$586,000 to Settle KY Jail Strip Search Suit by On January 25, 2000, Jefferson County, Kentucky, announced it would pay $586,000 to 31 people strip searched after being booked into the Jefferson county jail on minor traffic offenses in 1993. Previously, PLN reported that Jefferson County had paid $11.5 million …
Administrative Exhaustion Required in Bivens Suits by The court of appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled that federal prisoners filing Bivens suits must exhaust all administrative remedies regardless of whether or not they are seeking money damages. As previously reported in PLN, the Fifth, Ninth and Tenth circuits have held …
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 …
Kentucky Jury Awards $2,641 to Estate of Murdered Prisoner by In the January, 2003, issue of PLN we reported Flint Ex Rel Flint v. Kentucky Department of Corrections, 270 F.3d 340 (6th Cir. 2001) where the court held that Kentucky prison officials and employees of Correctional Industries were not entitled …
Kentucky Jail Settles Strip Search Suit for $11.5 Million by On December 23, 1998, the Jefferson county jail in Louisville, Kentucky, settled a class action suit by agreeing to pay $11.5 million to thousands of people who were strip searched after being arrested for minor offenses. The lawsuit and settlement …
Class Action Suits Challenge Rip-Off Prison and Jail Phone Rates by Suit Filed in Illinois On May 5, 1999, a class action suit was filed by Illinois consumers who receive collect calls from Illinois state and county jail prisoners alleging that they are forced to pay exorbitant phone rates as …
Kentucky Utilities Commission Reduces Prison and Jail Phone Rates by On January 10, 1999, the Kentucky Public Service Commission (PSC) issued an order, requiring: prison and Jail phone service providers to reduce the rates they charge for prison and Jail collect calls to the tariff charged for non prison and …
Sixth Circuit Discusses Habeas IFP by The court of appeals for the sixth circuit has outlined the procedures habeas corpus petitioners seeking In Forma Pauperis (IFP) status must follow. Every circuit to consider this issue has held that the Prison Litigation Reform Act's (PLRA) filing fee provisions do not apply …
PI Granted in Haircut Claim by A federal district court in Kentucky granted a motion for a Preliminary Injunction (PI) to a Hasidic Jew whose claimed his religious beliefs were violated when prison officials forced him to cut his hair. Several Kentucky state prisoners in Protective Custody (PC) filed suit …
BOP Phone Suit Settled by Paul Wright In the March and November, 1994 and March, 1995, issues of PLN we reported developments in Washington v. Reno, a class action suit filed by federal prisoners which challenged numerous aspects of a new phone system imposed by the Bureau of Prisons (BOP). …
Departing Visitor Cannot Be Searched -- Strip Search Okay by In the February, 1995, issue of PLN we reported Spear v. Sowders, 33 F.3d 576 (6th Cir. 1994) in which the court of appeals for the sixth circuit held that both the strip search and the car search of a …
Private Prison Executive Sentenced in Fraud Scheme by In 1993 Clifford Todd, 68, was chairman of Kentucky based U.S. Corrections Corporation, a private prison firm. In March of this year he was sentenced by a federal judge to a 15-month prison term. Todd pleaded guilty to mail fraud last year …
Washington v. Reno, KY, Settlement Agreement, Telephone Services in Prison, 1995 Washington v. Reno United States District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, Lexington Division November 9, 1999, Decided ; November 9, 1999, Filed CIVIL ACTION NO. 93-290 Reporter: 1999 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 22485 CONCHITA WASHINGTON, ET AL., PLAINTIFFS …
6th Cir. Rules on BOP Phone Suit PI by The March and November, 1994, issues of PLN both contained extensive articles about Washington v. Reno, the nationwide class action suit that challenges numerous aspects of the Inmate Telephone System (ITS) in the process of being installed at federal Bureau of …
No Immunity for Visitor Strip Search by Tina Spear regularly visited her boyfriend, Daniel Wade, at the Northpoint Training center, a Kentucky state prison. Upon arriving for a visit on Christmas day in 1990 prison officials told her she would not be allowed to visit Wade unless she submitted to …
BOP Phone Litigation Update by In the March, 1994, issue of PLN we reported on Washington et al. v. Reno, et al., a lawsuit filed by women prisoners at FCI Lexington challenging the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) newly implemented Inmate Telephone System (ITS). [Editor's Note: For a full account …
