Disbarred Cincinnati Defense Attorney Who Defrauded Prisoner Clients Gets Three-Year Sentence by On March 10, 2025, the federal court for the Southern District of Ohio sentenced former Cincinnati defense attorney Richard Louis Crosby III to 37 months in federal prison for Social Security fraud. The 37-year-old pleaded guilty in July …
News in Brief by Alabama: State Department of Corrections (DOC) guard Arianna Kimberly Slater faces life in prison after she was arrested while attempting to smuggle contraband into Ventress Correctional Facility on February 24, 2025. According to the Birmingham News, a routine employee screening of Slater’s food container found unspecified …
Ohio Pauses Executions, Louisiana and Arizona Race Ahead by Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R) reprieved three condemned state prisoners on February 13, 2025, pushing their execution dates years down the road to give the state time to fix its broken supply chain of lethal injections drug. But Louisiana Gov. Jeff …
News in Brief by Alabama: Former Crenshaw County Jail Administrator Christian Alexander Porter, 33, was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of excessive force, falsifying records and witness tampering on January 28, 2025. According to the Washington Post, the charges stem from an October 2021 incident in which …
ABA Highlights Ohio Prisoner’s Successful Transition to Lawyer by On October 29, 2024, the American Bar Association’s ABA Journal highlighted a former “jailhouse lawyer” who succeeded in becoming a licensed attorney after release. Damon Davis, 47, is now a lawyer with the Hamilton County Public Defender’s Office in Cincinnati. But …
Ohio Guard Killed by Prisoner in Christmas Day Attack by On December 25, 2024, Ohio prisoner Rashawn Cannon, 27, was accused of killing Ross Correctional Institution guard Andrew Lansing, 62. Annette Chambers-Smith, Director of the state Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (DRC), said that Cannon veered off from a group …
$220,000 Settlement After Woman Dies in Ohio Jail From Drug Withdrawal by Anthony Accurso by Anthony W. Accurso With signing of a settlement agreement on September 11, 2024, Ohio’s Richland County was on the hook for $220,000 to the estate of detainee Maggie Copeland, who died while experiencing withdrawal symptoms …
News in Brief by Alabama: Clarke County Jail guard Larissa Thompson was arrested on December 5, 2024, for plotting to smuggle drugs into the lockup, the Thomasville Times reported. An investigation by state law enforcement, the office of County Sheriff DeWayne Smith, and Jackson Police uncovered evidence that Thompson planned …
Cuyahoga County Judges Vowed to Reform the Bail System. Here’s What Happened. by Ilica Mahajan, Rachel Dissell by Ilica Mahajan and Rachel Dissell Court officials informally changed their bail-setting practices for felony cases. Now, fewer people have to pay to get out of jail, a Marshall Project analysis shows. I …
Sixth Circuit: Leaman Doctrine Did Not Bar Ohio Prisoner’s Pro Se Federal Civil Rights Suit Over Interference with Legal Mail by In an important decision on February 6, 2024, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit held that an Ohio prisoner’s federal civil rights claims against state …
Video of Autistic Ohio Teen’s Jail Death Undercuts Sheriff’s Report Calling It Suicide by Surveillance video from Ohio’s Montgomery County Jail surfaced from an unidentified source in early June 2024, showing the last hours before 19-year-old Isaiah Trammell died in custody in March 2023. As PLN reported, he died three …
News in Brief by Australia: Brisbane Correctional Center prisoner Jack James Peterson, 29, was sentenced to an additional 18 months in January 2023 for assaulting a guard with a squash racket, the Courier reported. Peterson struck the unnamed 34-year-old during a confrontation involving a riot response team, leaving him with …
News in Brief by Alabama: Former state Department of Corrections (DOC) guard Henry Guice, Jr., 46, was sentenced to 75 months in federal prison on September 9, 2024, for his role in a drug smuggling conspiracy at Staton Correctional Facility. The Birmingham News reported that a fellow guard was inspecting …
Impoverished Ohio County Gets New Jail Space After Settling Suit for Bloody Detainee Assault by On June 18, 2024, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R) announced $32 million in state funding for a new regional jail to serve Jackson, Lawrence, and Pike Counties. That promises significant savings for Pike County, among …
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) …
Ohio Pays $725,000 to Survivors of Two Prisoners Beaten to Death by Lying Guards by On July 17, 2024, the Ohio Court of Claims approved a settlement between the state Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (DRC) and the Estate of mentally ill prisoner Dewey C. McVay, Jr., who died after …
Advanced Correctional Healthcare Ends Two Suits Over Deaths at Ohio Jail by Private jail medical providers usually win contracts with promises to save a county money. But after two federal lawsuits filed in federal court for the Northern District of Ohio in 2023 against Ohio’s Richland County and its privately …
News in Brief by Alabama: Mobile Metro Jail guard Robert Aaron Small was fired and arrested for assault on June 27, 2024, one day after he allegedly used excessive force against an unnamed detainee. WKRG in Mobile said that the guard had worked at the lockup since 2019. Mobile County …
Former Ohio Deputy Prison Warden Gets Probation for Overtime Fraud by The former Deputy Warden of Ohio’s Warren Correctional Institution was sentenced on March 20, 2024, to probation not exceeding five years, after pleading guilty to theft in office. Robert Welch, 57, admitted stealing over $19,000 in pay for overtime …
Trial Rescheduled for Ohio Prisoner Accused of Murdering Fellow Prisoner by Trial didn’t start as scheduled on July 26, 2024, for Southern Ohio Correctional Facility (SOCF) prisoner Austin Burke, 25, who is accused of murdering fellow prisoner Ruben Melendez, 65, in August 2023. That’s because Burke was handed a new …
