$540,000 Settlement in Minnesota Jail Beating by In October 2001, Hennepin County, Minnesota, agreed to pay $540,000 to settle a brutality suit against the county jail. It is believed to be the largest brutality settlement in county history. On September 4, 2000, Derek Martin, 43, was arrested on suspicion of …
Minnesota Cost-of-Confinement Surcharge Upheld by The Court of Appeals of Minnesota has upheld a surcharge imposed on prisoners in custody of the Minnesota Department of Corrections (DOC). The case had been filed as a class-action suit in a Minnesota district court challenging a DOC rule imposing a 10% cost-of-confinement surcharge, …
Minnesota Prison Cited For Asbestos Infractions by A Minnesota prison received nine citations and was fined over $18,000 for violations involving cancercausing asbestos. The judgment levied against Faribault prison, in November 2000, by Minnesota Occupational Safety and Health Division, came as a result of disgruntled employees who say they have …
Voluntary Agreement with MINNCOR Not Enforceable Contract by Voluntary Agreement With MINNCOR Not Enforceable Contract A state court of appeals in Minnesota has held that the Voluntary Agreement signed by prisoners laboring under MINNCOR's administration is not an enforceable contract. Kenneth Murray, a Minnesota state prison, filed suit in state …
Frozen Toes State a Claim for Deliberate Indifference by A U.S. District Court in Minnesota handed down a mixed ruling on defendants' motion for summary judgment on a federal prisoner's claim of deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs. On January 25, 1996, after walking for 23 hours in freezing …
Retaliation Claim Requires Trial by The court of appeals for the Eighth circuit held that a trial was required to determine if a prisoner was retaliated against for exercising his right to religious freedom. The court also held that prisoners have no right to encourage other prisoners to file grievances …
Black Prison and Jail Employees Win Discrimination Lawsuits by Kentucky In October 2002, a federal jury awarded a former Fayette County Jail guard $196,000. James Young Sr., an African American, was fired from the jail in 1993 after complaining for over a year that black workers at the jail were …
Eighth Circuit Upholds, Defines IFP Provisions by The court of appeals for the Eighth circuit, in two separate rulings, has upheld and defined the In Forma Pauperis (IFP) provisions of the PLRA. Kenneth Murray filed a petition under the All Writs Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1651, claiming a court clerk …
RFRA Still Applies to Federal Government by The court of appeals for the eighth circuit held that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb, still applies to the federal government. In the September, 1997, issue of PLN we reported City of Boerne v. Flores , 117 S.Ct. 2157 …
8th Circuit Orders BOP Sentence Reductions by Joining the third and ninth circuits, the eighth circuit court of appeals held that a BOP program statement denying sentence reductions to non violent drug offenders was contrary to the purpose of 18 U.S.C. § 3621(e)(2)(B), an early release statute which allows a …
Women's Prison Book Project by The Women's Prison Book Project (WPBP) is a group of volunteers organizing to provide women in prison with free reading materials covering a wide range of topics from legal and education materials to politics, history, and women's health. There are other prison book projects, but …
$168,500 Awarded in Prisoner's Death by Gregory Stampley, 46, was convicted in 1993 of kidnapping and making terroristic threats. He was sentenced to eight years and sent to the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Stillwater. Prison doctors who examined him diagnosed paranoid schizophrenia, aggressive-personality disorder and bipolar disorder. According to court …
Minnesota Prisoners Strike for Minimum Wage by [The March 21 issue of Workers World reported that "a struggle exposing super-exploitation of prison labor has broken out at the Oak Park Heights Correctional Facility in Minnesota." The following account is excerpted from that article. Readers may note that Minnesota prisoners have …
MN Passes Laws Against Prison Litigators by The 1995 session of the Minnesota state legislature passed laws aimed directly at jailhouse layers. MN Statute § 243.241 titled "Civil Action Money Damages" was created. It states: "Money damages recovered in a civil action by an inmate confined in a state correctional …
Brutality Protested by On October 10, 1994, more than 25 protesters marched on the Oak Park Heights state prison in Minnesota The demonstrators entered the prison lobby and demanded to meet with warden Erik Skon, who declined. The march was organized by the Love & Rage Anarchist Federation of Minneapolis …
No FLSA Protection for Prisoner Workers by Past issues of PLN have extensively reported on the struggles by prisoners to obtain the minimum wage for industrial and production work performed in prison. Much of this litigation has focused on the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) 29 U.S.C. § 201-219 …
Visitor Awarded Damages by A man visiting his brother in jail was awarded damages both for battery and for violation of his civil rights, based on a guard's attack on him and making of racially derogatory remarks. On appeal, the Minnesota state appeals court ruled that because the racial slurs …
Prison Slavery Upheld, Again by Ed Mead By Ed Mead Prisoners in various Minnesota correctional facilities filed a class action suit in an effort to secure minimum wages for the work they performed in the many prison industries. The industries in question produce items such as furniture, truck and auto …
Minn. Prison Signs Contract for Puerto Rican Inmates by Minn. Prison signs Contract for Puerto Rican Inmates St. Paul, Minn. - about 500 prisoners from Puerto Rico will come to Minnesota as early as this month under a deal that finally will fill a privately operated prison in Appleton built …
