The Connally Seven - A Texas Prison Escape and its Aftermath by Roger Hummel The John B. Connally State Prison is a 2,800-capacity maximum security facility for men. As part of Texas' $2 billion prison building frenzy of the 1990's, construction of the so-called "Michael prototype" unit was completed in …
Jury Awards $5,000 to Beaten Texas Prisoner by A federal court in Texas has upheld a jury award of $5,000 to a prisoner who was beaten by a guard, denying the guard's motion for judgment as a matter of law. Daniel Glenn Ostrander, a Texas state prisoner, filed suit against …
BOP Lieutenant Pleads Guilty to Brutality Charges by Robert Durkee In an ongoing criminal investigation, the Department of Justice, Office of Inspector General, is continuing its probe into allegations of obstruction of justice and other civil rights violations at the federal prison in Beaumont, Texas. The investigation took a dramatic …
$1.1 Million Awarded in Texas Restraint Chair Settlement by Ronald Young Nueces County, Texas, settled a $1.1 million lawsuit filed by the father of Andrew Sokolinski, a prisoner who died while strapped into a restraint chair at the Nueces County Jail. The county settled the lawsuit midway through an August …
$250,000 Award to Beaten Texas Prisoner Upheld by A $250,000 jury award to a beaten Texas prisoner and a courtordered award of $95,000 in attorney's fees were upheld on appeal to the Fifth Circuit who found that the amount of damages was reasonable and the trial court did not abuse …
Texas Prisoner Takes Hostages by On January 5th at approximately 10:30 pm a Texas prisoner used a fake gun to back down an armed guard and hold an entire SWAT team at bay for over an hour. Dekenya Nelson used a hairbrush, soap, a deodorant bottle, and pages from the …
Custodial Rape of Female Prisoners Widespread in U.S. by Roger Smith Custodial Rape Of Female Prisoners Widespread In U.S. by Roger Smith American jail and prison officials sexually molest hundreds, and possibly thousands of women prisoners each year. According to a March 2001 report by Amnesty International USA, over 1,000 …
Texas Prisoners Have Thirty Days to Sue Following Resolution of Grievance by An appeals court in Texas has held that Texas prisoners have only 30 days to file a lawsuit after resolution of their administrative grievance. Failure to do so results in dismissal of the suit. Richard James Randle, a …
Texas Prisoners Have Liberty Interest in Mandatory Supervision by The court of appeals for the Fifth Circuit has held that eligible Texas state prisoners have a liberty interest in release on mandatory supervision. Dobber Graham Malchi, a Texas state prisoner, filed a federal habeas corpus action challenging a prison disciplinary …
Texas Prisoners Have Right to Appear at Civil Court Hearings by An appeals court in Texas has held that Texas prisoners have the right to appear-either in person, by affidavit, by depostition, by telephone, or by teleconferencingat court hearings in civil cases. Richard Owen Taylor, a Texas state prisoner, filed …
Texas Prisoners May Challenge Discretionary Mandatory Release Procedures by The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has held that Texas prisoners have the right to use a state habeas corpus action under Article 11.07, Texas Code of Criminal Procedure, to challenge the procedures used to deny them mandatory release. David Lee …
CCA Faulted in Texas Jail Escape by Staff shortages, unwatched video surveillance monitors, unlocked doors, untrained staff and a security alarm that was ignored by Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) employees contributed to the August 27, 2000 escape from the Bartlett State Jail near Austin, Texas. Sixteen problems, the biggest …
PLRA Attorney Fee Cap Doesn't Apply After Release; Texas County Liable in Attack by The court of appeals for the Fifth circuit held that a Texas county was liable for failing to protect an arrestee from assault in its jail. The court also held that the Prison Litigation Reform Act …
Prisoner Bound by Jailhouse Lawyer's Work by by Paul Wright Afederal district court in Texas has held that a prisoner who relies on other prisoners to prepare his legal pleadings is bound by the content of those pleadings. Nhan Kiem Tran is a federal prisoner in Texas who was convicted …
Texas Prisoner Raped By Wackenhut Guard Entitled To Discovery Protection by An appeals court in Texas has held that, under the Texas rape victims shield laws, Rule 412, 509(c)(1) and 510(b)(1), Texas Rules of Evidence, a prisoner who was raped by a guard and is suing Wackenhut may not be …
Texas and Florida Prisoners Used in Medical Experiments by Julia Lutsky When the AIDS epidemic struck in the mid eighties and pharmaceutical companies wished to test new and promising drugs, what better place than in the nation's prison systems? AIDS has no known cure and test subjects in the prison …
Mystery Surrounds Texas Prison Rape/Suicide by A prisoner at the French Robertson Unit near Abilene, TX, hanged himself August 16, 2000, shortly after sexually assaulting a female prison employee, prison authorities say. A few minutes after 4:00 p.m., the female recreational staff (whose name and age were not released) confronted …
Texas Deputy Pays Price for Testifying by Without the testimony of former Bexar County (TX) Jail guard Linda Grady, one of her former colleagues would never have been indicted for striking a prisoner, prosecutors say. As it was, Charles Mizell was convicted June 8, 2000 on one count each of …
Texas Death Machine Faces Renewed Criticism by A report released October 16, 2000 by the Texas Defender Service, a nonprofit group that represents death row prisoners, concludes that "an intolerably high number of people are being sentenced to death [in Texas] and propelled through the appellate courts in a process …
Error to Dismiss Suit for Inability to Pay Filing Fee by The court of appeals for the Fifth circuit held that it was an abuse of discretion for a district court to dismiss a prisoner's suit for failure to pay the initial assessed filing fee without first determining if the …
