by Matt Clarke
On May 29, 2026, the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit reversed a district court’s denial of qualified immunity to two police detectives who, by asking questions of a state prisoner in front of his cell, may have revealed to other prisoners …
by Matt Clarke
On June 5, 2026, the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit held that federal criminal law prohibiting forced labor, 18 U.S.C. §1589, applies to a county jail threatening immigration detainees with loss of phone and commissary privileges or up to 10 days …
by Matt Clarke
On June 15, 2026, the Supreme Court of New Mexico held that regulations promulgated by the New Mexico Corrections Department (CD) did not create an enforceable regulatory bar to the disclosure of public records under the New Mexico Inspection of Public Records Act (PRA), NMSA …
by Matt Clarke
On May 27, 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) issued a Management Advisory Memorandum (MAM) directed to federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) Director William K. Marshall expressing concerns about BOP personnel misusing their law enforcement credentials to illegally purchase …
by Matt Clarke
n June 9, 2026, the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit upheld a district court’s grant of summary judgment against three former Illinois Department of Corrections (DOC) guards who were fired for …
by Matt Clarke
On June 7, 2026, the United States District Court for the District of Columbia issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting the enforcement of Republican President Donald Trump’s executive order that all biologically male federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) prisoners be housed in men’s facilities.
“On …
by Matt Clarke
On May 12, 2026, the Supreme Court of Idaho held that indigent parents, including prisoners, facing or appealing termination of parental rights (“termination”) in a private action have the right to counsel at public expense. However, no division of the government is specifically required by …
by Matt Clarke
In June 2026, Worth Rises, a nonprofit organization “dedicated to dismantling the prison industry and ending the exploitation of those it touches,” published a report, The Power of Free Communication in Prisons and Jails.
The report depicts the quantitative and qualitative effects free phone …
by Matt Clarke
On March 17, 2026, the Court of Appeal of California held that a “defendant confined in jail in county one, cannot willfully fail to appear, as ordered, in county two. Such a defendant does not ‘fail’ to appear. He should not suffer a penalty for …
by Matt Clarke
On May 28, 2026, the Supreme Court of the Unites States (SCOTUS) reversed the conviction and death sentence of a Mississippi prisoner whose trial counsel raised an objection to the prosecutor’s racially biased use of peremptory strikes but was not given an opportunity to argue …
