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News in Brief
Article • January 1, 2026 • from PLN January, 2026
News in Brief by California: A suit filed in state Superior Court for San Francisco County on December 1, 2025, accuses the New York Post and Los Angeles Times of defaming Nima Momeni, 41, while he was detained in the County’s San Bruno jail before his December 2024 murder trial. …
News in Brief
Article • July 15, 2025 • from PLN July, 2025
Filed under: Staff-Prisoner Assault, Guard Misconduct, Jail Misconduct, Failure to Protect (General), Pepper Spray/Tear Gas, halfway houses, New Trial/Judgment of Acquittal, Bribery/Extortion/Theft, Fraud and Deceit
News in Brief by Alabama: Elmore County Jail guard Lita Williams, 57, was arrested and charged with first-degree promoting prison contraband on May 21, 2025, the Wetumpka Herald reported. Her arrest followed discovery of a cellphone in a jail cell during a routine search two weeks prior. Data from the …
Italy Begins Conjugal Visits 
in Prison “Sex Rooms”
Article • June 1, 2025 • from PLN June, 2025
Filed under: Conditions of Confinement
Italy Begins Conjugal Visits in Prison “Sex Rooms” by Joining other western European nations, Italy began permitting prisoners to have conjugal visits on April 18, 2025. Officials did not identify the prisoner making inaugural use of the newly constructed “sex room” at his prison in the Umbrian town of Terni. …
News in Brief
Article • December 15, 2024 • from PLN December, 2024
Filed under: News in Brief
News in Brief by Alabama: Wiregrass Daily News reported that Mobile Metro Jail guard Timothy Lee Scarbrough, 39, was arrested on September 9, 2024, and charged with first-degree sodomy for the alleged sexual assaulting of a detainee who was still under the effects of anesthesia after eye surgery. Scarbrough had …
News in Brief
Article • October 15, 2024 • from PLN October, 2024
Filed under: News in Brief
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) …
News in Brief
Article • November 1, 2021 • from PLN November, 2021
Filed under: News in Brief
News in Brief by California: A guard at San Quentin State Prison and one of two outside co-conspirators were arraigned on September 8, 2021, on federal charges they smuggled cellphones to an unnamed prisoner on death row at the California lockup. According to a statement by the U.S. Department of …
News in Brief
Article • June 1, 2021 • from PLN June, 2021
Filed under: News in Brief
News in Brief by Australia: A February 2021 ruling by the Supreme Court in the Australian province of Victoria presented “a rare win” for a prisoner contesting prison procedures, according to a report by The Conversation. The convict, 56-year-old Craig Minogue, argued that Barwon Prison’s random drug testing and strip-searching …
News in Brief
Article • March 1, 2021 • from PLN March, 2021
Filed under: News in Brief
News in Brief by Arizona: In January 2021, two women who worked at an Arizona state prison operated by Florida-based GEO Group pleaded guilty to having sex with inmates there. Melony Petrovffsky, 50, ran the commissary for the private contractor at a prison in Golden Valley, where she was allegedly …
COVID-19 Pandemic Leads to Unrest in Prisons Around the Globe
Article • July 1, 2020 • from PLN July, 2020
Filed under: COVID-19, Telephone Access, Visiting
COVID-19 Pandemic Leads to Unrest in Prisons Around the Globe by Matthew Clarke by Matt Clarke The COVID-19 pandemic, or rather government officials’ inept reaction to the pandemic, has led to unrest in prisons around the world—especially in South America and the Middle East. This has resulted in the escape …
Large Scale Releases and Public Safety
Article • June 1, 2020 • from PLN June, 2020
Filed under: COVID-19, Compassionate Release
Large Scale Releases and Public Safety by Peter Wagner Can governments safely release hundreds or thousands of people from prison? We offer 14 historical examples to show that, in fact, they already have. by Peter Wagner, Prison Policy Initiative https://www.prisonpolicy.org/blog/2020/04/09/large-scale-releases/ To protect the American public from COVID-19, schools have closed, …
News in Brief
Article • May 4, 2018 • from PLN May, 2018
Filed under: News in Brief
