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May 31, 2006

In the Black(water) (Hurricane Katrina)

by JEREMY SCAHILL
[from the June 5, 2006 issue]The Nation

Tens of thousands of Hurricane Katrina victims remain without homes. The environment is devastated. People are disenfranchised. Financial resources, desperate residents are told, are scarce. But at least New Orleans has a Wal-Mart parking lot serving as a FEMA Disaster Recovery Center with perhaps the tightest security of any parking lot in the world. That's thanks to the more than $30 million Washington has shelled out to the Blackwater USA security firm since its men deployed after Katrina hit.. Under contract with the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) Federal Protective Service, Blackwater's men are ostensibly protecting federal reconstruction projects for FEMA.

Documents show that the government paid Blackwater $950 a day for each of its guards in the area. Interviewed by The Nation last September, several of the company's guards stationed in New Orleans said they were being paid $350 a day. That would have left Blackwater with $600 per man, per day to cover lodging, ammo, other overhead--and profits.

Shortly after the hurricane hit, Blackwater "launched a helicopter and crew with no contract, no one paying us, that went down to New Orleans," says company vice chairman Cofer Black. "We saved some 150 people that otherwise wouldn't have been saved. And, as a result of that, we've had a very positive experience." Indeed. It was only days after the company arrived that it started reeling in lucrative deals.

According to Blackwater's government contracts, obtained by The Nation, from September 8 to September 30, 2005, Blackwater was paid $409,000 for providing fourteen guards and four vehicles to "protect the temporary morgue in Baton Rouge, LA." That contract kicked off a hurricane boon for Blackwater. From September to the end of December 2005, the government paid Blackwater at least $33.3 million--well surpassing the amount of Blackwater's contract to guard Ambassador Paul Bremer when he was head of the US occupation of Iraq. And the company has likely raked in much more in the hurricane zone. Exactly how much is unclear, as attempts to get information on Blackwater's current contracts in New Orleans have been unsuccessful.

"We saw the costs, in terms of accountability and dollars, for this practice in Iraq, and now we are seeing it in New Orleans," says Illinois Democrat Jan Schakowsky, who has been one of Blackwater's few critics in Congress. "They have again given a sweetheart contract--without an open bidding process--to a company with close ties to the Administration."

After The Nation exposed Blackwater's operations in New Orleans this past fall [see "Blackwater Down," October 10, 2005], Schakowsky and a handful of other Congress members raised questions about the scandal. They entered the report into the Congressional Record during hearings on Katrina and cited it in letters to DHS Inspector General Richard Skinner, who then began an inquiry. In letters to Congressional offices in February, Skinner defended the Blackwater deal, asserting that it was "appropriate" for the government to contract with the company. Skinner admitted that "the ongoing cost of the contract...is clearly very high" and then quietly dropped a bombshell: "It is expected that FEMA will require guard services on a relatively long-term basis (two to five years)." Two to five years? Already most of the 330 federally contracted private guards in the hurricane zone are working for Blackwater, according to the Washington Post. Another firm, DynCorp, is also trying to grab more of the action, offering its security services for less than $700 per day per guard.

The hurricane's aftermath has ushered in the homecoming of the "war on terror," a contract bonanza whereby companies can reap massive Iraq-like profits without leaving the country and at a minuscule fraction of the risk. To critics of the government's handling of the hurricane, the message is clear.

"That's what happens when the victims are black folks vilified before and after the storm--instead of aid, they get contained," says Chris Kromm, executive director of the Institute for Southern Studies and an editor of Gulf Coast Reconstruction Watch. "If officials really cared about protecting the people of New Orleans, they wouldn't be giving millions to scandal-ridden contractors. They would have given the city money to rebuild their levees to withstand more than a Category 2 Hurricane. They still haven't done that--and hurricane season is upon us."

Kromm alleges that vital projects that have "gotten zero or little money" in New Orleans include: job creation, hospital and school reconstruction, affordable housing and wetlands restoration. Even in this context, DHS continues to defend the Blackwater contract. In a March 1 memo to FEMA, Matt Jadacki, the DHS Special Inspector General for Gulf Coast Hurricane Recovery, wrote that the Federal Protective Service considered Blackwater "the best value to the government."

While companies like Halliburton may have raked in more profits since George W. Bush took office, few have seen growth as dramatic as Blackwater's. The firm has been at the front of the line at the domestic and international taxpayer-funded feeding troughs and has recently hired some high-profile former government officials, like Cofer Black, former chief of CIA counterterrorism, and former Pentagon Inspector General Joseph Schmitz. In March Black represented Blackwater at a conference in Jordan, announcing that the company was seeking to broaden its role in even more conflict zones. Blackwater is rapidly expanding its operations, creating a new surveillance-blimp division, launching new training facilities in California and the Philippines, and increasingly setting its sights on the lucrative world of DHS contracts. It is clamoring to get into Darfur and has also hired Chilean troops trained under the brutal rule of Augusto Pinochet. "We scour the ends of the earth to find professionals," company president Gary Jackson told the Guardian. "The Chilean commandos are very, very professional, and they fit within the Blackwater system." The business magazine Fast Company recently named Jackson one of its "Fast 50," predicting that the company and its president are in for "a very strong (and long) decade."

It's hard to imagine that the cronyism that has marked the Bush Administration is not at play in Blackwater's success. Blackwater founder Erik Prince shares Bush's fundamentalist Christian views. He comes from a powerful Michigan Republican family and social circle, and his father, Edgar, helped Gary Bauer start the Family Research Council. According to a report prepared for The Nation by the Center for Responsive Politics, in all of Erik Prince's political funding generosity since 1989, he has never given a penny to a Democrat running for national office. Company president Jackson has also given money to Republican candidates. For his part, Joseph Schmitz--the former Pentagon Inspector General turned general counsel to Blackwater's parent, The Prince Group--lists on his résumé membership in the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, a Christian militia formed before the First Crusade. Like Prince, he comes from a right-wing family; his father, former Congressman John Schmitz, was an ultraconservative John Birch Society director who later ran for President. Joseph Schmitz was once in charge of investigating private contractors like Blackwater, but he resigned amid allegations of stonewalling investigations conducted by his department. He now represents one of the most successful of those contractors.

Schakowsky charges that the Administration has written Blackwater "blank checks," saying that the internal DHS review of the company "leaves us with more questions than answers." She points out that the report fails to address the major issues stemming from deploying private forces on US streets. In her testimony this past September, Schakowsky said, "Ask any American if they want thugs from a private, for-profit company with no official law-enforcement training roaming the streets of their neighborhoods. The answer will be a resounding NO."

Blackwater's ascent comes in the midst of a major rebranding campaign aimed at shaking its mercenary image. The company is at the forefront of the trade association of mercenary firms, the International Peace Operations Association, which lobbies for even greater privatization of military operations. Blackwater and its cause have clearly found serious backing in the Bush Administration. Hiring Blackwater, says Schakowsky, "may be legal, but it is not a good deal for taxpayers and Gulf region residents in particular." Blackwater's sweetheart deals, both domestic and international, are representative of how business has been done under Bush. They are a troubling indicator of a trend toward less accountability and transparency and greater privatization of critical government functions. It's time that more members of Congress ask tough questions about Blackwater and its rapid, profitable rise.
This article can be found on the web at
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060605/scahill

Posted by lois at 11:05 PM | Comments (0)

CA: A Policy where women spend 150% more time in jail

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-jails29may29,1,4820897.story?coll=la-headlines-california

From the Los Angeles Times
THE STATE
Terms Differ in Jail Releases
Experts worry Sheriff Baca's policy of having certain prisoners serve more time for the same crime may invite `equal protection' challenges.
By Stuart Pfeifer
Times Staff Writer

May 29, 2006

Under its policy of selectively releasing criminals to ease jail overcrowding, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department has routinely forced women, prostitutes arrested in Compton and certain gang members to serve more time than others convicted of identical crimes.

Prosecutors and legal experts fear the practice could be illegal and prompt lawsuits challenging its constitutionality.

"It could not be more upside down and backward," Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley said.

The county lacks the resources to hold all the people being sent to jail, but at the same time Sheriff Lee Baca is under federal court order to avoid overcrowding in the nation's largest jail system.

Therefore, Baca says, he has no choice but to direct jailers to free dozens of inmates every day under a set of rules that governs which inmates get out early — many after serving less than 10% of their sentences — and which stay behind bars.

Under the policy, inmates arrested in certain crime-plagued regions are incarcerated 10 times longer than those arrested for the same crimes in other parts of the county, according to interviews and the department's two-page "Release Criteria."

For example, people convicted of prostitution in areas served by the sheriff's Compton and Century stations are required to serve 100% of their sentences, while those convicted of prostitution in the rest of the county serve 10%.

That's because the department is cracking down on prostitution in those regions, and officials believe the program would be less effective if inmates were released early, said sheriff's Chief Marc Klugman, who oversees the jails.

The department has also made exceptions for members of a Hawaiian Gardens gang implicated in the June 2005 slaying of Deputy Jerry Ortiz.

Department policy now calls for those associated with the gang to serve full sentences for any crime for which they are convicted.

The arbitrary nature of those decisions worries Cooley and others, who say the policy could violate the "equal protection" clause of the Constitution, which requires similarly situated people to be treated equally by the government.

Long Beach City Prosecutor Tom Reeves said he was concerned for other reasons. Forcing Compton prostitutes to serve their entire sentences could push them over the border into Long Beach, where prostitutes convicted by Reeves' office serve just 10% of their sentences.

"I guess it must be a much more serious crime in Compton than it is in Long Beach," Reeves said. "That upsets me a great deal because we have quality-of-life issues, just as Compton does."

There are also gender-equity issues.

Over the years, the Sheriff's Department has maintained different release policies for men and women, even for those convicted of the same crimes.

Male and female inmates are housed in separate jail sections, and sheriff's officials said their release policies are based on the amount of space available and fluctuations in arrests.

Two years ago, women convicted of all but the most serious crimes were released immediately, serving none of their sentences. But in the last year, the department required women convicted of assault to serve 25% of their sentences while men served just 10%.

Klugman said he changed the policy earlier this month. Men and women now are eligible for release after serving 10% of their time.

"You could probably go through this entire early release policy and nitpick it and find all kinds of inequities. But remember: No one has a right to early release," Klugman said.

The Sheriff's Department has released inmates early from its jails for decades to deal with overcrowding issues. Faced with steep cuts to its budget, the sheriff started closing jail facilities in 2002 and dramatically increased the practice of early release.

A staff of civilian clerks decides who is released by reviewing inmate files and the release criteria drafted by department executives.

