-Detention-Center-Deputies-Tortured-Inmates-258529231.html

Federal Lawsuit: San Bernardino County Deputies "Tortured" Inmates
Six inmates who served time in a Southern California jail are seeking $150 million each in a lawsuit, alleging deputies beat and tortured them in a lockup last year, according to a federal lawsuit filed this week.
The plaintiffs allege they were subjected to electric shocks to their genitalia, were deprived of sleep, had shotguns placed to their heads and were sodomized.
The inmates said in court documents that they were handcuffed with their arms behind their backs, causing extraordinary pain
while they were jailed at the West Valley Detention Center in Rancho Cucamonga between Jan. 1, 2013, and March of this year, the lawsuit said.
"The conduct of the defendants was willful, malicious, sadistic and designed to inflict pain and suffering upon the plaintiffs," court documents said.
Lawyer Jim Terrell described what allegedly happened to one inmate because he had metal plates in his hips.
"They actually stood on both sides of (my client) at the same time and shot into his steel hips with stun guns, and the ultimate goal
was to try to get to seven seconds," Terrell said.
They are seeking millions of dollars. Named in the lawsuit are San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon, Jeff Rose,
the commander of the West Valley Detention Center, and Deputy B. Teychea.
In April, the FBI launched its own investigation into alleged civil rights abuses at the jail, officials said.
"The agents most likely are going to trump what the deputies have been getting away with in this county for a long, long time," Terrell said.
McMahon said in a statement at the time that members of the Sheriff’s Department command staff received information about possible misconduct by
department personnel at the West Valley Detention Center and launched an investigation.

Ex-prison guard pleads guilty to sex charges

Ex-prison guard pleads guilty to sex charges
 James Fisher, The News Journal12 a.m. EDT May 1, 2014
 (Photo: Submitted)
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 A former guard at Sussex Correctional Institution, Christopher S. Peck, pleaded guilty Wednesday to six counts of having sex inside the prison.
 A Superior Court judge set Peck's sentencing for the crimes for June 6. In November, Peck, a guard at the former SCI Boot Camp, was charged with multiple counts of having sex with different female inmates.
 Story: Sussex Boot Camp permanently discontinued
 In the wake of the arrest, corrections officials ordered a review of the boot camp's effectiveness and then ended the program earlier this year. The program had been meant to give first-time drug offenders a way to end of their sentences early by submitting to rigorous military-style discipline, but Department of Corrections officials said they concluded the program wasn't scaring enough participants away from re-offending.
 Peck's attorney, Michael Andrew, said his client would not comment about the case or the boot camp before sentencing.
 "I believe this is the right thing to do," Peck told Judge T. Henley Graves in his plea hearing. In addition to the six counts of sex in a detention facility, pack pleaded guilty to one count of official misconduct. Prosecutors dropped 12 other counts of having sex in the prison under the plea agreement.
 Peck faces a maximum sentence of 13 years behind bars.
 Contact James Fisher at (302) 983-6772, jfisher@delawareonline.com. On Twitter@JamesFisherTNJ

