Texas Jailers Ran a 'Rape Camp' Behind Bars,

http://www.alternet.org/rape-texas-jail Texas Jailers Ran a 'Rape Camp' Behind Bars, Claim Two Women www.alternet.org This is unbelievable.

Records Show Excessive Use of Force at Colorado Supermax

Records Show Excessive Use of Force at Colorado Supermax by Lisa Dawson Records kept by the Colorado Department of Corrections show 61 instances from March 1, 2012 to March 1 of this year of corrections officers using force on men held at the Colorado State Penitentiary (CSP), where prisoners are held in administrative segregation on lockdown for 23 hours a day. The "use of force" log, obtained by Denver's Westword, documents varying levels of physical contact used in each incident, some of which required mild force, and others which prison officials deemed it necessary to use brutal control tactics, including restraint chairs and pepper spray. This story comes from Alan Prendergast, who writes for Westword and has reported on Colorado prisons for years: At Colorado's state supermax prison, inmates get into confrontations with guards over food, hygiene, privileges, a refusal to "cuff up" or whatever out of boredom, mental illness or plain orneriness. Some claim to be provoked by staff. Whatever the reason, it's a contest the prisoner is going to lose every time. Like many prisons throughout Colorado and across the nation, people with mental illness compose a large part of the population at CSP. Prendergast writes on the potential impact of solitary confinement on people with mental illness: Although proponents of supermax prisons claim that they act as a deterrent to violence elsewhere in the corrections systems, the facilities also become repositories of "problem" inmates, whose failure to follow the rules tends to prolong their stay in solitary confinement and possibly exacerbate any preexisting mental problems. (As we've previously reported, roughly a third of CSP inmates have been diagnosed with some form of mental illness.) http://solitarywatch.com/2013/06/15/records-show-excessive-use-of-force-at-colorado-supermax/

Lawsuit Filed Against Solitary Confinement of 800 Mentally Ill In Pennsylvania

Lawsuit Filed Against Solitary Confinement of 800 Seriously Mentally Ill In Pennsylvania by Sal Rodriguez RHU cell of prisoner Matthew Bullock, who committed suicide in 2009. The Disability Rights Network of Pennsylvania (DRNP) has filed a lawsuit against John Wetzel, the Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, charging that the confinement of prisoners in Restricted Housing Units (RHUs) amounts to cruel and unusual punishment of those diagnosed as seriously mentally ill. The suit seeks an end to long-term segregation of such individuals and seeks an order that DOC prisoners receive constitutionally adequate mental health care. According to the lawsuit, prisoners in the RHUs are locked in extremely small cells for at least 23 hours a day on weekdays and 24 hours a day on weekends and holidays. Typically, the lights are on in the cell all the time. The prisoners are denied adequate mental health care and prohibited from working, participating in educational or rehabilitative programs, or attending religious services. Prisoners in the RHU are generally held alone, notes the lawsuit, though even in cases when prisoners are assigned a cellmate, this may be "as deleterious to their mental health as solitary confinement" if the cellmate is "psychotic or violent." Placing people in such conditions, can create a Dickensian nightmare, in which prisoners are trapped in an endless cycle of isolation and punishment, further deterioration of their mental illness, deprivation of adequate mental health treatment, and inability to qualify for parole. The lawsuit provides profiles of 12 men housed in the RHU, which serve to illustrate the widespread use of solitary confinement against prisoners who have been diagnosed as having "serious mental illnesses." A man identified as "Prisoner #1" is described in the lawsuit as having been diagnosed with a delusional disorder with paranoid features and a borderline intellectual diability. Initially placed in a Special Needs Unit, in which prisoners receive psychiatric treatment, he was frequently placed in the RHU following incidents precipitated by delusions. Despite expressing suicidal thoughts before and during his confinement in the RHU, he remained in the RHU until he committed suicide by hanging on May 6, 2011. Prisoner #8 is a 28-year old man at State Correctional Institution-Green (SCI-Green) who has been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, a psychotic disorder, a paraphilia, and a personality disorder. According to the lawsuit, he claims to receive "messages from the television and from dead people." The lawsuit states that he has expressed suicidal ideation and has been placed in the RHU after being deemed by the Department of Corrections a "danger to himself and others. The lawsuit charges that Wetzel knows or is deliberately indifferent to the fact that the DOC's treatment of prisoners with mental illness, including the practice of segregating them for long periods of time in RHUs, can cause grave harm to their mental health. While it is unclear what DSM-Axis I mental disorders fall under the scope of serious mental illness, the lawsuit argues that the current disciplinary system within Pennsylvania prisons fails to "consider a prisoner's serious mental illness and the impact of isolation in assessing whether to sanction the prisoners. Pennsylvania prisoner Ricardo Noble, who has spent over five years in the RHU, has written to Solitary Watch about the nature of life in the isolation units: In the RHU life is intense. Especially in the beginning weeks or months. As time passes your mind begins to become clouded with mixed emotions, anger, guilt, hate, paranoia, hopelessness, loneliness, and other frustrations. Some who fail to productively channel their frustrations tend to take it out on those closest to them (mainly other prisoners) or even themselves because they can’t lash out on the ones (the Administration) who can affect change of the physical aspects of their harsh condition. Approximately 1/3 of prisoners in the RHUs, which as of February 28th housed 844 prisoners in long term Administrative Custody and an additional 1,417 in shorter term Disciplinary Custody, have been described by DRNP as seriously mentally ill.The DRNP cited the position of the American Psychiatric Association, which in December 2012 declared that prolonged segregation of adult inmates with serious mental illness, with rare exceptions should be avoided due to the potential harm to such inmates. For more on solitary confinement in Pennsylvania, click here to read Solitary Watch's reporting. http://solitarywatch.com/2013/03/18/lawsuit-filed-against-solitary-confinement-of-800-seriously-mentally-ill-in-pennsylvania/