In the last four years, the department has freed more than 150,000 inmates three or more days early. According to an investigation by The Times, nearly 16,000 of those were charged with committing new crimes during the time they would otherwise have been in custody, including 518 robberies, 215 sex crimes and 16 murders.

Last Tuesday, the Sheriff's Department announced that it would begin looking into inmates' criminal records before deciding whether they should be released early. Those with past convictions for violent or serious crimes would be held for their entire sentences, Klugman said.

That announcement underscored the difficult task the Sheriff's Department has in striking a balance between meeting a federal court order that prohibits the agency from overcrowding the jails and its duty to protect the public.

Cooley said he wants the department and county leaders to find a way to hold all inmates for their entire sentences. In the meantime, the prosecutor said, he's concerned about how the department is deciding who will be released. The decision about how much time inmates serve should be made by judges who have reviewed all relevant factors, not civilian clerks, Cooley said.

A policy that calls for women to spend 150% more time in jail than men convicted of the same type of crime appears to be "unconstitutional on its face," Cooley said.

Applying sentences differently based on where the crimes were committed could also pose problems, he said.

Prompted by questions from The Times, Cooley last week assigned attorneys to investigate whether the sheriff's early release policy is violating some inmates' constitutional rights. Although the review is just underway, Cooley said he was troubled to learn that the department is making its decisions based on geography, gender and other factors — instead of following judges' intentions.

"We need to spend more time with the Sheriff's Department and explain these concepts to them," Cooley said.

Steve Whitmore, a spokesman for Baca, said the sheriff would welcome suggestions from Cooley's staff. He said the department previously had been unable to get prosecutors to help devise an early release protocol.

"The sheriff welcomes his participation and looks forward to it," Whitmore said. "We believe the district attorney's office can be helpful."

Eugene Volokh, a professor of constitutional law at UCLA, said he believes the department has the right to prioritize enforcement efforts and can legally hold some inmates longer than others for the same crimes.

But he questioned the past policy of holding women longer than men.

"Having separate sentences based on whether you're a man or woman, I would say, would be presumptively unconstitutional," Volokh said. "At the very least it poses serious constitutional questions."

Duke University's Erwin Chemerinsky said, "Imagine if the Legislature said women who commit assault will serve 2 1/2 times more than the men who committed the same crime. No one would stand for that."

He suggested that the Board of Supervisors or Legislature might be better suited to establish guidelines for early release.

David Bennett, a Utah-based jail consultant who has advised counties on dealing with overcrowded facilities for more than 25 years, said the county needs to form a plan that makes sense. Leaving everything in the hands of the sheriff is unfair and ineffective, he said.

"L.A. County has to rethink its whole criminal justice plan because this doesn't work," Bennett said. The sheriff "should not have to put on a judicial robe and release people early. He's had to do this because the rest of the system is broken. It needs the involvement and leadership of the entire criminal justice system."

*------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Times staff writer Jack Leonard contributed to this report.

Posted by lois at 08:41 PM | Comments (0)

Durham, NC: Social Injustice Meeting

Social Injustice Meeting
(Lock’em up & throw away the key strategies are breaking the bank and destroying families)
DATE: Saturday, June 17, 2006
TIME: 9:00 a.m. until 3:00 p.m.
Place: Hayti Heritage Center
804 Old Fayetteville Street
Durham, NC 27701
IS HAS BEEN 20 YEARS SINCE THE “WAR ON DRUGS” BEGAN AND THE IMPACT HAS DISPORTIONATELY AFFECTED COMMUNITIES OF COLOR!!!!!!
YOU NEED TO ATTEND THIS MEETING IF:

1) YOU have a loved one or know someone that is incarcerated in the Federal Prison system serving a mandatory minimum sentence.

2) YOU have a loved one or know someone IS AFFECTED BY THE “WAR ON DRUGS”

3) YOU are a CONCERNED CITIZEN that would like to have a say about how your tax dollars are being spent.

4) YOU are concerned that we are spending more on PRISONS THAN on EDUCATION

5) YOU WANT YOUR LOVED ONE’S HOME!!!!!!!

The National NAACP Prisoner Rights Sub-Committee, NC-FAMM (Families Against Mandatory Minimums), The Freedom Project, and Project R.E.A.C.H. will host this meeting to help you and your family through these trying times. Please come out and join the movement to bring our loved ones home and restore justice.
FOR MORE INFORMATION CALL:
LaFonda Jones-General at 919-530-8077

Posted by lois at 08:35 PM | Comments (0)

MA: Mandatory supervision sought for people who have been incarcerated

Mandatory supervision sought for freed cons
By Michele McPhee, Boston Herald
Wednesday, May 31, 2006 - Updated: 01:49 PM EST

The Massachusetts Parole Board wants to make it mandatory for all violent offenders to be released into supervised settings, a move Mayor Thomas M. Menino said could be a deterrent to convicts going back to lives of crime.
“No one should be getting out of prison without supervision,” Menino said yesterday.

“We do not want any of these convicts going back to their old ways. Without supervision, without help, guidance, that happens,” he said.
Massachusetts does not mandate postrelease supervision for the more than 20,000 cons being released each year, a legislative lapse that leaves the most dangerous population of people unsupervised,Maureen Walsh, chairwoman of the state’s parole board, said in a recent interview.
In 2005, 7,923 prisoners were released, but just 2,177 are now under parole supervision, according to statistics obtained by the Herald.
Walsh said there are roughly 2,200 convicts who served time for violent crimes being released each year and more than half of those offenders opt to serve their entire sentence rather than face supervision by parole officers.
Gov. Mitt Romney has filed a bill to take away that option.
One convict who opted to stay behind bars for an extra year rather than pay $55 a month to be paroled was Joseph Gomes, 39. Gomes, of Dorchester, was released from prison in April after serving roughly nine years behind bars for armed robbery and other charges.
“I didn’t want to be under supervision. I’ve been under supervision since I was 13 years old,” Gomes told the Herald this week.
Since his release, he has been having trouble landing a job, Gomes said.
The state, for its part, has substantially increased its budget to help people like Gomes re-enter society.
In fiscal year 2006, the state received more than $1.7 million in federal funds for re-entry programs, a huge leap over grant money awarded in years past. In 2003, the state received just $114,051 to help convicts after their release from prison, according to Donald Giancioppo, executive director the Massachusetts Parole Board.
Yesterday the Herald reported that 171 killers convicted of second-degree murder have been paroled since 2002.

Posted by lois at 08:23 PM | Comments (0)

May 28, 2006

Article by former program supervisor at Hampden County Jail in MA

"The plans to build a new prison for women in Chicopee has sparked new discussion about an old issue. When state administrators invest in new prisons, judges will fill these new prisons with inmates. However, the state prison administrators should be increasing investment in community corrections or other alternatives to incarceration. "

http://bridgenews.org/news/062006/crimjust

Written by : Barry D'Andrea
Last modified 2006-05-27

I have worked in the adult and juvenile prisons for over 16 years. Until March 2006, I was the Program Supervisor for the Violence Prevention Program at the Hampden County Correctional Center in Ludlow. I have developed an awareness of issues of injustice and ethics in the criminal justice system.

1‹Systemic Racism and Class Oppression in the Criminal Justice System.

The criminal justice system is designed to arrest and prosecute persons who have committed "blue collar" crimes. These crimes are committed usually by persons who are poor, minority, desperate, addicted to drugs or alcohol, or mentally ill. The criminal justice system is NOT designed to arrest and prosecute persons who have committed "white collar" crimes. These are crimes of fraud and environmental destruction that are committed by persons who are wealthy, educated and in positions of power and influence in society.

For example, a policeman who wants to arrest a criminal can easily find a person addicted to drugs who is committing some kind of crime to maintain his or her addiction, such as prostitution or drug dealing or shop lifting. To find such a person the police officer simply needs to drive into poor communities where drug dealing or prostitution can be seen easily. This policeman would never consider going to banks, mortgage companies, realtors, corporate presidents to arrest them for fraud, false advertising, toxic waste dumping or environmental destruction.

2‹Prisons as Institutions for Persons with Mental Illness

When Ronald Reagan was president, he advocated the release of persons with mental illness from institutions. However, President Reagan did not ensure that programs to help persons with mental illness in the community were sufficiently funded. As a result, the prisons of America have become the new institutions for persons with mental illness. What is worse is that prisons are not designed to provide persons with mental illness with a therapeutic environment that would help them function better.

3‹Prisons as Institutions for Persons with Alcoholism or Addictions

Many persons with alcoholism or addictions end up in the prison system. Most prisons have few or no programs to assist them in their recovery from alcohol and drugs.

There should be new alternative to incarceration for persons who have committed a crime due to an addiction or alcoholism issue.

I propose that an alternative to incarceration could be mandatory treatment. That is to say, a person who has been arrested for a crime related to alcoholism or addiction should be given the option to enter into a mandatory and secured treatment facility. If he completes the treatment program satisfactorily, then he does not have to go to prison. His or her detention in the secured treatment facility would NOT be regarded as a punishment or a sentence for a crime. The record of his detention in a secured treatment facility would not be regarded as part of his criminal record. Further, if the person satisfactorily completes the treatment program, the record of his arrest and conviction is then expunged.

The purpose of this proposal is to ensure that addicts and alcoholics are dealt with as persons who have an illness that needs to be treated, not as criminals.

4‹No Methadone in Prisons

In most prisons, the medical staff do not provide methadone to new inmates who are withdrawing from heroin addiction. Persons who have been using heroin for many years may have severe withdrawal symptoms. Also, they may have other serious medical conditions (i.e. heart conditions, high blood pressure, diabetes, infections) while they are going through a difficult withdrawal. The severe withdrawal symptoms for some addicts may exacerbate other medical conditions and cause new complications or even death. Last summer a woman who was an addict suddenly died at the Hampden County Correctional Center in Ludlow. Apparently she had some kind of other medical condition that worsened as she entered into withdrawal without the support of methadone.

I propose that medical officers in prisons develop new policies and procedures so that the medicine of methadone can be provided to inmates under certain conditions.

5‹No Classification Protocols in Juvenile Detention Facilities or Orphanages

The juvenile detention centers are in chaos and full of violence. The staff are under so much stress that there is a high turnover of personnel in juvenile detention centers. Unfortunately, the children who are detained in juvenile detention facilities do not have the option to leave, as adult employees can do.