More Gruesome Details On Execution Turned Torture

Drugs in botched Oklahoma execution leaked from IV
May 2nd 2014 12:00PM
By SEAN MURPHY
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- Some of the three drugs used in a botched Oklahoma execution this week didn't enter the inmate's system because the vein they were injected into collapsed, and that failure wasn't noticed for 21 minutes, the state's prison chief said, urging changes to the state's execution procedure.
Medical officials tried for nearly an hour to find a vein in Clayton Lockett's arms, legs and neck before finally inserting an IV into his groin, prisons director Robert Patton wrote in a letter to the governor Thursday detailing Lockett's last day.
By the time a doctor lifted a sheet covering the inmate and noticed the line had become dislodged from the vein, all of the execution drugs had already been administered and there wasn't another suitable vein, the report noted.
"The drugs had either absorbed into tissue, leaked out or both," Patton wrote. "The director asked the following question: `Have enough drugs been administered to cause death?' The doctor responded, `No.'"
At that time, Patton halted the Tuesday night execution, but Lockett was pronounced dead of a heart attack 10 minutes later.
Oklahoma's execution rules call for medical personnel to immediately give emergency aid if a stay is granted while the lethal drugs are being administered, but it's not clear if that happened. The report does not say what occurred from when Patton called off the execution at 6:56 p.m. to Lockett being pronounced dead at 7:06 p.m.
The report also indicated that on his last morning, Lockett fought with guards who attempted to remove him from his cell and that they shocked him with a stun gun. After he was taken to a prison infirmary, a self-inflicted cut was found on Lockett's arm that was determined not to require stitches. The report also notes that Lockett refused food at breakfast and lunch.
Madeline Cohen, an attorney for inmate Charles Warner, who had been scheduled to be executed two hours after Lockett, said Oklahoma was revealing information about the events "in a chaotic manner."
"As the Oklahoma Department of Corrections dribbles out piecemeal information about Clayton Lockett's botched execution, they have revealed that Mr. Lockett was killed using an invasive and painful method - an IV line in his groin," Cohen said in a statement. "Placing such a femoral IV line requires highly specialized medical training and expertise."
Inserting IVs into the groin area - the upper thigh or pelvic region - is often done for trauma patients and in experienced hands can be straightforward, but injecting in the femoral vein can be tricky because it's not as visible as arm veins and lies next to the femoral artery, said Dr. Jonathan Weisbuch, a physician in Phoenix.
Warner's execution was initially rescheduled for May 13. Patton called Thursday for an indefinite stay, something Cohen said she agreed was necessary.
Gov. Mary Fallin, who has ordered one of her Cabinet members to investigate the botched execution, said Thursday she was willing to issue a 60-day stay for Warner, the longest allowed under state law, if needed to complete the inquiry.
"If it does require more time, then yes, I think they should take more time," Fallin said Thursday. "We need to get it right."
If 60 days isn't adequate, Oklahoma's attorney general said he would request an additional stay from the courts to ensure no executions are carried out until the review is complete.
In his recommendations to the governor, Patton said the state should:Place more decision-making power with the director instead of the prison warden.
Conduct a full review of execution procedures, and ensure Oklahoma "adopts proven standards."
Give staff the "extensive training" required once new protocols are written.
-Allow an external review of what went wrong.
Lockett's execution was to have started at 6 p.m., but according to a timeline with Patton's letter a medical technician working from 5:27 p.m. to 6:18 p.m. couldn't find a suitable place for an intravenous line on Lockett's arms, legs, feet and neck.
The execution started at 6:23 p.m. Typically inmates die in about 10 minutes. Patton stopped the execution at 6:56 p.m., but 10 minutes later Lockett apparently suffered a heart attack. Autopsy results are pending.A spokesman for the United Nations human rights office in Geneva said Lockett's prolonged execution could amount to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment under international human rights law. Rupert Colville said Lockett's was the second problematic execution in the U.S. this year after Dennis McGuire's death in Ohio on Jan. 16 with an allegedly untested combination of drugs.
http://www.aol.com/article/2014/05/02/drugs-in-botched-oklahoma-execution-leaked-from-iv/20879429/?icid=maing-grid10%7Chtmlws-main-nb%7Cdl21%7Csec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D471765

Women In California Asking For Help

The inmate's name has been omitted for her safety* I will just call her M.
M's Letter In Part*
  She Wrote To Me Begging To Get Them Help. M is being housed at CIW in Corona Ca.
Her Letter Reads>
"The staff here seems to warrant violence~There were a few girls fighting , it was   really bad they even cut one inmate. Instead of moving one or more of them. They are keeping them in the same unit.
The one that cut the other did not even go to Ad-Seg. Some of them have black eyes from being beat up all the time. Yet the staff is not moving them to safety, nor taking the abusers out.
It is very violent here at night, you can hear the fighting, screaming & later crying & staff does not
stop it, they do not intervene at all.  Staff hangs out right out side our windows & never come to see if anyone is hurt. There are 7 women with their faces all beat. Cuts & bruses, black eyes.One was beat so severly eyeis swollen shut.
My mind is on the brink of a break down.  I can not take this for much longer.
Please call up here or ask someone to please come help us.
 I was returning to my cell  when a staff member appeared out of no where, she grabbed my wrist and started dragging me behind her down the hall , she was yelling "you do not belong out here".
"It was not necessary to use force on me I would of went to her or stopped walking had she asked me to.
I have put in a complaint but I fear now they will start messing with me or allow another inmate to beat me.
This is a small setting & all the shady, violent stuff should not be going on like this.
Girls are written up all the time no matter how hard to keep good time.
Right after going to the bathroom they came in & demanded a urine sample,
the woman said she couldn't pee but would try. The sample was to small~she was written up.
Everyone is locked down every day for 22 hours a day. We have no visitation or  time  out side, just another way to  of us in lock down 23 hours a day,. I am becoming so depressed, I just don't know how much more I can stand.
We have No Voice, There Is No One To Help Us. PLEASE HELP!
 M. From C.I.W.
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This is one of the two letters that were written from Central California's prisons.
The other inmate: Just writes the CO beat me up pretty badly while I was in the SHU at CIW. They ten transferred me to CCWF for my safety
Please try to reach my folks for me, I am not allowed phone calls because they have placed me in Isolation here also.  Please, I need  them to know I have been moved again & what has happened to me.
 Signed E.G   at CCWF In Chowchilla Ca.  

