by Matt Clarke
In a settlement agreement effective October 23, 2023, California’sAlameda County agreed to pay $7 million to the estate and progeny of a detainee who died while incarcerated at the county’s jail in Santa Rita. The large settlement amount reflected the egregious neglect that allegedly contributed to ...
On October 17, 2023, the estate of a detainee who committed suicide in Florida’s Escambia County Jail accepted $300,000 to settle a federal civil rights lawsuit. Lukas MacKenzie Snelson, 24, was arrested on December 30, 2021, for second degree homicide of his grandmother, Fran Fournier, 75, grand theft of her ...
by Matt Clarke
On September 28, 2023, the federal court for the Western District of Michigan awarded a state prisoner $16,975.00 in attorney fees and $4,459.91 in costs in a civil rights lawsuit over his sexual abuse by a state Department of Corrections (DOC) guard. The Court had previously ...
by Matt Clarke
On December 13, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit held that a group of North Carolina prisoners can be treated like adherents of a religion even if the group denies the “religion” label. The case is one of three in which the state ...
by Matthew T. Clarke
On August 22, 2023, the federal court for the Middle District of Alabama declined to dismiss all but a few claims against officials with the state Department of Corrections (DOC) that were made by a prisoner who was abducted at knifepoint, repeatedly sexually assaulted and held ...
by Matt Clarke
On October 11, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit determined it was illegal to collect court filing fees from a prisoner denied indigent status to proceed in forma pauperis (IFP) unless he decides to go forward and pay them on his own. Once ...
by Matt Clarke
On January 12, 2024, the federal court for the Western District of Texas refused a motion by Williamson County Correctional Facility (WCCF) officials, which argued for dismissal of claims by former detainee Rodney A. Hurdsman, 55, that jailers recorded his privileged calls with his attorney and shared ...
by Matthew T. Clarke
On December 14, 2023, the state of Virginia confirmed that it had agreed to pay $15,000 to settle a state prisoner’s lawsuit alleging retaliation and excessive use of force by officials with the state Department of Corrections (DOC) who deployed a K-9 dog that bit and ...
by Matt Clarke.
Condemned Texas prisoner Scott Louis Panetti, 65, was taken off the state’s death row on September 27, 2023, when the federal court for the Western District of Texas found him too insane to kill—or as the Court said, because he “lacks a rational understanding of the connection ...
by Matt Clarke
On October 3, 2023, the Wisconsin Department of Justice sent a check for $9,000 to a state prisoner in settlement of his claims that he suffered a heat-related illness, fell and injured himself after state Department of Corrections (DOC) guards ignored his pleas for help. In addition ...