There is no effective classification of juvenile offenders into minimum, medium or maximum security facilities. Juveniles who are violent and abusive are detained in minimum security juvenile detention center where they terrorize children who are not aggressive. Due to the absence of a rational classification process in juvenile detention facilities, vulnerable and non-violent children are housed in the same facility with other juveniles who are bullies and violent. The vulnerable and non-violent children then can be easily bullied or abused by the older more aggressive juveniles.

Administrators in juvenile detention facilities or orphanages are reluctant to transfer out of their facility juveniles who are bullies or abusive to the other children because they then would lose funding. 6‹Elimination or Reduction of Treatment Programs

At the Hampden County Correctional Center, administrators have implemented a new policy that has not been approved by the superintendents or communicated to the public. This policy is to eliminate or reduce treatment programs wherever possible and to replace them with education based programs only.

Some inmates have severe emotional or psychological disorders for which the medicine of treatment and psychotherapy is essential.

The HCCC prison administrators (Thomas Rovelli, Guy Prairie and Basil
Tsagaris) eliminate the treatment based programs claiming that they are too expensive to operate in a prison. However, after eliminating the treatment based programs the prison administrators can then award themselves salary increases. This is exploitation of powerless inmates. The prison administrators harm inmates by removing from them the medicine of psychotherapy and treatment based programs. Then these same prison administrators take the money that previously had been budgeted for treatment programs and then put that money into their own paychecks.

7‹No Community Supervision of Prisons

The community members are not involved in the administration or supervision of prisons. Thus, prison administrators can implement unethical policies and procedures in secret from concerned citizens in the community.

I propose that community representatives be permitted to attend high level administration meetings with superintendents in the prisons. In a democracy, the administration of prisons should be transparent to the community and not held in secret.

8‹No Voting for Inmates

Inmates are not permitted to vote local, state or federal elections. It is impossible to lead inmates to become good citizens participating in democracy when the right to vote is taken from them.

I propose that inmates be permitted to vote and to register to vote while they are in prison.

9‹Convicted Felons Lose Professional Licenses

Persons who have been convicted of a felony often lose their professional licenses. For example, a lawyer who is convicted of a drug charge may lose his license to practice law. This hinders them from succeeding in the community as law abiding persons because they cannot return to their previous profession.

I propose that persons who were convicted of a felony that is unrelated to the duties of their profession be permitted to retain their professional license after their sentence is completed. After their debt to society has been paid in full by completion of their sentence in prison, they can then return to gainful employment in their previous profession. 10‹Cover-up of Sexual Exploitation of Inmates

At the Hampden County Correctional Center, an unqualified white female therapist sexually exploited a vulnerable black man who was her client in therapy in the prison. This female therapist did not have any degree in counseling. She was completely unqualified to work as a therapist in a specialized field. However, she was given the position as therapist because she was a close friend of Sheriff Ashe's daughter.

This man's recovery from addictions and criminal conduct was undermined by his having been sexually abused by his incompetent therapist. The man relapsed back to criminal conduct and was convicted of a new crime and sent back to prison. However, the unethical conduct by his therapist was quickly covered up by administrators at the Hampden County Correctional Center. The woman who sexually abused her client later obtained a license as a social worker.

This is a case where the criminal justice system is quick to prosecute a black man who is an addict but fails to punish or prosecute a white woman who sexually exploited a vulnerable man in her care. The black man goes to prison and the white woman enjoys gainful employment as a social worker at liberty in the community.

I propose that there should be an open community investigation to determine why the administrators at the HCCC did not inform the state licensure board about the unethical conduct of this woman who sexually exploited her vulnerable client.

11‹Absence of Treatment Programs

In most prisons there are few or no treatment programs to assist inmates with their personal issues. Many inmates need the medicine of psychotherapy or group therapy in order to maintain sobriety and to correct their past patterns of criminal conduct. To deny inmates the opportunity for such treatment is "cruel" punishment (although probably not "unusual").

I propose community supervision of prisons to ensure that inmate receive group therapy and treatment specific to their needs in rehabilitation. This treatment should be compassionate but also challenge inmates to take responsibility for correcting their abusive or criminal conduct and to maintain sobriety from alcohol and drugs.

12‹More Prisons

The plans to build a new prison for women in Chicopee has sparked new discussion about an old issue. When state administrators invest in new prisons, judges will fill these new prisons with inmates. However, the state prison administrators should be increasing investment in community corrections or other alternatives to incarceration.

I propose that there be a moratorium on the construction of new prisons. During the moratorium, concerned citizens can discuss with state prison administrators new strategies for holding criminals responsible for their conduct that would be an alternative to incarceration.

http://bridgenews.org/news/062006/crimjust

Posted by lois at 11:58 AM | Comments (0)

May 24, 2006

Tex. Court Overturns Convictions Under ‘Fetal Rights’ Law

NewStandard
Tex. Court Overturns Convictions Under ‘Fetal Rights’ Law
by Michelle Chen
Drawing an unlikely consensus between opposing sides of the abortion debate, a Texas court has ruled that the state cannot criminalize a woman for drug-use that impacts her fetus.

Apr. 4 – Physiologically, little comes between a pregnant woman and her developing fetus, but some officials have tried to expand the state's power to intervene in the name of protecting prenatal life.

Last week, a Texas appeals court overturned the convictions of two women who had used illegal drugs while pregnant, invalidating the prosecution's controversial reading of a state law protecting the unborn. The decision, which skirted the constitutional issues at the center of the national abortion debate, drew support from a diverse host of both pro- and anti-abortion-rights groups.

The state had prosecuted the women under the state's Prenatal Protection Act of 2003, which allows civil and criminal penalties against conduct leading to prenatal injury or death. The statute redefines "individual" in the Texas criminal code to include "an unborn child at every stage of gestation from fertilization until birth."

Tracy Yolanda Ward admitted to using crack cocaine while pregnant, after her newborn son tested positive for cocaine in 2003. Rhonda Tulane Smith, whose daughter was tainted with methamphetamine at birth, confessed to drug use while pregnant that same year. Both were sentenced to five years probation in 2004 for transferring drugs to their fetuses.

Prosecutors in Amarillo charged the women under Texas's Controlled Substances Act, accusing them of "delivering" drugs to their unborn children, essentially indicting them for a kind of in-utero drug dealing. The appeals court, however, unanimously struck down the convictions last week on the grounds that the prosecutor had overreached in charging the women with passing drugs to their fetuses through the umbilical cord.

A coalition of progressive groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, the Harm Reduction Coalition and National Advocates for Pregnant Women, celebrated the ruling as a push back against "fetal rights" laws that many states have enacted. Abortion-rights groups say such legislation threatens the Fourth Amendment right to privacy – the same provision that guided the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade establishing abortion rights nationwide.

"Inherently personal decisions relating to individual autonomy are constitutionally protected," the ACLU had written in its friend-of-the-court brief, "and women do not lose the right to privacy when they become pregnant."

In the prosecution's brief, District Attorney Randall Sims had argued, "Prosecuting these appellants impinges on their choice about reproductive matters no more than prosecuting them for theft, welfare fraud, sexual assault or any other criminal offense."

But Lynn Paltrow, executive director of National Advocates for Pregnant Women, said that the court's decision affirmed that "problems women face during pregnancy should never be addressed through the criminal justice system." She added, "There should be broad consensus, regardless of people's positions on the abortion issue, that threatening pregnant women [who have] health problems with arrest is not an effective way of protecting either pregnant women or their children."

Those at the forefront of the anti-abortion-rights movement have also supported the overturning of the convictions. Adding a political nuance to the "fetal rights" debate, the group Texas Right to Life says that while the unborn deserve protection as individuals, pregnant women should receive treatment rather than punishment for drug abuse.

"We don't want an unborn child to be harmed in any way," said Stacey Emick, legislative director for Texas Right to Life, which pushed for the Prenatal Protection Act's passage in 2003. "So the preference," she continued, "is for healthcare providers to intervene and to support a woman in keeping her child."

If a drug-addicted woman faces criminal penalties for her treatment of her fetus, she told The NewStandard, "then she may have an abortion. So, we would rather her not even think of that."

The Act, primarily intended to protect pregnant women and their fetuses from violent crime and domestic abuse, explicitly exempts "conduct committed by the mother of the unborn child," as well as medical procedures to terminate pregnancies.

However, the district attorney's office has consistently argued that the Controlled Substances Act, which bars the "delivery" or "transfer" of an illegal drug to a person under 18 years old, applied to the women under the Prenatal Protection Act's definition of fetuses as "individuals." That law carries a penalty of up to 20 years in prison.

In 2003, then-District Attorney Rebecca King issued a letter to healthcare providers advising personnel to report drug use by pregnant women to law enforcement. She stated that most of the women would "qualify for probation, which will allow [authorities] to legally mandate medical services" to treat the mother and child.

Before leaving office in early 2005, King charged eighteen women with delivering drugs to their fetuses.

But last January, after Ward and Smith had already pleaded guilty, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott issued an official opinion declaring that the Prenatal Protection Act's exemption for pregnant women also shields them from the Controlled Substances Act. The prosecutors in the case nonetheless stood by the original charges throughout the appeals process.

Unlike litigation in other states that has challenged fetal-rights policies on constitutional grounds, the Texas appeals court ruled instead on a technical basis, avoiding the heavier issues.

According to the organization Center for Reproductive Rights, in the first half of 2005, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada and Louisiana all enacted fetal-rights legislation expanding child-abuse or neglect statutes to cover newborns testing positive for drugs. On the federal level, the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, enacted in 2004 amid intense political controversy, holds that a fetus that is criminally harmed or injured is a separate victim in addition to the mother, though the law does not address conduct by pregnant women themselves.

While generally acknowledging the dangers of drug addiction during pregnancy, many public-health professionals argue that intervention by law enforcement will simply instill women with the fear that those they turn to for help will end up turning them in.

In a statement accompanying National Advocates for Pregnant Women's friend-of-the-court brief, David Schneider, Chair of the Public Health Commission of the American Academy of Family Physicians, predicted: "When patients know that physicians are required to report patient behavior to the authorities... women will stop seeking necessary medical care, including drug treatment. We will have more drug-addicted babies, babies born with lower birth weights, and stillbirths."

Critics also say fetal-rights prosecutions have a discriminatory impact on minority women. In 1989, for instance, law enforcement authorities began targeting a hospital in a poor, mostly black community in Charleston, South Carolina, to root out women testing positive for drug use during pregnancy. The Supreme Court ruled in 2001 that the intrusive testing, which had led to a spate of arrests and detentions of pregnant and post-partum women, had violated the women's civil rights.

