by Christopher Zoukis
America’s jails and prisons have a serious contraband problem. From the smallest county jails to state prisons holding thousands of prisoners, the nation’s correctional system is overrun with illegal goods of every variety. Fast food, heroin, marijuana—you name it, and it’s been smuggled into a prison.
The ...
by Christopher Zoukis and Charles Sloan-Hillier
“If we catch a drug dealer – death penalty.” – President Donald J. Trump, 2018
“Lock the S.O.B.s up.” – Former Senator Joe Biden, 1994
As protests and calls for police reforms continue in response to police shootings of unarmed suspects, both the Republican and Democratic parties seem to be on the same page: How do we maintain the status quo and strengthen the police state while pacifying the population. But even with these views in mind, the question of how each candidate, if elected, would deal with criminal justice reform needs to be examined. Since 1992 PLN has compared presidential candidates track records on criminal justice issues and the consistent result is two empty bottles with different labels. One reason the U.S. has a mass incarceration problem and an overwhelming police state is the bipartisan consensus in creating and sustaining it. This election is no different.
The problem starts for each candidate at different points in time, in different eras, and with divergent factors contributing to their positions. While it would be nice to say that one party is better for criminal justice reform, this isn’t possible. The only difference is asking whether ...
As Numbers Rise, Some Prison Systems Admit Defeat, Others Try to Ignore Death Toll
by Christopher Zoukis, MBA
As nations across the world battle the coronavirus plague, American prisons continue to fail at managing this pandemic, not unlike many communities across the United States. For what appears to be primarily ...
by Christopher Zoukis
As a result of a ruling June 5, 2020, hundreds of immigrant detainees held by federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in south Florida may have to be released. That day a federal judge for the Southern District of Florida agreed the agency was likely “[shuffling] people ...
by Christopher Zoukis
On April 17, 2020, a judge for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan granted a temporary restraining order (TRO) against the Oakland County Jail due to its mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic. Plaintiffs filed a class action complaint against the Oakland County Jail ...
by Christopher Zoukis
The silence is deafening. Over a week in mid-May, Prison Legal News tried to contact public information officers at seven federal prisons seeking an answer to a straightforward question: What are you doing to protect prisoners at your facility from COVID-19?
The answer?
As of press time, ...
by Christopher Zoukis
On April 6, 2020, New York Supreme Court Judge Mark Dwyer ordered the release of 18 pre-trial detainees held at Rikers Island in response to a lawsuit brought by attorneys Lauren Gottesman and Mary Lynne Werlwas of the Legal Aid Society, and Robert Briere. The lawyers had ...
by Christopher Zoukis
“Mother Nature is a serial killer. No one’s better. More creative. . . . She’s a bitch.”
– World War Z
Between January and August of 2019, the Department of Health and Human Services played a game, a simulation of sorts. The exercise was called Crimson Contagion, ...
by Christopher Zoukis
On April 4, 2020, a three-judge court in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California denied a motion seeking an order requiring the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) to immediately release specific categories of inmates due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The ...
by Christopher Zoukis, MBA
The Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC), the parent organization of Prison Legal News, prevailed in a lawsuit seeking to force private prison contractor GEO Group to comply with Vermont’s public records law.
The complaint, filed in a Vermont Superior Court, sought to obtain records ...
