by Jayson Hawkins
The Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) shuttered its Wayne Scott Unit in Brazoria County on December 15, 2020. Its Neal Unit in Amarillo and Gurney Unit outside Palestine were also closed by the end of 2020.
TDCJ said the latter two were expected to be temporary ...
by Jayson Hawkins
A two-year federal investigation into the Massachusetts Department of Corrections (MDOC) found that prisoners’ constitutional rights had been violated in regard to mental health care.
Investigators cited hundreds of instances of MDOC employees failing to prevent suicide or other self-harm among prisoners who had been designated for ...
by Jayson Hawkins
Two audits released July 20, 2020 revealed a series of shortcomings by a food service contractor tasked with providing meals to juvenile detainees and in Pennsylvania’s Allegheny County.
Florida-based contractor Trinity Services Group was paid $3.5 million to provide three meals a day to prisoners at the ...
by Jayson Hawkins
His Texas ID card identifies him as Jason Jackson, Offender #2208297. The black ink etched in his skin and white clothing he must wear mark him as little different from 140,000 others in the state’s prison system, yet the phrase “Living Legend” tattooed across his face is ...
by Jayson Hawkins
Recent public outrage over the needless killings of Black men at the hands of police has led to greater scrutiny of the many instances in which people of color die either while being arrested or while in police custody. The patterns of racism, casual violence, arrogance, and ...
by Jayson Hawkins
When facing the harsh reality of incarceration, whether for a few years or several decades, one will soon confront a rather crucial question: “What am I going to do with all this time?”
For many, the answer is to distract themselves with dominoes and television. Others turn ...
by Jayson Hawkins
A violent disturbance was reported inside Georgia’s Ware State Prison in early August 2020. A prisoner reporting from inside the prison on an illegal cellphone cited health issues, three meals a day consisting only of cheese and peanut butter sandwiches, and a lack of electricity as reasons ...
by Jayson Hawkins
Former Vermont prison Superintendent Ed Adams has found himself the subject of repeated media scrutiny over the last few years, and his story is illustrative of the problems that surround prison reform, public records availability, and bridging the often jarring disconnect between societal norms and prison reality.
Adams worked as a guard for well over a decade before rising to become senior superintendent of Vermont’s only female prison in 2013. A few years later, he took over administration of the Southern State Correctional Facility, the state’s second largest prison. In 2016, he earned Department of Corrections manager of the year honors, and all the way through April 2018, his performance evaluations showed an overall assessment of “outstanding,” the highest grade given.
But Adams had been dogged by allegations of sexual harassment while running the women’s prison, and at the Southern State facility he was repeatedly accused of “creating a hostile work environment” through his reported use of sexist language, inappropriate sexual comments, and threats of retaliation toward prison staff, Vermont Digger reported in March 2020.
In September 2018, he was placed on administrative leave, and three months later, he accepted a demotion to probation officer at ...
by Jayson Hawkins
Mass incarceration has long been recognized as a serious and abiding problem in the American social landscape. Historically, mass incarceration has been attributed to a combination of the war on drugs, politically driven harsh sentencing, and the growth of a prison industrial complex. Recently, however, as arrest rates fall and more judges have recognized that draconian sentencing standards are not sustainable, the persistence of mass incarceration as a phenomenon has led analysts to consider the role of prosecutors in the perpetuation of mass incarceration.
Prosecutors are by far the most obscure variable in the criminal justice equation. They enjoy enormous discretion in their decision making, and much of what they do occurs in private meetings. Past efforts to study and quantify the role of prosecutors in the justice process have shed only limited light on how they make decisions, but a recent study published by the Southern California Law Review offers important insight into the decisions prosecutors routinely make and how those decisions could have an outsized impact on incarceration rates.
The study was carried out by Shima Baradaran Baughman at the University of Utah College of Law and Megan S. Wright at Pennsylvania State University. Five-hundred ...
by Jayson Hawkins
A recent audit at an Allegheny county jail revealed a series of shortcomings by a food service contractor tasked with providing meals to prisoners. Florida-based contractor Trinity Services Group was paid $3.5 million to provide three meals a day to prisoners at the Shuman Juvenile Detention Center and Allegheny County Jail in Pennsylvania. The audits were conducted by the County Controller’s office and examined the year from June 2018 to June 2019. Controller Chelsa Wagner released the audit on July 20, 2020 and noted what she called “several instances of noncompliance” with contract provisions.
Much of the audit’s 34 pages focused on flawed record-keeping and Trinity either over charging for meals or failing to reimburse the county for commissions as stipulated in the contract. The county was overcharged at the Shuman Center, for example, by $8,413, including more than $6,000 for food donated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. At the jail, the county was overbilled more than $1,600.
There also is a discrepancy concerning meals from a program called Trinity Take-Out, which allows prisoners to order specialty items like cheeseburgers and chicken sandwiches at prices ranging from $12 to $20. Trinity’s contract with the county provides ...