Pointing to a stark imbalance between punitive measures and health resources, Paltrow of National Advocates for Pregnant Women said that pregnant women with substance-abuse problems too often lack access to appropriate treatment facilities in their communities. Prosecutions based on fetal-rights laws, she said, "create the illusion that there is treatment… when in all sorts of healthcare areas, patients of all kinds, and particularly ones… who have drug problems, are completely abandoned."
© 2006 The NewStandard. All rights reserved. http://newstandardnews.net
http://newstandardnews.net/content/index.cfm/items/3024

Posted by lois at 06:52 PM | Comments (0)

May 23, 2006

We Are All Prisoners Now

New America Media, Commentary, Nell Bernstein, May 23, 2006

Editor's Note: Today, one in 10 American children has a parent under criminal justice supervision -- many for non-violent drug offenses. As incarceration touches the lives of more and more Americans, a backlash against the drug war may be brewing. Nell Bernstein is the author of "All Alone in the World: Children of the Incarcerated" (The New Press, 2005).

Over the past year, 1,000 new prisoners entered America's packed jails and prisons every week, bringing the nation's prison population to 2.2 million-- a record high here and anywhere on the planet.

During much of this time, I was traveling around the country speaking in person and on talk radio about my book, "All Alone in the World: Children of the Incarcerated." Everywhere I went, without exception, I heard the samething: My family has been touched by this, too.

Once, after a radio interview, the engineer told me that he had been arrested in front of his children. Another time, the engineer was a young grandmother trying to gain custody of her incarcerated son's children. During yet another interview, the host announced on-air that his brother-in-law had done time, leaving his children fatherless.

In reporting my book I spoke with children across the country whose families had been severed by incarceration, and particularly by the drug war, which is single-handedly responsible for the boom in the prison population. Many of these children were black: African-American children are nine times more likely than white children to have an incarcerated parent. But plenty were
white: the drug laws, while disproportionately targeting blacks (who use drugs at almost exactly the same rate as whites -- and so make up about 14 percent of the nation's drug users -- but comprise 74 percent of the nation's drug prisoners), are so broadly written that they inevitably reach beyond these targets.

When I set out to promote my book, I hoped to let those who had little first-hand experience of the criminal justice system see that system through children's eyes. I hoped to spark new ways of thinking about crime and punishment. Think of it, I imagined myself exhorting the unenlightened, as if it were your children.

This instruction, I quickly learned, was superfluous. Everywhere I went, someone told me, This is my child. This is my story, too.

A reading at a Borders Books in Phoenix quickly devolved into a tearful group therapy session. One woman -- a black child-welfare worker -- was struggling with whether to take her young son to visit his incarcerated father. Another -- a middle-age white woman who looked every inch the soccer mom -- had been visiting her daughter, a grad student picked up for her first DUI, in the county jail for the past several months, and was stunned by the hostile indifference she met as a family member.

At a university in New Mexico, a student thanked me for the book; she came to the reading, she told me, because of her younger brother, who is growing up in the shadow of their mother's incarceration. She herself, she hastened to add, was no longer affected; she was grown up now and able to care for herself. Then, in the lobby of the student center, she began to shake.

I spent five years researching my book, talked to hundreds of children; I thought I had limned the pain caused by our policy of indiscriminate incarceration. I may have tested the depth of that pain, but I underestimated its breadth.

Is it desperation that leads me to find hope in these numbers? One of the basic functions of incarceration is invisibility: We place our prisons in remote rural counties, build high walls and lock out the media. Then we fortify those walls with stigma, so that those who have been there, or seen family sent there, will keep that journey secret.

But an elephant can grow only so large before people start remarking on its presence in the living room. One in 10 American children has a parent under criminal justice supervision today -- in jail, in prison, on probation or parole. The number does not include those who have had this experience at some point in their lives, or those who will. Those who have lived or worked inside a prison, or seen a family member spirited away, have seen what we are hiding from ourselves, and they are beginning to speak out. I have to believe that it is their voices, their experience, that will turn back the tidal wave that incarceration has become.

Last month in Florida, Governor Jeb Bush signed an executive order aimed at rolling back the multiple restrictions on employment that make it virtually impossible for those leaving prison to get back on their feet. He's got occasion enough to be concerned: Each of his three children has had run-ins with the police, and his daughter Noelle has found herself behind bars, albeit briefly, because of her drug problem.

At a drug policy conference in Florida after his daughter's arrest, Jeb Bush wept at the podium as he talked about his family's struggle. Critics were quick to cry "hypocrite," for Bush had previously cut state-funded rehab programs. But rather than pointing fingers, why not ask Bush to join hands with the thousands of parents whose children are locked up in his state prisons for non-violent drug crimes; the thousands of children who won't have Dad there to bail them out when they forge a Xanax scrip (Noelle's crime), because Dad is incarcerated, too.

The reasoned arguments against the drug war have been made ad infinitem, and new ones emerge every day. A study released in April, for example, found that Proposition 36, California's treatment-instead-of-incarceration
initiative, has saved the state's taxpayer's $7 for every dollar spent.

The economic argument against indiscriminate incarceration is irrefutable, but that doesn't mean it can't be ignored. What may bring it home is a river of tears, from governors and grandmothers -- the millions of Americans who have seen their families shattered by our insistence on answering addiction, and myriad other social problems, with incarceration only.

In Phoenix, I told the weeping soccer mom with the DUI daughter how powerful her testimony was, and encouraged her to share it more widely. Not now, she said; not while her daughter is still in the clutches of the state. But soon, she promised, we'd be hearing from her.

http://news.ncmonline.com/news/view_article.html?article_id=499190e571343d35
5f79edf8130614e6

Posted by lois at 08:03 PM | Comments (0)

BJS: Prison and Jail Population Grew by 2.6% in 12 months

Bureau of Justice Statistics
SUNDAY, May 21, 2006
www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs

NATION'S PRISON AND JAIL POPULATION GREW 2.6 PERCENT DURING
12 MONTHS THAT ENDED JUNE 30, 2005

WASHINGTON -- During the year that ended last June 30, the nation's prison and jail population grew 2.6 percent, reaching 2,186,230 inmates behind bars, the Department of Justice's Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) announced today. Two thirds were in state or federal prisons (1,438,701) and the other third (747,529) were in local jails.

The 12-month increase of 56,428 prison and jail inmates was the equivalent of 1,085 new inmates every week, the BJS report said. Other report highlights include:

* During the period, 10 state systems grew by more than 5 percent, led by Montana (up 7.9 percent), South Dakota (up 7.8 percent), and Minnesota (up 6.7 percent).
* Three state systems -- Florida (up 2,812 inmates), Texas (up 2,228), and North Carolina (up 1,482) -- accounted for more than 40 percent of the state growth.
* Twelve state systems reported population decreases, including Vermont (down 2.9 percent), Idaho (down 2.8 percent) and New York (down 2.5 percent)
* The Federal prison population rose 2.9 percent, reaching 184,484 inmates.

The Census of Jail Inmates, conducted on June 30 of 2005, recorded a 33,539 inmate increase, the largest 12-month growth since 1997.

Women make up an increasing proportion of jail inmates, reaching 12.7 percent of the population
in 2005, compared to 10.2 percent in 1995.

At midyear 2005, nearly 6 in 10 offenders in local jails were racial or ethnic minorities, which
was nearly unchanged in the last 10 years.

During the period, slightly more inmates (33,539) than beds (33,398) were added to local jail capacity. At the midyear, jail facilities were operating at 95 percent of rated capacity.

During the 12-month period, the number of women under the jurisdiction of state and federal prison authorities rose 3.4 percent (from 102,691 to 106,174), while the number of men rose by 1.3 percent (from 1,389,143 to 1,406,649). At midyear 2005, women accounted for 7.0 percent of all prisoners, up from 6.1 percent at yearend 1995.

Since 1995 the nation's prison and jail population has risen by more than 600,000 inmates. At midyear 2005 one in every 136 U.S. residents were in prison or jail.

Louisiana and Georgia led the nation in percentage of their state residents incarcerated (with more than 1 percent of their state residents in prison or jail at midyear 2005). Maine and Minnesota had the lowest rates of incarceration (with 0.3 percent or less of their state residents incarcerated).

At midyear 2005, nearly 4.7 percent of black males were in prison or jail, compared to 1.9 percent of Hispanic males, and 0.7 percent of white males. Among males in their late 20s, nearly 12 percent of black males, compared to 3.9 percent of Hispanic males and 1.7 percent of white males, were incarcerated.

The report, "Prison and Jail Inmates at Midyear 2005" (NCJ-213133), was written by BJS statisticians Allen J. Beck and Paige M. Harrison. Following publication, the report can be found at:
www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/pjim05.htm

Additional information about BJS statistical reports and programs is available from the BJS website at www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs.

The Office of Justice Programs provides federal leadership in developing the nation's capacity to prevent and control crime, administer justice and assist victims. OJP is headed by an Assistant Attorney General and comprises five component bureaus and two offices: the Bureau of Justice Assistance; the Bureau of Justice Statistics; the National Institute of Justice; the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention; and the Office for Victims of Crime, as well as the Office of the Police Corps and Law Enforcement Education and the Community Capacity Development Office, which incorporates the Weed and Seed strategy and OJP's American Indian and Alaska Native Affairs Desk. More information can be found at www.ojp.usdoj.gov.

# # #

Posted by lois at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)

An Appreciation: How Katherine Dunham Revealed Black Dance to the World

May 23, 2006

By JENNIFER DUNNING

Whatever else Katherine Dunham was in her long and productive life, which ended on Sunday at 96, she was a radiantly beautiful woman whose warmth and sense of self spread like honey on the paths before her.

How could anyone be stopped by the color of her skin after her invincibly lush sensuality and witty intelligence had seduced audiences on Broadway, in Hollywood films and in immensely popular dance shows that toured the world? And how could anyone cram black American dance into one or two conveniently narrow categories — or for that matter ignore the good strong roots that would one day grow green stems and leaves — with the vision of her company's lavishly theatrical African and Caribbean dance revues in mind?

Miss Dunham was one of the first American artists to focus on black dance and dancers as prime material for the stage. She burst into public consciousness in the 1940's, at a time when opportunities were increasing for black performers in mainstream theater and film, at least temporarily. But there was little middle ground there between the exotic and the demeaning everyday stereotypes.

Ms. Dunham's dance productions were certainly exotic, and sometimes fell into uncomfortable clichés. But a 1987 look at her work, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater's "Magic of Katherine Dunham" program, confirmed that she also evoked ordinary lives that were lived with ordinary dignity.