FBI probes alleged abuse of inmates by deputies at West Valley Detention Center

FBI probes alleged abuse of inmates by deputies at West Valley Detention Center
By Doug Saunders, The Sun
and Joe Nelson, The Sun
Posted: 04/11/14, 7:18 PM PDT|
RANCHO CUCAMONGA >> The FBI is investigating the alleged abuse of inmates at the West Valley Detention Center involving at least three San Bernardino County deputies no longer working for the Sheriff’s Department, officials said Friday.
Sheriff John McMahon ordered an administrative investigation after allegations surfaced March 5 by his ranking commanders about the possible abuse of inmates at the jail, according to a sheriff’s news release.
“I will not tolerate any misconduct by department personnel,” McMahon said in a statement. “These allegations are being taken very seriously and this department is determined to get answers.”
 During its internal investigation, the Sheriff’s Department learned the FBI had received a similar tip about the alleged abuse.
Both agencies are cooperating with each other to ensure a comprehensive investigation, according to a sheriff’s news release.
As of Thursday, the three deputies assigned to the jail were no longer employed by the department. No other information was disclosed about them.Sheriff’s Cpl. Randy Naquin said the FBI is conducting the criminal investigation.
The FBI is investigating possible civil rights violations of inmates at the jail in March, FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller said.
She said the case will ultimately be submitted to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles for consideration of criminal charges.
Naquin could not say how extensive the investigation will be or if any other deputies or jail staff had been accused of similar conduct.
“We want to make sure the integrity of the investigation is intact,” Naquin said.
The news comes in the wake of a jail abuse scandal in Los Angeles County in which 18 current or former sheriff’s deputies have been accused of abusing inmates at the Men’s Central Jail. U.S. Attorney Andre Birotte Jr. said the alleged incidents did “not occur in a vacuum” and that the pattern of behavior of which the defendants are accused had become “institutionalized.”
 In 2008, a grand jury investigation revealed dysfunction and disarray at Orange County’s Theo Lacy Jail, where a deputy exchanged text messages and watched the television show “Cops” as a 41-year-old inmate was beaten to death by other inmates over a 50-minute period, according to published reports.
http://www.sbsun.com/social-affairs/20140411/fbi-probes-alleged-abuse-of-inmates-by-deputies-at-west-valley-detention-center

