by Douglas Ankney
The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Kentucky granted plaintiffs’ motion seeking class certification in a suit alleging the Louisville Metro Department of Corrections (LMDC) holds people after their court-ordered release.
In February 2017, plaintiffs Jacob Healy, James Michael Jarvis, Jr., Cynthia …
by Douglas Ankney
According to the Connecticut Post, as of January 23, 2021, the number of people confined in Connecticut jails and prisons was 9,083—the lowest it has been in the last 32 years. That number represented 3,326 fewer prisoners than on March 1, 2020, and was …
by Douglas Ankney
On March 16, 2021, Daniel Ruiz’s four children and his mother, Angelica Chavez, filed suit in the Federal District Court for the Northern District of California in relation to his death from COVID-19 that he contracted due to infected prisoners being transferred to San Quentin …
by Douglas Ankney
As a surge in migrants apprehended at the U.S.-Mexico border made headlines in March 2020, the federal agency in charge was still trying to address deficiencies uncovered in an oversight report released the summer before.
According to a July 2020 report by the U.S. …
by Douglas Ankney
As of March 11, 2021, there were more than 137 active cases of COVID-19 at the Northern State Correctional Facility (NSCF) in Newport, Vermont. James Lyall, executive director of the ACLU of Vermont said, “This was predictable and it was preventable. Just like the multiple …
by Douglas Ankney
On September 8, 2020, U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilkin of the Northern District of California ordered additional remedial measures—including body-worn cameras for guards—as relief in a class-action suit claiming allegations of abuse of disabled prisoners by guards at the R.J. Donovan Correctional Facility (“RJD”) in …
by Douglas Ankney
Law professors Shirin Sinnar (Stanford Law School) and Beth A. Colgan (UCLA School of Law) explored the viability of victim compensation and restorative justice as alternatives to sentencing enhancements for hate crimes in New York University Law Review’s September 2020 issue.
During the …
by Douglas Ankney
In late September 2020, private correctional healthcare contractor Wellpath paid $4.5 million to settled a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family of a mentally ill teen who died from dehydration while incarcerated in 2016 at the Benton County Jail in Kennewick, Washington.
The …
by Douglas Ankney
Beginning in July 2021, California will stop accepting nearly all youth offenders at three facilities operated by the Division of Juvenile Justice (“DJJ”). This resulted from an August 2020 deal between Governor Gavin Newsom and the California Legislature whereby the majority of offenders age 25 …
by Douglas Ankney
Gerrymandering is defined in U.S. politics as “the dividing of a state, county, etc., into election districts so as to give one political party a majority in many districts while concentrating the voting strength of the other party into as few districts as possible.” Webster’s …
