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Articles by Kevin Bliss

ICE Diverts Needed Face Masks from Medical Professionals

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) placed a request for bids on its website in March 2020 for 45,000 N95 protective face masks for 26 of its enforcement and removal operation field offices. This came at a time that the nation’s frontline healthcare workers are experiencing a mass ...

Paroled New Yorker Wrongfully Confined; Awarded $3,250

Clarence Delaney, Jr. was granted $40 per day for 88 days of unlawful confinement by the State of New York, receiving a total payment of $3,250. He also was able to recover his 42 USC § 1983 filing fee, in a state Court of Claims ruling on ...

Women Advocate for the Release of COVID-19 At-Risk Prisoners in Indiana

A prisoner advocacy group in April began urging residents to call Indiana Governor Eric Holcomb and the state Department of Corrections (DOC) Commissioner Robert Carter to demand the release of nonviolent prisoners, the elderly and those with underlying medical conditions amid the COVID-19 health threat, one of ...

Santa Rita Jail Accused of Slave Labor in California Class Action

Current and former prisoners at Santa Rita Jail in Alameda County, California, filed a class action lawsuit on November 18, 2019 against the county, Sheriff Gregory Ahern, and Aramark Correctional Services for violating a California prison labor law, the federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act, and the Thirteenth ...

$41,850 Settlement in Heart Attack Death at California Jail

The surviving family of Kevin Lee McLaughlin, who died of a heart attack in California’s San Luis Obispo County Jail (SLOCJ) in April 2017, attempted to withdraw from a $41,850 settlement negotiated in its wrongful death lawsuit, which claimed deliberate indifference to McLaughlin’s emergency medical needs resulting ...

Illinois Prison Guilty of Censoring Free Speech Over Facebook Posts

An Illinois federal district court held on September 9, 2019, that Larry Harris was retaliated against when he was punished and transferred to a less-desirable prison because of what his daughter, Amanda Carrasco, posted on her Facebook account.

Harris filed a § 1983 complaint against officials of ...

Former Prisoners Find Career Success and Help Others to Achieve the Same

Ex-felons are gaining more opportunities to rebuild their lives after release without having the stigma of incarceration hanging over their heads. With such measures as Ban the Box, Second Chance Employment, and self-startups, people with criminal convictions are getting a leg up on employment, a major factor ...

Massachusetts Prison Retaliates Against Prisoners for Assault on Guards; Court Grants Preliminary Injunction in Class Action

After January 10, 2020, prisoner riot left three guards injured at Massachusetts’ Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center (SBCC), prisoners and their loved ones said prisoners were subjected to retaliation, losing their property, being tased, locked down 23 hours a day and denied access to phones and visits. Attorneys and ...

Major Outbreak of Legionnaires’ at Coleman Women’s Work Camp

The women’s work camp at Coleman Federal Correctional Complex in Sumter County, Florida, reported 18 confirmed cases of Legionnaires’ disease in early February of this year.

The Bureau of Prisons (BOP) said it was working with the Department of Health (DOH) to identify the source of the infection, ...

Seventh Circuit Appeals Court Upholds Ruling Against Wisconsin Prisoner’s Medical Negligence Claim

A Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on October 29, 2019 that there was a rational basis for the jury to determine that nurse Angela McLean and guard Joseph Cichanowicz did not violate prisoner James Lewis’ constitutional rights by delaying medical assistance, and that the United States ...