Nine state prison guards charged in inmate beating probe

MD - Nine state prison guards charged in inmate beating probe Nine state prison guards charged in inmate beating probe Federal indictment alleges officers at Hagerstown prison planned assault, covered it up By Carrie Wells, The Baltimore Sun 10:38 p.m. EST, February 27, 2013 Nine current and former guards at a state prison in Hagerstown were charged Wednesday in a federal indictment that alleges they conspired to assault an inmate and covered up the incident. The U.S. Department of Justice indictment refers to two separate beatings of an inmate, identified only as "K.D.," in the same weekend in March 2008. K.D. was beaten so badly that he had to be taken to a hospital, the indictment says. None of the current and former prison officers was actually charged with assault. The charges included obstruction of justice for one lieutenant at the prison who the justice department says used a magnetic device to destroy surveillance tapes that captured the beating. The beatings of the inmate at medium-security Roxbury Correctional Institution in 2008, coming at the same time as an alleged inmate beating at maximum-security North Branch Correctional Institute in Cumberland, led to a high-profile investigation and scrutiny of the state prison system that year. Two dozen officers at both prisons were fired or put on leave amid the investigation, though two guards were later reinstated. The Department of Justice says K.D. was assaulted first during the 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. shift at Roxbury on March 8, 2008. In one indictment, Correctional Officer Walter Steele and Lieutenant Jason Weicht face conspiracy charges related to covering up the assault. Former Correctional Officers James Kalbflesh and Jeremy McCusker face civil rights and conspiracy charges. Weicht was also charged with obstruction of justice. The justice department said his actions included "encouraging officers to get together to get their stories straight, providing home telephone numbers for the involved officers so that they could arrange for a cover-up meeting, and giving an officer books on interrogation techniques so that he would be prepared to mislead investigators." Steele faces two more counts of providing false and misleading information to investigators. A second federal indictment stems from a second assault on K.D. the following morning, during the 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. shift. It was after that beating, in which K.D. was kicked and punched in his cell "in order to punish K.D. for a prior incident involving another officer" that the inmate was sent to the hospital, according to the Department of Justice. Lt. Edwin Stigile and former Correctional Officers Tyson Hinckle, Reginald Martin and Michael Morgan were charged with conspiring to have officers assault K.D. during the day shift. Sgt. Josh Hummer and Hinckle, Martin and Morgan also were each charged with a civil rights violation, and Stigile was charged with obstruction of justice for allegedly destroying surveillance tapes that recorded the beating. The maximum sentences for the prison officers range from 25 years to 55 years. Dustin Norris, a former correctional officer at Roxbury, pleaded guilty to conspiring to assault the inmate and faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison, the justice department also announced Wednesday. cwells@baltsun.com twitter.com/cwellssun http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/crime/blog/bs-md-prison-guards-conspiracy-20130227,0,6505284.story#sthash.ZD4dYQnR.dpuf