Miss Dunham, as she was universally known, was by no means the only dance artist to push for the recognition of black dance in the 1940's, when Pearl Primus pushed, too, though a great deal less glamorously. But though Miss Dunham's academic credentials as an anthropologist were impeccable, including a doctorate from the University of Chicago, it was her gift for seduction that helped most to pave the way for choreographers like Donald McKayle, Talley Beatty and Alvin Ailey, who were the first wave of what is today an established and influential part of the larger world of American modern dance.

Ailey's first encounter with her, as a newly stage-struck boy in his mid-teens, says a great deal about Miss Dunham's appeal. Intrigued by handbills advertising her 1943 "Tropical Revue," he ventured into the Biltmore Theater in downtown Los Angeles, his hometown, where it was playing. There he was plunged into a world of color, light and heat that was populated by highly trained dancers with a gift for powerful immediacy, who were dressed in subtle, stylish costumes designed by John Pratt, Miss Dunham's husband. After the show, Ailey followed the crowd making its way backstage to her dressing room and was again stunned when the door opened on a vision of beautiful hanging fabrics and carpeting, paintings, books, flowers and baskets of fruit. And there was La Dunham, dressed in vividly colored silks and exuding irresistible gaiety and warmth.

Ailey returned to the show several times a week, let into the theater by the Dunham dancers who had looked so unapproachably exotic on that first backstage visit. And he was still more than a little in love with her when he invited her to create for his company "The Magic of Katherine Dunham," a program of pieces that had not been seen for a quarter-century. Miss Dunham's dancers, who remained close to her and to one another throughout her life, swarmed into the studios to help her work with the young performers.

Most of the Ailey dancers did not appreciate Miss Dunham's iron perfectionism or the unusual demands of her technique, a potent but challenging blend of Afro-Caribbean, ballet and modern dance. And she was not the easiest of women. I remember speaking with her before a public interview we were to do in April 1993. Addicted to CNN, she had just learned of the fiery, tragic end to the F.B.I.'s seige of the Branch Davidian compound in in Waco, Tex., that morning, and that was all that she could talk about, off and on the stage, despite her promises to discuss her work.

Her horror was real, as was her sense of social justice. She has been criticized for not denouncing the Duvaliers for their dictatorship in Haiti, where she owned a home. But she had also sponsored a medical clinic in Port-au-Prince, and she stayed on for many years in desolate, impoverished East St. Louis, Ill., where she established a museum of artifacts pertaining to her career and taught local children including Jackie Joyner-Kersee, the Olympic long jumper, and the filmmakers Reginald and Warrington Hudlin.

"I was trying to steer them into something more constructive than genocide," she said of the children in a 1991 interview with me in The New York Times. "Everyone needs, if not a culture hero, a culturally heroic society. There is nothing stronger in a man than the need to grow."

That idealistic, eloquent self was infused with a streak of no-nonsense practicality.

"I don't like that 'accept,' " MissDunham, still a vibrant beauty at 91, said during a Times interview six years ago in response to a middle-aged visitor who insisted on talking to her about the acceptance and embrace of old age. "I would just let the whole thing go. Just be there for it, centimeter by centimeter." Then it was time for the photo session.

Her eyes seemed to widen even more invitingly and her gaze to grow even warmer as she looked into the eye of the camera and asked, "Did you ever see photographs of elderly divas trying to look sexy?"

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Posted by lois at 11:04 AM | Comments (0)

Judge Steps in for Poor who are Incarcerated Since Katrina

New York Times
May 23, 2006
Judge Steps In for Poor Inmates Without Justice Since Hurricane
By LESLIE EATON

NEW ORLEANS * Hurricane Katrina took his house, his courtroom and, Judge Arthur L. Hunter Jr. says, his faith in the way his city treats poor people facing criminal charges.

Nine months after the storm, more than a thousand jailed defendants have had no access to lawyers, the judge says, because the public defender system is desperately short of money and staffing, without a computer system or files or even a list of clients.

And so Judge Hunter, 46, a former New Orleans police officer, is moving to let some of the defendants without lawyers out of jail. He has suspended prosecutions in most cases involving public defenders. And, alone among a dozen criminal court judges, he has granted a petition to free a prisoner facing serious charges without counsel, and is considering others.

It is, he said in an interview, his duty under the Constitution. "Something needs to be done, it's that simple," he said. "I'm the lightning rod, yes."

The district attorney's office opposes letting defendants back out on the street, saying the court should find them lawyers. But Judge Hunter said he has had little luck finding private firms willing to take on most indigents' cases, and there appears to be no money to pay their expenses.

The public defenders' office, run not by City Hall but by a parish board, is basically broke. Louisiana, alone among the states, relies mainly on local court fees * mostly surcharges on traffic tickets * to finance its public defenders, according to the National Legal Aid and Defender Association.

It is a financing system that Judge Hunter and Calvin Johnson, the chief judge of the criminal court in New Orleans, have recently found to be unconstitutional because it forces poor people to pay for the system. The Louisiana attorney general's office says it plans to appeal those decisions.

In Orleans Parish, the traffic and the tickets both evaporated after Hurricane Katrina. Most of the office's 42 part-time public defenders were laid off. And they were, by many accounts, inadequate to begin with; a new study sponsored by the federal Justice Department says that the office probably needs 70 full-time lawyers, a computer system for case management, support staff and a reliable source of financing.

The study calls for scrapping the current system, which an appeals court decision recently described as "overburdened, underfunded and perhaps unconstitutional." The public defenders' office in New Orleans is slated to receive a $2.8 million federal grant on May 31 * but the study says it needs more than $10 million to get up and running and operate for a year.

The criminal justice system in New Orleans was notoriously troubled long before the storms, and if anything, it is now worse. Officials hope to resume jury trials soon for the first time since Hurricane Katrina, but still do not know if they will have enough courtrooms, jurors or witnesses to proceed.

On a recent Friday morning, in a borrowed courtroom in the Federal Building downtown, Judge Hunter listened to testimony from Ronald Dunn, 43, who was arrested on Aug. 19, 10 days before Hurricane Katrina hit, on a charge of possessing crack cocaine. Like the vast majority of the defendants in criminal court here, he cannot afford to hire a lawyer, and so would normally be represented by a public defender.

Handcuffed, shackled and wearing jailhouse orange, Mr. Dunn told the court that as the water rose, he spent four frightening days without food in the House of Detention, and was then moved from prison to prison, losing touch with his family.

In the nine months since the hurricane, he said, he has never even spoken to a lawyer. "I don't have a lawyer," Mr. Dunn said. "I never been to court." Without a lawyer a defendant cannot even plead guilty.

Pamela R. Metzger, the director of the Criminal Court Clinic at Tulane Law School, has petitioned the court to release Mr. Dunn and more than a dozen other poor prisoners in similar circumstances. Releasing them would not hamper the prosecution, she argued, and would give them an opportunity to try to gather evidence in their own defense. And, she said later, "to be free from imprisonment and punishment without due process of law."

But David S. Pipes, an assistant district attorney, argued against releasing Mr. Dunn, whom he described as a five-time felon. (Court documents show that Mr. Dunn has been arrested 10 times since 1990 and has pleaded guilty to previous drug and theft charges.)

More broadly, Mr. Pipes said: "The proper solution for someone who does not have an attorney is to get them an attorney. Releasing them does not cure anything and does not protect their rights."

Of course, everyone in the courtroom could describe a life turned upside down by Hurricane Katrina. Mr. Pipes is working out of an office in an old nightclub because the district attorney's office flooded. Professor Metzger is commuting to New Orleans from Atlanta.

And Judge Hunter is driving back and forth to Tampa, Fla., where his family fled, or Baton Rouge, where he has bought a house where he plans to live with his wife and teenage son, a cousin and a widowed aunt.

Over the years, the district attorney and others have accused Judge Hunter of being too soft on defendants, and of having too high an acquittal rate in nonjury trials. (He says he is simply fair.) But even longtime critics like the independent Metropolitan Crime Commission say that when it comes to the public defenders' office, he is doing the right thing.

"I don't have any problem with what he's trying to do there," said Rafael C. Goyeneche III, president of the commission. "He's demanding that it function properly."

The battle over indigent defendants is proceeding on several levels. Last month, Judge Hunter granted a petition for release filed by Professor Metzger on behalf of Donald Crockett, a mentally ill man accused of being a felon in possession of a firearm. He has been in jail since October 2003.

The district attorney's office appealed, and an appellate court found that additional procedural steps were required. Though it reversed the judge's decision, the court suggested such releases might be possible once the program completely runs out of money. Professor Metzger said she planned to appeal to the Louisiana Supreme Court.

Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco has submitted a budget that would double, to $20 million, the appropriation for defenders around the state, and a legislative task force set up before Hurricane Katrina continues to work on the issue.

The Louisiana State Bar Association has made fixing the public defender system a priority and has paid for both another study and for the salaries of three defenders for a year, said Frank X. Neuner, president of the bar association. In Orleans Parish, the criminal court judges have appointed new directors (including Professor Metzger) to oversee the public defenders' program.

Judge Johnson, who runs the criminal court and is a former public defender himself, has been working to build a consensus for changing the system, something he said he has supported for years. He was the first judge after Hurricane Katrina to order an investigation into whether the public defenders could adequately represent the poor.

But having Judge Hunter halt prosecutions and consider freeing inmates has helped focus attention on the issue, Judge Johnson said.

"You have to have some guy out there rattling the saber, absolutely," Judge Johnson said. "I think the message was loud, clear and necessary."

Posted by lois at 10:57 AM | Comments (0)

Women's Prison Assoc. New Report on Incarceration of Women

I want to add a cautionary note to new report from the Women’s Prison Association, “Hard Hit: the growth in the imprisonment of women, 1977-2004." ( http://www.wpaonline.org/institute/hardhit/index.htm). The report states: “Neighboring Massachusetts is also remarkable for its equally low incarceration rate; the small share of prison beds the state devotes to women (4.3 percent); and a 9 percent reduction in the female prison population that has taken place in the last half-decade.”

While it is true that the incarceration rate for women in Framingham prison from 1999-2004 was -9%, the incarceration rate from 1977-2004 increased 382%. As the report shows, the number of women incarcerated in Framingham experienced a modest decline. However, the number of women incarcerated in jails continues to climb.

In Massachusetts women and men can be incarcerated in “county” jails up to 2 ½ years. (“County” jails in MA are distinctive not only in the length of sentences but also because county government was abolished in 1998). In Massachusetts, a new regional jail for women from the four western counties is now being constructed. The current jail was designed to hold 130 women. The jail to be completed next spring was to have 240 “beds” but due to overcrowding, the sheriff has just asked the legislature for an additional 56 “beds”, bringing the total to more than twice the current number.

