by David Reutter
On June 23, 2012, Florida Department of Corrections (FDOC) guard Roland Clarke placed Darren Rainey, a prisoner at the Dade Correctional Institution (DCI), into a shower and locked the door. He then turned on the hot water using specially-rigged controls in another room. The 50-year-old Rainey, who ...
by David M. Reutter
In a show of continued support for privately-operated prisons, the Florida legislature considered giving the state’s for-profit prison contractors a $4 million raise.
The GEO Group, MTC and CoreCivic, formerly Corrections Corporation of America, have had contracts to operate prisons in Florida since the 1990s. While ...
by David M. Reutter
In March 2018, the Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) agreed not to set another execution date for death row prisoner Doyle Lee Hamm. The settlement resolved a lawsuit that followed a failed attempt to execute Hamm, 61, on February 22, 2018.
Hamm was sentenced to die ...
by David Reutter and R. Bailey
Correct Care Solutions, a for-profit company that provides medical services at correctional facilities, contested the release of documents concerning the death of Dino Vann Nixon at the Forsyth County Jail (FCJ) in North Carolina.
Upon being booked into FCJ on drug trafficking charges on ...
by Matt Clarke and David Reutter
On April 27, 2018, the Supreme Court of Alaska held that a prisoner had been improperly denied his right to call witnesses at a prison disciplinary hearing, and his failure to raise that issue during administrative appeals did not waive the issue.
Scott Walker, ...
by David Reutter
In December 2017, a Pennsylvania Superior Court affirmed a conviction for possession of contraband by a state prisoner. The court rejected the prisoner’s claim that the evidence was insufficient to support the conviction, as testimony presented at trial indicated the contraband had been retrieved from the prisoner’s ...
by David M. Reutter
Following an onslaught of pressure from the public and action by the Florida legislature’s Joint Administrative Procedures Committee (JAPC), the Florida Department of Corrections (FDOC) was forced to withdraw a rule proposal to reduce in-person visitation time by half.
At an initial April 3, 2018 public ...
by David Reutter
The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a Georgia federal district court’s grant of judgment of law for Corrections Corporation of America, now known as CoreCivic, in a lawsuit alleging it failed to take prompt remedial action against sexual harassment.
Felecia Wilcox worked for CCA’s federal prison, McRae ...
by David Reutter
The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals held on January 22, 2018 that civil rights actions brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 are considered personal injury claims. With that principle established, the Court found that such a claim can survive a plaintiff’s death and allow for party substitution ...
by David Reutter
In February 2018, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that the Prison Litigation Reform Act’s administrative exhaustion requirement justifies the tolling of the statute of limitations, but not the creation of a new accrual time.
Arizona prisoner Angel Soto filed suit over an April 2010 incident ...
