Eleventh Circuit Finds Administrative Remedies Unavailable When Prison Official Threatens Retaliation by The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals has held that a prison official’s threat to retaliate against a prisoner for use of the institutional grievance procedure made the prisoner’s administrative remedies unavailable. The appellate ruling came in a civil …
Georgia Prisoners Must Use Court Promulgated Form to Initiate a Court Action by The Georgia Supreme Court has held that a trial court should have dismissed a mandamus petition filed by a prisoner against prison officials because the prisoner failed to use a form promulgated by the Administrative Office of …
Qualified Immunity Awarded to Guards for Restraint Necessitating Amputation by The Court of Appeals of Georgia has affirmed the grant of qualified immunity for two Glynn County Detention Center (GCDC) guards accused of violating a prisoner’s civil rights resulting in leg amputation. Diana Whitten was arrested for a probation violation …
Georgia Mail Policy Limiting Who Can Send Internet Material Upheld, then Changed by On December 4, 2007, Chief U.S. District Judge Hugh Lawson upheld a Georgia Department of Corrections (DOC) policy that prohibited prisoners from receiving materials printed from the Internet from persons other than publishers, vendors, or attorneys. Danny …
Prison, Jail and Law Enforcement Corruption Continues in Georgia by David Reutter by David M. Reutter As the number of people in prison and jail in Georgia has increased, so too has the number of corruption cases involving detention and police officials. One of every 13 Georgians are under the …
Georgia Attorneys Abandoning Indigent Defendants by David Reutter by David M. Reutter For almost 50 years, following the Supreme Court’s 1963 decision in Gideon v. Wainwright, criminal defendants have had a constitutional right to legal representation. However, Georgia lawmakers have decided that as a result of the state’s budget shortfall …
No Damages for Georgia Prisoner Left Paraplegic After Prisoner Attack by A former Georgia prisoner won a liability claim against a guard at the Ware State Prison, but was not awarded damages. While serving a life sentence, Henry Leroy Martin was told by guard Timothy Bagley to remove another prisoner’s …
Innocent Georgia Man Receives $500,000 as Compensation for Rape Conviction by The State of Georgia paid $500,000 to a man who spent 28 years in prison for a rape he did not commit. John Jerome White was arrested in 1979 after an elderly woman identified him during a police line …
Eleventh Circuit Unpublished Decision on PLRA Administrative Exhaustion Requirements Trumped by Published Ruling by In an unpublished ruling, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals held that summary judgment, rather than a motion to dismiss, was the proper procedure to determine whether a prisoner had exhausted administrative remedies under the Prison …
State, Not County, Required to Pay Attorney Fees in Georgia Death Penalty Cases by On March 9, 2009, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed a lower court’s order holding the Georgia Public Defender Standards Council (“Council”), in contempt for refusing to pay two defense lawyers in a death penalty case. The …
Georgia Sheriffs are Not County Employees, Allowing Suit by Estate of Court Reporter Killed by Prisoner to Proceed by A county sheriff in Georgia is not a “county employee” for workers’ compensation purposes, the Georgia Court of Appeals decided June 26, 2008. This ruling clears the way for a tort …
Prisoner’s Free Speech Rights Violated by Legal Mail Opened Outside His Presence; Qualified Immunity Denied by David Reutter Prisoner’s Free Speech Rights Violated by Legal Mail Opened Outside His Presence; Qualified Immunity Denied by David M. Reutter The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals held that prison officials who open legal …
Sexual Abuse by Prison and Jail Staff Proves Persistent, Pandemic by Gary Hunter Sexual assault, rape, indecency, deviance. These terms represent reprehensible behavior in our society. They also represent recurring themes in our nation’s prisons – not only by prisoners, but also by guards and other staff members. PLN’s August …
Bivens Action Unavailable Against Federal Private Prison Employees by The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit held that a federal prisoner incarcerated at a privately operated prison may not pursue a Bivens action against private prison employees for violating his Eighth Amendment rights. Luis Francisco Alba, a federal …
Federal Supervised Release Must be Credited for Time Served on Prior Revocations by Federal Supervised Release Must be Credited for Time Served on Prior Revocations The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals held that the maximum allowable period of federal supervised release following multiple revocations must be reduced by the aggregate …
Guards Presence Not Necessary During Deposition in Georgia by A Georgia federal district court has held that refusal to participate in a deposition is not sufficient to warrant dismissal. This case was filed by prisoner Stanley Farley for a retaliatory beating by guards at Georgia State Prison. He was beaten …
$23,000 in Costs Assessed Against Ex-Prisoner for Scam Lawsuit by A Georgia federal district court has taxed costs of $23,000 against an ex-prisoner after a jury entered a verdict for prison officials. The jury’s verdict rejected the prisoner’s claim of cruel and unusual punishment and accepted the prison officials’ claim …
Executing the Innocent? by David C Fathi By David C. Fathi At 7 p.m. on September 23, the state of Georgia plans to execute Troy Anthony Davis. That by itself is unremarkable; Georgia has carried out 42 executions since 1983, including two since May of this year. What makes this …
$250,000 Settlement After Federal Prisoner Dies From Undiagnosed Heart Attack by Georgia State resident Janie Federick, administrator of deceased federal prisoner Ronnie Ruff's estate, and Ruff's family, brought a federal tort action against the United States in 2002. Federick alleged that a lack of standard medical care proximately resulted in …
Nominal Damages for Atlanta Georgia Jail’s Ban on Magazines, Books and Newspapers by On April 17, 2008, a Georgia federal court granted a prisoner summary judgment and nominal damages in a lawsuit over a jail policy that barred prisoners from receiving books, newspapers and magazines. David Robertson was incarcerated in …