It might appear that tossing jails and prison together is mixing apples and oranges; in fact, women serving up to 30 months are in jails in Massachusetts and in prison in other states. Are these apples and oranges? As the Corrections bureaucracy comes up with ever more marketable names for their products and processes---“civil commitment” for sex offenders or “secure facilities” for women in California--- it becomes all the more important that we be clear about our categories and language so as not to lend credence to progress where it does not exist. A possible consequence of the WPA report in Massachusetts is that it may be used by people advocating for more and bigger jails and as approval for policies and practices which, from the point of view of someone working to organize against the new jail and the increasing incarceration of women, should not be endorsed.

Lois Ahrens
Real Cost of Prisons Project

"Hard Hit: the growth in the imprisonment of women, 1977-2004" a new report from WPA's new Institute on Women and Criminal Justice (Part One authored by the Justice Strategies YIMBY team) see http://www.wpaonline.org/institute/hardhit/index.htm

washingtonpost.com
Mountain States Imprisoning More Women

By DAVID CRARY
The Associated Press
Sunday, May 21, 2006; 2:28 AM

Oklahoma had the highest per capita imprisonment rate for women _ 129 behind bars for every 100,000 women in its population. Mississippi was second with a rate of 107. Women in those states were roughly 10 times more likely to be imprisoned than women in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, which shared the lowest rate of 11.

Nationwide, there were 1.42 million inmates in state and federal prisons at the end of 2004, including 96,125 women _ up from 11,212 in 1977.

Though the overall surge of women behind bars has continued in recent years, it has tapered off in the Northeast, the report said. From 1999 to 2004, it said, the number of female inmates dropped by 23 percent in New York and 21 percent in New Jersey _ part of broader reductions that also cut the number of male inmates.

The report concurred with previous analyses attributing much of the nationwide increase in women's imprisonment to the war on drugs. The proportion of women serving time for drug offenses has risen sharply in recent years, while the proportion convicted of serious violent crimes has dropped, it said.

Bob Anez, a Corrections Department spokesman in Montana, confirmed that drug offenses _ especially related to methamphetamine _ were a major factor in the high proportion of female inmates in the state. Half the women imprisoned from January through March had committed meth-related offenses, he said.

Jerry Massie of Oklahoma's Corrections Department also said rising drug convictions were a factor in the high number of imprisoned women, but he noted that Oklahoma has one of the highest incarceration rates for men as well as for women.

Ann Jacobs, executive director of the Women's Prison Association, said states with high rates of women behind bars should look closely at alternative sentencing, particularly mandatory treatment as an option for drug offenders.

"It's startling to think that Oklahoma incarcerates 129 of every 100,000 women, while other states can provide public safety by incarcerating 11 of every 100,000," she said. "Women in Oklahoma can't possibly be 10 times worse."

K.C. Moon, executive director of the Oklahoma Criminal Justice Resource Center, said the state's high incarceration rate is linked to the types of crimes that are felonies _ including simple drug possession and relatively minor thefts.

"Those are two types of crimes that are typically committed by women," Moon said. "In Oklahoma, we choose to make lower-level crimes felonies, therefore we stand out like a sore thumb."

The Women's Prison Association and like-minded groups focus attention on female inmates in part because they are more likely than men to be primary caretakers of children, and their incarceration can place severe strains on families.

The report urged an expansion of research to identify factors that have contributed to the increase of female inmates and to develop policies which help at-risk women lead law-abiding, self-sufficient lives. Jacobs said the reduction of female inmates now occurring in some Northeast states would be worth celebrating only if coupled with investment in social programs that could reduce recidivism.

Associated Press writer Sean Murphy in Oklahoma City contributed to this report.

On the Net:

Women's Prison Association: http://www.wpaonline.org

Posted by lois at 10:54 AM | Comments (0)

May 22, 2006

Free Jailhouse Lawyer's Handbook

CCR Pamphlets

Jailhouse Lawyer’s Handbook (PDF) - The Center for Constitutional Rights, in alliance with the National Lawyers Guild, has just released “The Jailhouse Lawyer’s Handbook: How to Bring a Federal Lawsuit to Challenge Violations of Your Rights in Prison.” The handbook is a free resource for prisoners and their family members who wish to learn about legal options to challenge mistreatment in prison. It can be downloaded, or you can request a copy by writing to us at the following address:
Jailhouse Lawyers Handbook
c/o The Center for Constitutional Rights
666 Broadway, 7th Floor
New York, NY 10012

Jail House Lawyers Handbook Women's Appendix (PDF) - The JHL Appendix for women is a free resource geared specifically to women prisoners and their family members who wish to learn about legal options to challenge mistreatment in prison.

http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/legal/justice/docs/jailhouselawyershandbook.pdf
http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/pub_resources/pub_resources_contents.asp#books_pham

Posted by lois at 11:22 PM | Comments (0)

Foundation helps return higher ed to prisons

Posted on Mon, May. 22, 2006

St. Paul Pioneer Press
Foundation helps return higher ed to prisons

RUBÉN ROSARIO

Face and eyes locked in thought, Elijah Thomas Combs strikes a contemplative pose in response to a question.

"A lot of the people on the outside might have an ill perspective of us,'' the 24-year-old Minneapolis native says as he leans against the guard desk inside Cell Hall A-West at the state prison in Stillwater.

"We're all in here, and 99 percent of us are guilty,'' says Combs, who has 10 more years to go before he is eligible for release for aiding and abetting a 1999 murder in Shakopee. "A lot may say they are not guilty, but a lot of us recognize that we are and want to change. We don't want to live the same lives that got us here. And education is one of the main ways I believe you can do that."

Say hello to Combs, Inmate No. 215445 and one of the new Joe Colleges behind bars. Combs, who obtained his GED high school diploma in lockup, is now one of about 100 inmates enrolled in post-secondary education courses at Stillwater and two other prison facilities in St. Cloud and Shakopee.

Posted on Mon, May. 22, 2006

St. Paul Pioneer Press
Foundation helps return higher ed to prisons

RUBÉN ROSARIO

Face and eyes locked in thought, Elijah Thomas Combs strikes a contemplative pose in response to a question.

"A lot of the people on the outside might have an ill perspective of us,'' the 24-year-old Minneapolis native says as he leans against the guard desk inside Cell Hall A-West at the state prison in Stillwater.

"We're all in here, and 99 percent of us are guilty,'' says Combs, who has 10 more years to go before he is eligible for release for aiding and abetting a 1999 murder in Shakopee. "A lot may say they are not guilty, but a lot of us recognize that we are and want to change. We don't want to live the same lives that got us here. And education is one of the main ways I believe you can do that."

Say hello to Combs, Inmate No. 215445 and one of the new Joe Colleges behind bars. Combs, who obtained his GED high school diploma in lockup, is now one of about 100 inmates enrolled in post-secondary education courses at Stillwater and two other prison facilities in St. Cloud and Shakopee.

Politics, public backlash, swelling inmate populations, rising costs for basic upkeep and steep budget cuts wiped out government funding for higher-ed prison courses throughout prisons in Minnesota and most other states in recent years.

But they're back now after a nearly three-year absence. Classes began in March and there's a waiting list of more than 100 inmates. This time, however, the offering is not costing taxpayers or the government one red cent, thanks to the little-known Minnesota Correctional Education Foundation.

The St. Paul-based foundation, established two years ago, was the brainchild of like-minded educators, prison officials and others who felt strongly about the benefits of bringing back such courses to eligible inmates.

Since December, it has managed to raise $85,000 in donations. Contributors range from corrections officers to deep-pocketed philanthropists. It has also aligned itself with an educational consortium of higher-education entities such as Augsburg College, Inver Hills Community College and St. Cloud State University. The institutions are providing instructors, mostly through contracts and in-kind donations. The courses can lead to an associate of arts degree.

Although the adult reoffense rate is more than 60 percent nationally, most studies have found that recidivism rates drop significantly the more education an inmate achieves while in prison. Those who took post-secondary education record the lowest reoffense rates.

One study in the late 1990s in Alabama found that only 1 percent of inmates who completed college degrees while incarcerated returned to prison, compared to a 35 percent reoffense rate that year in Alabama's general population. Minnesota was included in a three-state study in 2001 by the U.S. Department of Education that reported similar findings. The report concluded that society saves more than $2 for every dollar spent on prison education programs.

"I truly believe in this effort because I know it will lead to much safer and healthier communities when they return,'' says Liz Evensen, the foundation's executive director, lone staffer and chief fundraiser. "I am so proud of being a part of this, because I see the value and I also see the big picture in this.''

Evensen has the kind of can-do personality needed for a fundraising job that one Stillwater inmate said is about as tough as "selling ice cubes in Alaska.''

Evensen acknowledges the challenge. She knows there's intense competition for donations, and that the immediate beneficiaries are not cuddly kids or animals.

"You get a range of reactions, from those who express some understanding to others who are very direct and tell me that I won't get one penny from them and not to ever contact them again,'' she says.

A major and notable contributor is Bruce Johnson, the St. Paul native and inventor who came up with the enormously successful Breathe Right nasal strips.

"I'm willing to put my money where my mouth is,'' says Johnson. "I believe in this, that post-secondary is a void that needs to be filled and that this is a good way to reinvest in our community.''

Two other inmates taking the college courses at Stillwater are Elizer Darris, 22, of St. Louis and Quentin Starin, 24, of Little Falls, Minn.

Darris, who joined a traveling carnival at age 14 and was functionally illiterate, has another 10 years at least to serve for the 1999 murder of a carnival colleague in Polk County, Minn. He was 15 at the time of the slaying. He has since obtained his GED and said a turning point in his life came a few years ago when he watched a documentary about the Holocaust as part of a now-defunct post-secondary course while at the St. Cloud prison.

"It just opened my eyes,'' he says. "I had no idea. I felt compassion for somebody else, something I had never felt before."

Starin, serving a 12-year term for possession of methamphetamine, actually had his family bankroll college correspondence courses through Louisiana State University after higher-ed courses at Stillwater were wiped out two years ago.

He recently completed work for a degree and was accepted to the state prison system's Challenge Incarceration Program in outstate Minnesota for nonviolent offenders.

Tim Eling, 57, stood a few feet behind Combs as he spoke last week. The convicted cop killer and lifer will leave Stillwater in a pine box. A gang member who smuggled drugs into prison, Eling was perhaps among the most troublesome of prisoners until the light bulb went on 10 years ago.