News in Brief by Alabama: A 33-year-old prisoner who had worked at the Koch Foods poultry plant for nearly five months while participating in a work release program was killed in an October 29, 2017 “industrial accident.” Frank Dwayne Ellington died shortly after he was caught in a machine during …
Institute for Criminal Policy Research - World Prison Population List, 2018
Publication • January 1, 2018
Filed under: Statistics/Trends
Institute for Criminal Policy Research - World Prison Population List, 2018 World Prison Population List twelfth edition Roy Walmsley Introduction This twelfth edition of the World Prison Population List gives details of the number of prisoners held in 223 prison systems in independent countries and dependent territories. It shows the …
News in Brief
Article • April 1, 2017 • from PLN April, 2017
News in Brief by Alabama: In November 2016 the Barbour County Sheriff’s Office received a faxed court order for the release of state prisoner Bobby Campbell, so of course they released him. As it turned out, however, the order was fake. “Right now we are unsure about the real source of …
News in Brief
Article • July 6, 2016 • from PLN July, 2016
Filed under: News in Brief
News in Brief by Alabama: Federal and state officials raided the Sumter County Jail on March 8, 2016 as part of an investigation into the Sumter County Sheriff’s Department. The search led a grand jury to recommend the impeachment of Sheriff Tyrone Clark and issue an indictment against him the …
The Death Penalty in the United States and the Force of Regional Human Rights Law
Article • July 30, 2014
Filed under: Eighth Amendment, International Law, Death Penalty
The Death Penalty in the United States and the Force of Regional Human Rights Law by Saira Mohamed The Death Penalty in the United States and the Force of Regional Human Rights Law by Saira Mohamed The botched execution last month of Oklahoma prisoner Clayton Lockett has focused attention on …
Italian Prison Program Trains Female Prisoners in Fashion Industry
Article • July 15, 2013 • from PLN July, 2013
Filed under: Work, Prison Industries, Prisoners-International
Italian Prison Program Trains Female Prisoners in Fashion Industry by Derek Gilna Leave it to the Italians to extend their love of fashion to a women's prison. At the Rebibbia facility in Rome, the well-known fashion house of Fendi is supporting a voluntary training program where women prisoners manufacture handbags. …
Sylvia Baraldini Goes Home After Sixteen Years
Article • February 15, 2000 • from PLN February, 2000
Filed under: Discrimination, Political Prisoners, Immigration
Sylvia Baraldini Goes Home After Sixteen Years by Julia Lutsky Sylvia Baraldini Goes Home after Sixteen Years by Julia Lutsky On August 25, 1999, after more than a decade of battle to return to her homeland, Sylvia Baraldini was transferred from the federal prison at Danbury, Connecticut to the Rebibbia …
Solidarity with Revolutionary Prisoners
Article • September 15, 1993 • from PLN September, 1993
Filed under: Political Prisoners, International, Prisoners-International
Solidarity with Revolutionary Prisoners by Solidarity With Revolutionary Prisoners We are a committee formed by two Italian political groups (Il Bollettino and Solidarieta Proletaria), which have been focusing on revolutionary political prisoners for a number of years, since the early eighties. Our activity of support for political prisoners not disassociated …
View From Italy
Article • September 15, 1991 • from PLN September, 1991
Filed under: Discrimination, Political Prisoners
View From Italy by Giovanni Senzanni The U.S. prison system is one of the worst in the world: it is a means of mass oppression and control against the "minorities" (the people of the inside colony) and the proletarians - a perfect example of "class justice" as Marx said - …
Political Prisoners Beaten
Article • May 15, 1990 • from PLN May, 1990
Filed under: Political Prisoners, Excessive Force, Guard Brutality/Beatings, Prisoners-International
Political Prisoners Beaten by Novara, Italy On January 30, 1990, 20 political prisoners (members of the Red Brigades) held a sit-in, in the political prison to protest the continued solitary confinement of a fellow prisoner based on a guard's trumped up allegations. After 30 minutes of refusing to return to …