What Solitary Confinement Does to the Mind

Voices from Solitary: What Solitary Confinement Does to the Mind by Voices from Solitary The following was submitted to Solitary Watch by Michael Jewell, who was sentenced to death in Texas for capital murder in 1970 and spent three years in solitary confinement as a death row prisoner. His sentence was commuted to life imprisonment in 1973 following the 1972 Supreme Court ruling in Furman v. Georgia, which prohibited the death penalty nationwide until the decision was overturned in 1976 in Gregg v. Georgia. Over the next 30 years, Jewell spent two two-year-long terms in Administrative Segregation. In Ad Seg, he would spend 23 hours a day in a 5x9 foot cell alone, allowed only a 20 minute shower and one hour of exercise in a cage. The first term was a result of his leading a work stoppage at Ellis Unit in Huntsville, Texas, in support of the Texas civil rights case Ruiz v. Estelle, which ultimately led federal courts to rule that the conditions in the Texas prison system violated 8th Amendment prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment. His second term in solitary confinement was the result of an escape attempt at Ferguson Unit in Madison County. Since his parole, he has found that life after prison is not easy. "Hell, with my criminal history, I couldn't get a job as a speed bump at Kroger's," he writes. "If it were not for a loving wife with enough fixed income to support the both of us, no doubt I would have recidivated for something akin to throwing a brick through a bank window." Jewell has become active in prison reform with Citizens United for Rehabilitation of Errants (CURE), Amnesty International, the Texas Inmate Family Association, and the ACLU of Texas. With his wife, Joan, he founded Con-Care Services, which assists Texas inmates with problems prisoners routinely face, including visitation issues and appealing disciplinary cases. "We don't move mountains but we kick the shit out of molehills," --Sal Rodriguez I served 40 consecutive years on a life sentence in the Texas Department of Corrections, from 1970 to 2010. My first 3 years were on death row, which is much like Administrative Segregation and Solitary Confinement (S.C). I also did time in Ad Seg on two separate occasions, staying over two years each time. During that time I was confined to a 5 x 9 foot cell for 23 hours per day. I was allowed a 20 minute shower and an hour for outside recreation in a cage made of cyclone fencing, which resembled a cage you’d see at the dog pound. The cage measured about 10 x 10 square feet. S.C. is a form of sensory deprivation, in that your perception shrinks to the dimensions of the space and sensations of confinement. Visual, auditory, olfactory, tactile, and even the sense of taste are dramatically deprived and constricted. Almost immediately upon being tossed into isolation, though many people may not recognize it for what it is, you begin to suffer from a form of “sensory withdrawal.” Soon, you begin to crave the broader liberty you’ve lost, even the limited freedom of a prison’s environment: the ability to move about and interact with other human beings. Such a radical deprivation of sensory perceptions has a ‘numbing’ effect. You feel ‘stunned.’ Removed from the distractions and diversions of the broader context, the mind is suddenly forced to confront itself. You begin to hear yourself think. When the mind is withdrawn from the experience of ‘perceiving’ and interacting with the complex activities of the broader environment, it is forced to switch to perceptions from within itself and draw upon self-consciousness, as well as the subconscious. Sudden subjection to S.C. is a painful and dreaded experience. Because it is human nature to seek pleasure and avoid pain, we have a tendency to withdraw from the physical and take refuge into the psychological. Different people will have different reactions to this phenomenon. But most will indulge in various memories and forms of ‘fancy.’ Alongside memories of good times come those of sad and bad times. It is my opinion that all prisoners, deep inside, have a poor self-image. In S.C. that fact becomes acutely self-evident, or at least it did in my case. I suffered profound feelings of guilt and shame for past actions and inactions. Hot on the heels of regret come recrimination. Again, it is our nature to seek pleasure and to avoid pain. We tend to escape from over-awareness of our faults and foibles by turning to ‘fancy.’ Over time: days, weeks, months, and years, imagination can verge on, and in many cases, into, hallucination. The next stage is often psychosis and irreparable psychological damage. Resech has shown an irrefutable link between S.C. and mental deterioration: http://solitarywatch.com/2013/02/16/voices-from-solitary-what-solitary-confinement-does-to-the-mind/