He is a holder of a community college degree, a tutor to other inmates and the editor of the Prison Mirror, the award-winning prison newspaper. He says he has seen the faces of "thousands'' of inmates walk out of prison, only to return.

"The hope is that they don't end up like me,'' Eling says as he nods toward Combs and Starin nearby. "This is what I hear: 'I'm going to make it. Everything is going to be great. It's all good.'

"Unfortunately, most of them don't learn anything while they are here,'' Eling continues. "They got no education. So what are they going to do when they get out? The same thing they were doing when they left. If you don't learn something while you are here, you are still the same person when you get out. So what's going to change? Nothing is going to change."

Rubén Rosario can be reached at rrosario@pioneerpress.com or 651-228-5454.

Online

Learn more about the Minnesota Correctional Education Foundation at www.mcef.info.

Stillwater prison inmate Aldridge Smith, left, is tutored during a spelling and phonics lesson by fellow inmate John Sims, 53, in a Literacy 1 class. Smith, 23, is serving an eight-year sentence for accessory to murder, while Sims is serving 13 years for attempted second-degree murder. The class, which meets daily for three hours, is funded by the Minnesota Correctional Education Foundation.

© 2006 St. Paul Pioneer Press and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.

Posted by lois at 06:19 PM | Comments (0)

MA: Women in Hampden County Jail's Death Puts Focus on Dangers of Detoxing in Jail

Inmate's death puts detox in spotlight
Monday, May 22, 2006
By PATRICK JOHNSON and DAVID REID
Staff writers

LUDLOW - As many as six of every 10 inmates arriving at Hampden County House of Correction, either to await trial or to begin a sentence, are addicted to drugs or alcohol and need immediate detoxification, jail officials said.

In the past year alone, the jail has had to sort out about 3,800 of the 6,392 inmates entering the gates of the county facility in order to give them immediate detoxification treatment, or detox, according to official estimates.

Those inmates are given medications, mostly tranquilizers, to help them cope with the physical symptoms, such as vomiting, nausea, lethargy and confusion, resulting from going cold turkey in the hands of law enforcement, officials said.

One of those detoxing inmates, said jail superintendent Jay Ashe, was Cynthia Brace.

Brace, a 41-year-old Holyoke woman and longtime heroin user, died Aug. 20, one day after she was sent to the Ludlow facility following her arrest on drug charges.

"Was that a detox case? Yeah. Yeah. It's not that hard to guess with these numbers," said Jay Ashe, the brother of Hampden County Sheriff Michael J. Ashe, during a recent interview. "Unfortunately, she died during the treatment."

Brace's lawyer, Shawn P. Allyn of Holyoke, said her death was more than unfortunate, it was unnecessary.

"This death could have and should have been prevented," said Allyn, who also represents Brace's husband, Cecil, who is awaiting trial in Hampden Superior Court on drug and other charges.

Allyn said he has asked the state attorney general to investigate Brace's death, and charged jail officials with failing to provide proper care while she detoxed. He said that was, in effect, cruel and unusual punishment and a violation of his client's constitutional rights.

Allyn, who represents Brace's estate, said he intends to file a wrongful death suit against the county facility, the Hampden County Sheriff's Department and the Massachusetts Department of Corrections.

"Requiring an inmate to go 'cold turkey' clearly demonstrates a deliberate indifference to the serious health risk and potential of medical harm this may have on a given inmate," Allyn said.

The state medical examiner ruled Brace's death was the result of natural causes, and District Attorney William M. Bennett told The Republican there is no indication of foul play.

So far, jail and county officials have not provided The Republican with the autopsy reports or detailed records of her treatment, citing laws relating to inmate privacy.

Prior to an April hearing on Beacon Hill about inmates with mental illness, Sheriff Ashe said the jail could not have done anything differently in Brace's case.

Jay Ashe said her death was investigated internally, by the Massachusetts State Police and by the Hampden County district attorney, and Ashe expressed confidence that jail staff followed all proper procedures.

"We're very comfortable with it," he said of the jail's response.

Brace was arrested by Holyoke police on Aug. 18 in connection with drug charges and allegations of elderly abuse of a city man.

Two days later she was dead.

Brace was brought to the jail on a Friday afternoon after a Holyoke District Court judge ordered her held without bail.

According to a timeline issued by the jail shortly after Brace's death, she was seen twice by medical staff on the first day and put through the standard orientation procedure.

According to a heavily redacted, eight-page account of Brace's stay at the jail - released recently only after The Republican filed a public records request with Sheriff Ashe - jail officials, nurses and other medical staff had numerous, regular contacts with Brace.

The report, released by lawyers representing the sheriff, detailed regular 15-minute checks throughout the night and the following morning, although all medical references were blacked out. Brace reportedly was alert and conversant between periods of sleep, was given two showers and her bedclothes were changed several times.

The last contact between Brace and medical staff was noted at 10:55 a.m. on Aug. 19, shortly after she was given medication and placed on a stretcher in a hallway near the nurse's station, according to the report. At about 11:20 a.m., a registered nurse noticed that Brace "was on her left side but that her head was turned awkwardly."

Emergency life-saving steps were taken after the nurse found that "she wasn't breathing" and that "she didn't have a pulse, no respiration."

Earlier, officials said Brace had been vomiting and was brought to the jail's medical unit for treatment.

At 11:55 a.m., the report states, she was taken by ambulance to Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, where she was pronounced dead at 11:59 a.m.

Lawyer Edward J. McDonough Jr., who represents the sheriff, stressed that all references to Brace's specific medical condition were blacked out in the report because Allyn refused to waive privacy protections for Brace.

McDonough denied the newspaper's request for the results of an internal investigation into Brace's death, citing they are the purview of "medical peer review proceedings" and specifically exempt from public disclosure.

He also refused to provide internal communications about Brace's condition, saying public disclosure of such materials "would so prejudice the possibility of effective law enforcement that such disclosure would not be in the public interest."

The district attorney and the medical examiner's offices used similar language in declining to provide similar requests for interoffice correspondence regarding Brace's death.

The Republican is considering appealing those decisions, particularly regarding the internal review of Brace's death, since the public is entitled to know how a person in state or county custody is cared for.

Allyn, who received a copy of the autopsy report, said it shows that neither Medical Examiner Dr. Joann Richmond nor consulting cardiac specialist, Dr. David L. Gang of Baystate Pathology Associates in Springfield, could definitively conclude why Brace died.

Each doctor offered cardiac arrhythmia, or an irregular heartbeat, as a possible cause of death. Allyn said he doubts those determinations because, although she was a longtime drug user, Brace had "no prior heart problems to this degree."

The report also notes Brace had bruising on her wrists, Allyn said.

Brace is the 25th person to die in jail custody in the last 25 years, a period spanning an estimated 55,000 inmates, according to jail statistics.

Eighteen of the deaths were of inmates being held in custody, and the rest were people who died while in day-reporting or work release programs.

Eight of the deaths were attributed to AIDS-related illnesses. Four were considered suicides, and the remainder were from a variety of medical conditions, including brain hemhorrage, stroke, liver disease, lung cancer, heart disease and sleep apnea.

Six other inmates, like Brace, died within the first two weeks of custody. Three of them were suicides.

Jail officials, speaking generally about detox procedures and not the Brace case specifically, said the volume of new inmates needing detox is just one part of the bigger issue involving chronic health and mental health issues at the jail.

"They're big. That's what we're dealing with," Jay Ashe said of the medical concerns. "No one has any idea, (and) no one wants to know. The medical issues are huge, aside from the detox."

Nationally, since the declaration of the War on Drugs in the mid-1980s, county jails have seen between 60 and 70 percent of new inmates needing detox, said Dr. Scott Chavez, vice president of the National Commission on Correctional Health Care.

"Jails are at the front lines of (the war) on drug addition," he said.

Sheriffs throughout the state recently went to Beacon Hill to lobby for an additional $9 million to assist with treatment of mentally ill inmates.

As social service agencies have seen budget cuts in the last few years, county jails have been left to treat inmates arriving with mental, medical and addiction issues, said James F. Walsh, executive director of the Massachusetts Sheriff's Association.

The estimated number needing treatment at the Ludlow facility is comparable with other county jails across the state, Walsh said.

There has been no official study but the sense is that the problem has only gotten worse over the last decade, he said.

Officials with the Ludlow facility said roughly half of all inmates have historically needed some kind of detox, but as the jail population has grown in recent years, the number of detox cases has grown proportionately.

For the first time since the Ludlow facility opened 14 years ago, jail officials have recently begun describing the facility with a word not used since the days of the old York Street jail: overcrowded.

At the beginning of April, the jail had a record 1,642 inmates inside a facility designed to hold 962, or 171 percent above the planned capacity, according to jail officials.

The pretrial population of 814 inmates, following an increase of 17 percent over the previous three months, is now just below the sentenced population of 828.

Overcrowding complicates every aspect of running the facility, jail officials say.

Jay Ashe agreed the jails are being forced to pick up the slack on detoxing as community-based programs that specialize in addictions are losing resources.

"We have become the detox center," he said. "There are very few resources until you hit rock bottom."

As Sheriff Ashe notes, "Jails are a reservoir of illness, and no less so than in terms of the illness of addictions."

With many inmates, the addiction masks an underlying health concern that also needs to be addressed, officials said.

Terri Theroux, director of health care at the Ludlow jail, said that in addition to seeing patients in varying stages of addiction, the medical staff has to treat people suffering from illnesses such as asthma, chronic illness, hypertension and hepatitis.

"Generally, there are very sick people, and (the illness) could be exacerbated by the detoxification of one substance or another," she said.

Theroux said the detox treatments vary from inmate to inmate, depending on the substance, how long the person has been addicted and the last amount taken.

Men and women are kept separated from each other at the jail, but the detox procedures are exactly the same, she said.

The jail has no infirmary with bed space for inmates needing treatment. Instead its medical unit is run like a clinic, and inmates receive treatment and return to their cell. Those needing more serious care are transferred to local hospitals.

The Ludlow jail was given full accreditation last year by the National Commission on Correctional Health Care, and was named its facility of the year in 1998.

Chavez, who has toured the Ludlow facility, said its health care services are highly regarded, and are seen as a model for more than a dozen jails nationwide.

The jail's approach is to contract doctors from area health clinics and assign inmates to doctors based on proximity to the community where the inmate resides, he said.

This encourages inmates to continue going to the area health clinic after release, he said.

Medical staff check in with detox inmates daily, but it is up to corrections officers to keep an eye on them, Theroux said. A person who has been an addict for a longer period has a rougher time coming clean than a new user, she said.

