by David Reutter
The District of Columbia Court of Appeals held that privacy interests in not disclosing a 20-year-old proposed termination letter for a previous Assistant U.S. Attorney (AUSA) outweighed the pubic interest under exemption 5 U.S.C. § 552(6)(6).
Howard Bloomgarden, represented by attorney Torrence E.S. Lewis, filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the Department of Justice (DOJ) for disclosure of a termination letter naming the AUSA. He asserted the letter was a public record as the AUSA was a government employee at the time. He also argued it could help him in his criminal appeals because the AUSA had prosecuted him, and it may show severe misconduct and laxness in the DOJ’s disciplinary process.
The district court acknowledged Bloomgarden’s motivation to obtain the letter because it involved his own legal proceedings, but clarified that it must consider the public’s interest, not the individual’s. The court granted summary judgment to the DOJ, holding the AUSA’s privacy interest in not being unduly embarrassed outweighed the public interest in disclosure.
The DOJ released over 3,000 pages of other documents related to the termination letter, but after an in camera review, the court ...
by David Reutter
A North Carolina federal district court has voided a contract between death row exoneree Henry McCollum and his lawyer. The court’s unusual move was based on evidence that due to his low IQ, McCollum was vulnerable to manipulation.
As previously reported in PLN, McCollum and his brother, Leon Brown, were released after serving over 30 years for the rape and murder of 11-year-old Sabrina Buie. DNA evidence proved their innocence and revealed the crime was actually committed by Roscoe Artis – someone McCollum had served time with on death row and believed was his friend. [See: PLN, Aug. 2017, p.58].
Cases such as McCollum and Brown’s became magnets for consultants and attorneys hoping to cash in on fees for the ensuing wrongful conviction lawsuits. Shortly after the brothers were released in September 2014, Kimberly Weekes, a consultant in Atlanta, heard about their situation and decided that she and her partner, Deborah Pointer in New York, could put pressure on the governor’s office to grant a pardon.
In January 2015, Weekes and Pointer signed a contract with McCollum and Brown to provide “advocacy and civil rights” services. The agreement included an advance payable to the consultants, plus ...
by David Reutter
Poor sanitation, asbestos contamination, leaky roofs, inadequate health care, the loss of a top doctor frustrated with it all – those are just some of the problems that have plagued Georgia’s Augusta State Medical Prison (ASMP). Plus incidents of brutality by guards.
“These prisoners are often selected for abuse because they suffer from mental illness and have difficulty reporting assaults or being taken seriously when they do,” a federal civil rights lawsuit filed in August 2017 claims.
Photos of ASMP showing “garbage bags and empty boxes filling portable Dumpsters and spilling onto the floor” – even in a hallway outside the operating room – were obtained by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in October 2017.
“At times,” the newspaper reported, “the bags almost reached the ceiling.”
Dr. Mary Sherryl Alston, ASMP’s medical director, wrote that the trash drew insects “of all varieties” into the operating room, and that during procedures mosquitoes had to be swatted away. The smell of garbage was noticeable.
“I am incredulous that such a discussion is still needed to address the problem within a facility that provides health care,” Dr. Alston wrote. “Simple solution: stop placing garbage by the OR now ...
by David Reutter
Cook County, Illinois has paid $4.75 million to settle a federal lawsuit alleging it failed to provide doctor-ordered accommodations for a pretrial detainee who suffered seizures.
In October 2014, Michael Joseph Borys was booked into the Cook County Jail on a misdemeanor charge. He was seen ...
by David M. Reutter
In 1868, in response to the abolition of slavery following the Civil War (except for prisoners), Florida enshrined in its constitution the permanent disenfranchisement of people convicted of a felony. The deprivation of felons’ voting rights was combined with Black Codes that criminalized offenses state lawmakers believed were mostly committed by blacks, as a means of sending freed slaves to prison and ensuring they could not vote.
While the civil rights movement helped to change racial attitudes, Florida has held strong to its disenfranchisement policy. It is one of only four states, the others being Iowa, Kentucky and Virginia, to require executive clemency to restore voting rights.
“[Felon disenfranchisement] is understood as an issue of law and order, and in Florida that’s the end of the discussion,” said Scott Paine, a political analyst for the Florida League of Cities. “It is not seen in other terms, no matter the merits of other arguments. At the same time, this may be less about the state as a whole than about a particular administration’s perspective.”