Prison Abuse,Police Shootings,Curruption And Big Settlements

May 30, 2012 Suit Alleges Placer County Sheriff's Deputy Shot Man In Back As He Ran Away "A man who admits he stole seven lottery tickets claims Placer County Sheriff's Deputy Van Bogardus shot him three times in the back as he ran away, in Superior Court." Pautov v. Placer County Civil Complaint, 5/25/12, No. 12-cv-1424-KJM. Courthouse News, 5/29/12 ------------------------------------------- Sacramento County Cuts Funding On Inmate Rehabilitation Sacramento County officials voted unanimously Thursday to further reduce spending on rehabilitation for inmates sentenced under a new state law. The Community Corrections Partnership amended the Sheriff Department's budget for the fiscal year by reducing expenditures for inmate services from $500,000 to $122,000 and put the difference toward jail costs. The shift further tilts the county's budget for handling new offenders from the state toward incarceration instead of rehabilitation. Sacramento Bee, 5/4/12 ---------------------------------------- Sacramento County Pays $150,000 To Settle Jail Lawsuit Even though he was a regular, Marvin Orr was never able to get a bottom bunk when he checked into the Sacramento County Main Jail. Now, it has wound up costing the taxpayers $150,000 to make his federal lawsuit against the county go away. According to the legal action, Orr suffers from arthritis and attendant joint problems so severe that he gets disability benefits, uses a cane to ambulate and is on a variety of pain medicines and other medications. At the time of the incident, his degenerating hips needed to be replaced, and he was a diabetic taking medicine to hold off seizures. He checked into the jail on Dec. 8, 2008, and took a spill from his upper bunk that same day, causing head injuries and loss of consciousness for a time. A jail special-needs form dated the next day reiterated the importance of a lower bunk and tier, and noted that Orr had to have a cane to get around and a wheelchair for transportation to court. But the system is entrenched, so he remained on a top bunk, and less than a week later took the header that broke his leg and led to the lawsuit. This time he hit his head on the metal toilet. Rather than immediately taking Orr to the hospital for proper evaluation and treatment, he was instead propped up in a wheelchair, the suit alleges. He spent several days in the wheelchair in the so-called medical wing sitting in his own waste. His frequent pleas for urgent medical attention were ignored. After other inmates and at least one correctional officer aggressively lobbied for action, Orr was transported on Dec. 16 to the UC Davis Medical Center, where he had surgery on his broken leg and remained for 10 days. Planned hip replacement surgery had to be postponed. After Orr fell last month while climbing the stairs to his cell on an upper tier, his attorney, Stewart Katz, says he spoke to a ranking Sheriff's Department officer at the jail, to the county counsel's office, and the county's outside litigation counsel in an effort to assure Orr a bottom bunk and lower tier. After Katz spoke to a jail watch commander, Orr was moved to a lower tier, but nothing else changed, the attorney said. His client occupied a top bunk during his stay last month, even as the county was cutting a $150,000 check. --------------------------------------------------------- March 31, 2012 Is Real Change Coming To California's Use Of Long-Term Solitary Confinement? Today's New York Times has a piece about potential changes to California's policy of using long-term solitary confinement in prisons to isolate suspected gang members: Ernesto Lira is not a murderer. He has never participated in a prison riot. The crime that landed him behind bars was carrying three foil-wrapped grams of methamphetamine in his car. But on the basis of evidence that a federal court later deemed unreliable, prison officials labeled Mr. Lira a gang member and sent him to the super-maximum-security unit at Pelican Bay State Prison, the state’s toughest correctional institution. There, for eight years, he spent 23 or more hours a day in a windowless 7.6-by-11.6-foot cell, allowed out for showers and exercise. His view through the perforated steel door — there were 2,220 holes; he counted them — was a blank wall, his companions a family of spiders that he watched grow, “season by season, year by year.” Mr. Lira insisted that he was not a gang member, to no avail. He was eventually vindicated and is now out of prison, but he still struggles with the legacy of his solitary confinement. He suffers from depression and avoids crowds. At night, he puts blankets over the windows to block out any light. “He’s not the same person at all,” said his sister Luzie Harville. “Whatever happened, the experience he had in there changed him.” California has for decades used long-term segregation to combat gang violence in its prisons — a model also used by states like Arizona with significant gang problems. Thousands of inmates said to have gang ties have been sent to units like that at Pelican Bay, where they remain for years, or in some cases decades. But California corrections officials — prodded by two hunger strikes by inmates at Pelican Bay last year and the advice of national prison experts — this month proposed changes in the state’s gang policy that could decrease the number of inmates in isolation. Depending on how aggressively California moves forward — critics say that the changes do not go far enough and have enough loopholes that they may have little effect — it could join a small but increasing number of states that are rethinking the use of long-term solitary confinement, a practice that had become common in this country over the past three decades. ----------------------- Aug, 03, 2012 Women In Alleged Assault By Modesto Officer Files Claim An attorney has filed a claim against the city seeking $4 million in damages for the woman who alleges she was sexually assaulted by a Modesto police officer in January. The tort claim filed last week says the Jan. 5 incident caused the woman to suffer bodily injury and extreme emotional distress, and that the victim is entitled to damages for economic and noneconomic losses. This type of action typically is a forerunner to a lawsuit. Modesto City Attorney Susana Alcala Wood confirmed the claim was received at City Hall on Wednesday. "We are reviewing it and will proceed accordingly," she said, declining further comment. Fresno attorney Jacob Rivas, who specializes in civil rights cases, filed the claim against former officer Lee Freddie Gaines II, the Police Department and the city. He said he is seeking multimillion dollars in damages because of the severity of the claimed offense against his client. As you can imagine, when you have a sexual assault, it takes a heavy toll on the victim emotionally and physically," Rivas said. City officials have 45 days to decide whether to accept or reject the claim. If it's rejected, Rivas said he expects to bring a lawsuit on behalf of his client, most likely in federal court. Modesto Bee, 4/2/12; Claim for Damages. -------------------------------------------------- Sacramento County Pays $75,000 To Settle Jail Beating Lawsuit For full story with photos and video, see Denny Walsh's story in the Sacramento Bee, 8/12/12.

