News in Brief by Arizona: State prisoner Brigido Montoya made the briefest of escapes from the State Prison Complex in Eyman on August 10, 2024, before he was recaptured 48 minutes later by Florence Police, the Florence Reminder & Blade-Tribune reported. The state Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry (DCRR) …
First Circuit Affirms Qualified Immunity for Massachusetts Officials Who Held Prisoner in Solitary for Two Years Without Hearing by Douglas Ankney by Douglas Ankney In a maddeningly byzantine decision on February 21, 2024, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit dismissed a claim by Massachusetts prisoner Jwainus Perry …
Solitary Confinement Prompts Lawsuit in Massachusetts, Hunger Strike in Maine by A suit filed by six Massachusetts prisoners on July 1, 2024, alleges that conditions in what the state Department of Corrections (DOC) calls a “Secure Adjustment Unit” (SAU) are no different from solitary confinement—something state legislators outlawed in 2018. …
News in Brief by Alabama: On June 24, 2024, Walker County Sheriff Nick Smith told the Birmingham News that county jail guard Tony Dewayne Jackson, 29, had been arrested for smuggling “non-­drug” contraband into the lockup. Jackson was no longer working at the jail, but Smith didn’t say how or …
Prisoner Admissions Soar at Massachusetts Psychiatric Lockup Plagued by Overcrowding and Violence by As of March 11, 2024, almost half those held at Massachusetts’ Tewksbury Hospital were forensic patients, admitted to the state-­run mental health lockup from the criminal justice system. At the same time, the state Department of Mental …
Massachusetts Prison Closure Reflects Success of Criminal Justice Reforms by On January 24, 2024, the Massachusetts Department of Correction (DOC) announced it was closing the Massachusetts Correctional Institution (MCI) in Concord, and a report released the same month by a pair of local nonprofits celebrated the decision for reflecting the …
Hearing-Impaired Massachusetts Prisoners Win ADA Case by On January 17, 2024, the federal court for the District of Massachusetts issued a ruling in a long-running case brought by hearing-impaired state prisoners, finding that the state Department of Correction (DOC) had violated their rights under Title II of the Americans with …
Pell Grant Restoration Not Reaching All Prisoners by Marina Bueno, an incarcerated writer, hopes to attend college but faces a harsh reality—no college classes are offered at her Florida women’s prison in Homestead. In fact, only 326 out of 80,000 state prisoners were enrolled in a college class as of …
Massachusetts Makes Calls Free From Prisons and Jails by Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey (D) signed H. 1796 on November 15, 2023, making hers the fifth state in the nation to eliminate fees for prison and jail phone calls. When the law took effect on December 1, 2023, the state joined Connecticut, …
NaphCare: More Proof That Privatized Healthcare Deals Death and Misery to the Incarcerated to Enhance Profits by David Reutter by David M. Reutter A settlement approved by the federal court for the Eastern District of California on January 16, 2024, recalls an all-­too familiar jail story. A wheelchair-­bound detainee named …
Massachusetts High Court Calls Denial of Prisoner’s Medical Parole without Risk Assessment Arbitrary and Capricious by Douglas Ankney by Douglas Ankney On April 3, 2023, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts called a medical parole denial by the state Commissioner of Correction arbitrary and capricious because it was made without …
Massachusetts Prisoners Again Stage Hunger Strike Against Solitary Confinement by At Massachusetts’ maximum-­security Souza-­Baranowski Correctional Center (SBCC), 19 prisoners held in the Secure Adjustment Unit (SAU) began a hunger strike in October 2023, alleging conditions like solitary confinement despite state law reforms limiting its use. The protest began with a …
Moms Released from Massachusetts Prison Decry Dearth of Help by Crystal Hinson’s journey back into society in April 2023 after release from the Massachusetts Correctional Institution (MCI) in Framingham exemplifies the biggest challenge often faced by women leaving prison: reuniting with their children. Leaving MCI-Framingham, the state’s only women’s lockup, …
Massachusetts Becomes the Fifth State to Make Prison Phone Calls Free by Until December 1, 2023, Massachusetts prisoners and their families paid 12 cents per minute for phone calls, 14 cents in jails, though the first 10 minutes there every month were free. That added up to about $25 million …
First Circuit Lets BOP Take Prisoner’s Entire $10,956.36 Trust Account Balance for Restitution by Douglas Ankney Douglas Ankney Prisoners beware: On June 5, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit refused to stop the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) from “turn[ing] over the full amount” in a …
Commonwealth of Mass-Standard Contract -Inmate Calling Solutions 2024 Commonwealth of Massachusetts Standard Contract Form Instructions and Contractor Certifications This form is jointly issued and published by the Office of the Comptroller (CTR), the Executive Office for Administration and Finance (ANF), and the Operational Services Division (OSD) as the default contract …
While Federal Prisoners Died of COVID-19 in Massachusetts, BOP Staff Used Up Vaccine Allotment on Themselves by On May 23, 2023, the health, medicine and life sciences journal STAT released a scathing report detailing the shabby care prisoners received early in the COVID-19 pandemic at the Federal Medical Center (FMC) …
Court Orders Preliminary Injunctive Relief for Transgender Massachusetts Prisoners by Douglas Ankney by Douglas Ankney In consolidated cases, the Massachusetts Superior Court for Suffolk County ordered preliminary injunctive relief on December 30, 2022, for a pair of transgender women incarcerated at the state’s Souza Baranowski Correctional Center (SBCC). Each woman …
Former BOP Employees Guilty of Assaulting a Prisoner and Taking Bribes at Troubled Federal Prison in Massachusetts by On July 10, 2023, a sentence of 12-months plus one day was handed to a former guard at the Federal Medical Center (FMC) in Danvers, Massachusetts, for brutally assaulting a mentally ill …