Over a four-year period, former Florida Governor Charlie Crist, who earned the nickname “Chain Gang Charlie” as a state senator ...
by David M. Reutter
After enduring five years of poor service, inadequate staffing and several scandals with its privatized food-service vendors, Michigan has decided to bring its prison services back into government service.
“As the contract with Trinity was approaching its end, we took the opportunity to re-examine our operations,” said Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) Director Heidi Washington in a statement. “After discussing options with Trinity, it was determined it was in the best interest of both parties not to renew our agreement, we believe the department’s needs would be better met by returning to state-run food service.”
Since MDOC privatized its food service following a legislature mandate in 2012, it has watched the quality and quantity of food decline while the amount of contraband and other security incidents by privatized staff have increased.
Previous stories in Prison Legal News detailed the problems MDOC incurred after privatizing its kitchens. As we reported, prisoners were served food with maggots and items that were nibbled on by rodents at the order of the first vendor, Aramark. Staffing shortages and staff that brought in drugs or who had sex with prisoners were a regular problem.
It was hoped that changing ...
by David Reutter
The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals has reversed a Florida federal district court’s order denying a motion to reopen a case and substitute parties due to the death of the original plaintiff. The district court erred in finding it could not extend the 90-day time period for substitution set forth in Fed.R.Civ.P. 25.
The suit was initially filed in 2016 by Gustavo Adolfo Lizarazo, who was arrested on June 8, 2012. He alleged that while being detained at a jail in Miami-Dade County, multiple officers “repeatedly kicked, struck and punched him in the face and abdomen,” resulting in a fractured right orbital socket and exploded orbital floor.
Lizarazo died on November 17, 2016, and his attorney filed a Joint Motion for Stay of Proceedings due to his death. Lizarazo’s father, Gustavo Antonio Lizarazo, was served by the defendants in anticipation that he would be appointed the personal representative of his son’s estate.
The district court entered an order on December 29, 2016 that granted a 90-day stay; it required Lizarazo’s attorney to file reports every month on the status of the probate proceedings. The court also administratively closed the case and said it ...
by David M. Reutter
A Florida juvenile offender who was beaten and raped by other prisoners as a guard stood by and watched has received a $60,000 settlement from the state.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, Florida imprisons more children in adult prisons than any ...
by David Reutter
Alabama’s prison murder rate, already the nation’s worst, is on the rise – along with an increase in assaults that do not end in fatalities, as well as prisoner suicides. Prison officials agree that the root problems – mainly overcrowding and understaffing – are correctable. But the state has not fully addressed those problems.
Nationally, about five of every 100,000 prisoners are murdered and another 16 commit suicide. In Alabama the number of prison homicides is over 30 per 100,000 – six times the national average and twice that of the next-highest state – while the number of suicides has risen to 37 per 100,000, more than twice the national rate.
In 2017, a federal district court found the Alabama Department of Corrections (DOC) had failed to provide prisoners with constitutionally sufficient mental health care, calling it “horrendously inadequate.” As with the homicide rate, the court found the DOC’s “skyrocketing suicide rate” was due to preventable factors that had not been addressed by prison officials due to a “culture of cynicism towards prisoners.”
In October 2016, the U.S. Department of Justice opened an investigation into all DOC facilities housing male prisoners ...
by David Reutter
A federal lawsuit filed in October 2017 accuses an Arkansas-based drug rehab center of “human trafficking and forced labor” for abusing a court-ordered pre-trial diversion program. The rehab center reportedly compelled defendants to provide cheap labor for welding companies, chicken processing plants and manufacturers – including a plastics firm owned by state Senate Majority Leader Jim Hendren.
The Drug and Alcohol Recovery Program (DARP) is supposed to provide substance abuse treatment as an alternative to prison. Courts in both Arkansas and Oklahoma send defendants to DARP, with a stern warning that failure to complete the program will result in jail or prison time. [See: PLN, Jan. 2018, p.8].
With a second facility in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, DARP enrolls as many as 80 men at any given time, who work for no pay. Founder Raymond Jones and Pastor Glenn E. Whitman, who run the non-profit, were named as defendants in the suit. In addition to Hendren’s company, Hendren Plastics, Inc., DARP provided workers to R&R Engineering, Inc., Western Alliance, Inc. (formerly known as Jer-Co Industries, Inc.) and Simmons Foods, Inc. Those companies were also named in the lawsuit.
“This forced labor scheme was developed by defendant Raymond Jones ...