Kan. women's prison violates inmates' rights Inmates Were Being Sexually Abused

Feds: Kan. women's prison violates inmates' rights
If Kansas officials don't take remedial action in less than 50 days to address Eighth Amendment violations at the prison, the Justice Department issued notice of intent to file a federal lawsuit to compel reform

Inappropriate sexual behavior goes unreported due to flawed TCF staffing and supervision, a heightened fear of retaliation, a dysfunctional grievance system and weak investigative processes.

Barry Grissom, U.S. attorney for Kansas, said the federal prosecutor's office stood ready to work with state government officials to resolve glaring problems outlined by the department's investigators.

"The report has identified a very serious and troubling situation at the facility," Grissom said. "Action needs to be taken immediately."

Since 2001, TCF has served as the lone state prison for women in Kansas. On average, more than 500 women ranging from work-release to maximum-security inmates are housed there.

The Capital-Journal's sex-abuse stories in 2009 detailed problems at the prison with impropriety among inmates and corrections officers, including a plumbing instructor charged with rape after an inmate became pregnant.

The stories described how inmates were driven in state vehicles by a corrections officer to a Topeka cemetery or other remote areas and forced to engage in sexual conduct. In June, Brownback and top legislators approved payment of $30,000 in state funding to a former inmate involved in these assaults.

Other stories in The Capital-Journal documented use by the state corrections department of inmate labor in abatement of cancer-causing asbestos from TCF buildings. The state was reprimanded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
In 2010, the National Institute of Corrections and the Kansas Legislative Post Audit Committee issued reports stipulating dangers faced by TCF prisoners in regard to sexual abuse. The 2010 Legislature amended Kansas law to increase the penalty for unlawful sexual relations between prison staff members and inmates. TCF's warden at that time was removed from his job.

Roberts, hired by Brownback as secretary of the Department of Corrections in 2011, vowed to correct inadequacies at TCF by installing more cameras at the prison and improving training standards.
However, the Justice Department said findings of their investigation "mirror those found" two years ago by NIC and Kansas auditors.

Federal officials concluded TCF failed to employ routinely accepted correctional practices, including gender-responsive training of the staff. TCF had no early-warning system to identify problem employees or a method of tracking potential misconduct, the Justice Department said.
By Tim Carpenter
The Capitol-Journal

TOPEKA, Kan. — An investigation by the U.S. Justice Department made public Thursday contained findings of rampant, widespread sexual abuse at Topeka Correctional Facility among state employees and inmates in violation of the constitutional rights of women incarcerated at the facility.

The Justice Department's report to Gov. Sam Brownback declared Kansas Department of Corrections officials "still have not acted" to correct "repeatedly documented" misconduct and "grossly deficient systemic practices" at TCF despite a series of stories in The Topeka Capital-Journal in 2009 and two independent audits in 2010 pointing to employee-on-prisoner and prisoner-on-prisoner sexual abuse.