Judge: California Mistreating Mentally Ill Inmates

Judge: California Mistreating Mentally Ill Inmates
SACRAMENTO, Calif. April 11, 2014 (AP)
 By DON THOMPSON Associated Press
A federal judge ruled Thursday that California's treatment of mentally ill inmates violates constitutional safeguards against cruel and unusual punishment through excessive use of pepper spray and isolation.
 U.S. District Court Judge Lawrence Karlton in Sacramento gave the corrections department time to issue updated policies on the use of both methods but did not ban them.
 He offered a range of options on how officials could limit the use of pepper spray and isolation units when dealing with more than 33,000 mentally ill inmates, who account for 28 percent of the 120,000 inmates in California's major prisons.
 The ruling came after the public release of videotapes made by prison guards showing them throwing chemical grenades and pumping large amounts of pepper spray into the cells of mentally ill inmates, some of whom are heard screaming."Most of the videos were horrific," Karlton wrote in his 74-page order.Corrections department spokeswoman Deborah Hoffman said prison officials are reviewing the order.Prison officials had already promised to make some changes in how much pepper spray they use and how long mentally ill inmates can be kept in isolation, but attorneys representing inmates said those changes did not go far enough.
 Karlton gave the state 60 days to work with his court-appointed special master to further revise its policy for using force against mentally ill inmates.
 The inmates' attorneys and witnesses also told Karlton during recent hearings that the prolonged solitary confinement of mentally ill inmates frequently aggravates their condition, leading to a downward spiral.Karlton agreed, ruling that placement of seriously mentally ill inmates in segregated housing causes serious psychological harm, including exacerbation of mental illness, inducement of psychosis, and increased risk of suicide.
 "He made findings in every area of ongoing constitutional violations," said Michael Bien, an attorney who represents mentally ill inmates in the long-running class-action lawsuit. "Despite all these years of legal efforts, he found that there needs to be more done."
 Karlton ordered the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to develop a plan to keep mentally ill inmates out of segregation units when there is a substantial risk that it will worsen their illness or prompt suicide attempts.He found that keeping mentally ill inmates in isolation when they have not done anything wrong violates their rights against cruel and unusual punishment. He gave the state 60 days to stop the practice of holding mentally ill inmates in the segregation units simply because there is no room for them in more appropriate housing.Even before the latest rulings, the hearings before Karlton spurred the department to limit the time that mentally ill inmates spend in isolation units if they have not broken prison rules.
 Karlton also ruled that mentally ill inmates cannot be placed in special security housing units unless corrections officials can demonstrate that the isolation will not further harm their mental state.
 The state's practice of housing inmates in the units for years, even decades, prompted a series of widespread inmate hunger strikes and led to two bills being considered in the Legislature this year that would restrict their use.Finally, Karlton ordered the state to revise its policy for strip-searching mentally ill inmates as they enter and leave housing units.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/judge-california-mistreating-mentally-ill-inmates-23283553?page=2

Medical Neglect of Women in US Prisons

The Issue: Medical Neglect of Women in US Prisons Women are often denied essential medical resources and treatments, especially during times of pregnancy and/or chronic and degenerative diseases. • Failure to refer seriously ill inmates for treatment and delays in treatment Women inmates suffering from treatable diseases such as asthma, diabetes, sickle cell anemia, cancer, late-term miscarriages, and seizures have little or no access to medical attention, sometimes resulting in death or permanent injury. Instances of failure to deliver life-saving drugs for inmates with HIV/AIDS has also been noted. • Lack of qualified personnel and resources and use of non-medical staff There is too few staff to meet physical and mental health needs. This often results in long delays in obtaining medical attention; disrupted and poor quality treatment causing physical deterioration of prisoners with chronic and degenerative diseases, like cancer; overmedication of prisoners with psychotropic drugs; and lack of mental health treatment. The use of non-medical staff to screen requests for treatment is also common. • Charges for medical attention In violation of international standards, many prisons/jails charge inmates for medical attention, on the grounds that charging for health care services deters prisoners from seeking medical attention for minor matters or because they want to avoid work. In some supermaximum prisons, where prisoners cannot work at all, the US Justice Department has expressed concern that charging prisoners impedes their access to health care. • Inadequate Reproductive Health Care In 1994, the National Institute of Corrections stated that provision of gynecological services for women in prison is inadequate. Only half of the state prison systems surveyed offer female-specific services such as mammograms and Pap smears, and often entail a long wait to be seen. • Shackling During Pregnancy Shackling of all prisoners, including pregnant prisoners, is policy in federal prisons and the US Marshall Service and exists in almost all state prisons. Shackling during labor may cause complications during delivery such as hemorrhage or decreased etal heart rate. If a caesarian section is needed, a delay of even 5 minutes may result in perment brain damage to the baby. Pperceived sexual orientation was chosen as the most likely personal characteristic to bias a juror against a defendant, three times greater than race. (National Law Journal 11/2/98.) • The case of Robin Lucas depicts how sexual identity may subject a woman to further abuse or torture by a guard. She was placed in a men’s prison where male guards allowed male inmates to rape her. The male guards taunted her about her same sex relationship, saying to her “maybe we can change your mind”. See also Amnesty International USA’s “The Issue: Discrimination Based on Gender, Race and Sexual Orientation” and “The Issue: The Impact on Children of Women in Prison”. For the report, “Not Part of My Sentence: Violations of the Human Rights Of Women in Custody” and for information on women’s human rights, visit the Women’s Human Rights Program at www.amnestyusa.org/women or call (212) 633-4292