by Douglas Ankney
"The value of human life in prison and jail is worth less—including for these children, because of who their parents are. They are born with a stigma or they are not even born at all because they are viewed as not worthy of life,” said …
by Douglas Ankney
Evidence uncovered by InvestigateWest released in an exposé entitled “Guarded by Predators” revealed rampant sexual abuse of prisoners by staff at three women’s prisons—a condition denied by Idaho Department of Corrections (DOC) Director Bree Derrick.
As previously reported by PLN, the DOC paid former …
by Douglas Ankney
In a settlement agreement that took 15 months for PLN to obtain, Illinois’ Will County Adult Detention Facility (WCADF) agreed to reverse policies challenged in a suit by a group of pretrial detainees at the jail, which prohibited them from receiving copies of materials printed …
by Douglas Ankney
In a case of first impression, the Supreme Court of Oklahoma held that a Jail Trust is not a law enforcement agency and cannot withhold requested records under the law enforcement exemption of Oklahoma’s Open Records Act (ORA), 51 O.S. 2022 §§ 24A.1 et seq.
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by Douglas Ankney
Horrendous conditions inside Los Angeles County Jails, described as “barbaric” in a recent law suit, continue to plague those facilities and at least 122 detainee deaths since January 2023 show these conditions are deadly. Those unfortunate enough to be confined in an LA County Jail …
by Douglas Ankney
With at least 42 people killed inside Mississippi’s prisons over the last decade, multiple families are wondering why the Mississippi Department of Corrections (DOC) cannot protect people in its custody or hold the killers accountable.
From 2015 through 2024, the homicide rate at Parchman …
by Douglas Ankney
The cover story of the June 2025 issue of PLN reported that “[d]espite years of litigation, injunctions, consent decrees, and contempt fines ranging into the hundreds of millions,” the State of Washington had “consistently failed to provide timely competency evaluations and restoration services to defendants …
by Douglas Ankney
On September 2, 2025, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that 28 U.S.C. section 2107(a) requires that a notice of appeal of an order denying qualified immunity must be filed within 30 days after entry of the order and to the …
by Douglas Ankney
On September 29, 2025, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit reversed a district court’s denial of qualified immunity (QI) to Louisiana prison officials on the ground that, at the time of the alleged constitutional violation, the law was not clearly established that …
by Douglas Ankney
Campaign Zero, a “research and data-driven organization working to end police violence and carceral harm” released in June 2025 a report titled Paying for One’s Own Incarceration: National Landscape of ‘Pay-to-Stay’ Fees and called for the repeal and ban of such fees.
To gain …