Sometimes, Theroux said, inmates arrive in rough shape because they've been held in a police lockup for a day or more without a fix and with no medical assistance. "Detoxification may take several days for a person to rid him or herself of the substance," said Theroux. The jail's procedures seek only to "ease the detoxification process."

Jay Ashe said the initial detox treatments seek only to minimize the physical symptoms of withdrawal. The psychological reasons for addiction are addressed later in counseling, he said.

The jail does not treat inmates with methadone, a synthetic narcotic used to treat heroin addicts, but its use has been under consideration for the past year, he said.

Detoxing inmates are given medications used as various forms of "mild tranquilizers," such as Librium, a short-term medication used for treating anxiety associated with types of withdrawal, Jay Ashe said.

"We're trying to calm them down and deal with the detox issue," he said.

Patrick Johnson can be reached at pjohnson@repub.com

David Reid can be reached at dreid@repub.com

©2006 The Republican

Posted by lois at 03:23 PM | Comments (0)

Bob Herbert Op-Ed: Justice Derailed

May 22, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Justice Derailed
By BOB HERBERT

The murder happened in snow-covered Rochester, N.Y., on New Year's Day in 1996.

As the police and prosecutors told it, a 63-year-old activist named William Beason was stabbed to death in his home by a young sex hustler and ex-convict named Douglas Warney. The case was solid, the authorities said. They had a confession.

Not only were the authorities wrong, it was almost immediately clear that they were wrong.

I wrote in a column less than a month after the murder: "The closer one looks at the case, the more it appears that Douglas Warney did not kill William Beason."

Under the headline "Slay Confession Is Full of Holes," Jim Dwyer, who is now at The Times but was then at The Daily News, wrote:

"[Warney's] confession is contradicted by virtually all the physical evidence made public, including a trail of blood apparently left by the killer, but which did not come from Warney."

I wondered then, and I still wonder, why so many seemingly decent people in law enforcement are willing to participate in the evil practice of sending people to prison — or, worse — who are demonstrably innocent of the charges against them.

The prosecutors who went after Douglas Warney were seeking the death penalty. It didn't matter to them:

That Mr. Warney was delusional.

That Mr. Warney said that he had killed Mr. Beason in a struggle in the kitchen, when in fact the victim had been murdered in his bed.

That Mr. Warney said he had cut himself during the attack, but a medical exam showed no evidence of a cut.

That Mr. Warney claimed to have driven his brother's brown Chevrolet to the murder scene, a car that his brother had gotten rid of years earlier.

And so on and so forth.

There was no physical evidence — none — linking Mr. Warney to the crime. The only evidence against him was the confession, conveniently typed up by a detective.

Mr. Warney, who was retarded and suffered from AIDS-related dementia, signed the confession. That flimsy document, which bore approximately the same relationship to reality as an episode of "Desperate Housewives," was enough to get Mr. Warney convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to a minimum of 25 years.

Last week, after serving 10 years, Mr. Warney was released. More than a decade after the murder, DNA testing had led to a match between blood found at the scene and an incarcerated killer named Eldred Johnson Jr. Mr. Johnson admitted to investigators that he had, indeed, killed Mr. Beason, that he had done it alone, and that he did not know Douglas Warney.

Mr. Warney's case reminded me of one recounted by Arthur Miller in his autobiography, "Timebends."

Back in 1973, an 18-year-old named Peter Reilly returned from church to find the bloodied body of his mother, Barbara Gibbons, on the kitchen floor of their home in rural Canaan, Conn. She had been killed in what Miller described as a "fiendish" attack. Under intense interrogation, Mr. Reilly confessed to the murder. Although he quickly retracted the confession, he was tried and convicted.

Miller and others, convinced of Mr. Reilly's innocence, spent years trying to help him. It was finally proved, Miller wrote, "that Peter had been five miles from his home at the very moment his mother was murdered."

The witnesses who vouched for the alibi were considered substantial: a local police officer and his wife.

"Their affidavit," Miller wrote, "of which the state police had to have been aware, was discovered in the files of the prosecutor after he suddenly died of a heart attack."

Peter Reilly was exonerated. An investigation determined that there had been law-enforcement misconduct in the case, and that Mr. Reilly's confession had apparently been coerced.

It was ever thus. Law-enforcement officers tend to fight to the very limits of their strength against any and all evidence that would exonerate defendants or convicts.

Most people in prison have committed crimes. But it's also true that there are many, many inmates who were wrongly convicted. And the recent record of people being released from death row as a result of DNA evidence is itself evidence of horrifying law-enforcement abuses.

Don't expect much in the way of change. Indifference to injustice in the criminal justice system is so pervasive, and so difficult to counteract, as to seem part of society's DNA.

Posted by lois at 09:20 AM | Comments (0)

May 21, 2006

MA: Growth Industry--New Jail for Women

Growth Industry
Activists protest the expansion of the new women's jail in Chicopee.

by Maureen Turner - May 11, 2006, Valley Advocate. www.valleyadvocate.com
Construction is well underway, but Jo Comerford can still picture alternatives to the women's jail being built on Center Street in Chicopee. "Just envision what that could be, that land, that $[26] million--a health center, a park," says Comerford, director of the western Mass. American Friends Service Committee, one of the local groups that have fought against the 120-cell jail.

The new jail, however, seems to be a done deal; indeed, Hampden County Sheriff Mike Ashe is now asking for another $6 million to add 56 more cells. That would require the approval of the Legislature and the Romney administration to raise the bond ceiling on the project--approval opponents concede is likely to be given. The sheriff's department says the jail will improve conditions for female inmates, who right now are outnumbered by men 11 to 1 at the co-ed jail in Ludlow. That imbalance means there's no room for women, the majority of whom are locked up for non-violent crimes, usually drug-related, to get the services the new jail will offer, such as drug treatment, classes, job training and re-entry programs.

But to Comerford, there's something wrong when those kinds of services are most readily available behind bars. "Mazel tov, Sheriff Ashe--great, you're throwing someone a bone," she says. "But a woman shouldn't have to get locked up to get healthcare, to get her addiction looked at, to get a GED. What I'm interested in is the root cause of what brought her to jail."

And that root cause, adds activist Holly Richardson of the Statewide Harm Reduction Coalition, is almost invariably poverty, exacerbated by a classist and racist system that views some people as throw-always. About one-third of the women now at Ludlow, she estimates, are there waiting trial. "We're talking about poor people who can't make bail, who end up for months waiting for trial because the court system is backlogged," and therefore are more likely to take a plea bargain to get home sooner.

"If you or I are arrested, we're going to find a way to bail out, and then we're going to hire a private attorney to handle it while we're at home," she says. For a poor woman, time in jail could mean losing her job, her housing, her kids.

The jail does come with financial incentives for the city of Chicopee, which receives a $10,000 mitigation fee for each cell; the proposed expansion would boost that total to $1.76 million. The state also paid the city $1.3 million for the land and committed $2.6 million for infrastructure work on Center Street.

Mayor Michael Bissonnette says the jail is key to redeveloping that corner of his city, now distinguished by overgrown weeds, junkyards and the burnt-out shell of the old American Bosch plant. "Two years from now that entire corridor will be developed," says Bissonnette, who sees the area as "a springboard for new business."

Bissonnette, a former criminal defense lawyer, says he has sympathy for the case made by jail opponents and supports preventative programs and alternatives to incarceration. "As a practical matter, I'd rather see money spent on these types of services at a point prior to incarceration," he says. Still, he adds, the reality is that some women are going to end up in jail; now, at least, "they're going to be housed in a progressive facility that's new and clean, and hopefully will get the services necessary to gain skills, education, maybe get some guidance for post-incarceration."

Lois Ahrens, director of the Northampton-based Real Cost of Prisons Project, is exasperated by arguments that jails lead to economic development; she points to multiple studies showing the exact opposite (see www.realcostofprisons.org). "Jails and prisons are in this category of industries of last resort," she says. "Jails and prisons, toxic waste dumps, pig farms -- those are in the communities that have given up thinking there's any hope, so they settle for this."

Use our contact form to write to Maureen Turner.

Posted by lois at 04:42 PM | Comments (0)

A Jailhouse Lawyer's Manual- 7th edition

JLM has published its 7th edition, and the price has changed. The JLM is now one volume only and costs $25.00. We also publish the Immigration and Consular Access Supplement for $5.00. Please see http://www.columbia.edu/cu/hrlr/ and click on "Jailhouse Lawyer's Manual" for pricing and ordering information.

A Jailhouse Lawyer's Manual (JLM) is a handbook of legal rights and procedures designed for use by people in prison. Prisoners are often indigent and therefore lack access to legal counsel while in prison. The JLM informs prisoners of their legal rights, shows them how to secure these rights through the judicial process, and guides them through the complex array of procedures and legal vocabulary which make up this system. The JLM also instructs prisoners in techniques of legal research and explains the need to take note of important legal developments. With the JLM, prisoners can learn to use effectively the resources available in prison law libraries. Since publication of the first edition in 1978, A Jailhouse Lawyer's Manual has been used by tens of thousands of prisoners in institutions across the country. Prisoners have used the book to become informed of their rights and to address specific problems related to their treatment in prison or their convictions.

To date, more than two hundred correctional facilities across the United States have ordered the JLM, in large part due to the Supreme Court's decision in Bounds v. Smith, 430 U.S. 817 (1977). Bounds requires states to provide inmates with meaningful access to the judicial system, either through legal assistance programs or adequate law libraries. This influential opinion, written by Justice Marshall, and cited in over three hundred opinions in thirty-three states and eleven federal circuits, has had a dramatic impact on the ability of inmates to pursue their legal rights while in prison. Prison administrators have ordered the JLM as part of their efforts to build adequate law libraries. They have discovered that inmates find the book easy to use and relevant to issues that concern them.

The Sixth Edition of the JLM, published in March of 2005, contains chapters on the following areas: the Prison Litigation Reform Act, legal research, legal documents, discovery, freedom of information, right to learn the law, rights of pretrial detainees, appeals, article 440 of the New York Criminal Procedure Law, federal habeas corpus, New York habeas corpus, relief from violations of inmates’ rights under Sections 1983 and 1331, state’s duty to protect inmates, challenges to administrative decisions through Article 78 of the New York Civil Practice Law, New York grievance program, inmates’ rights to adequate medical care, AIDS in Prison, right to be free from assault, sexual abuse and sexual harassment, rights of incarcerated parents, prison marriage and divorce, special issues of female prisoners, inmates’ right to communicate with the outside world, religious freedom in prison, immigration consequences to criminal activity, rights at prison disciplinary proceedings, temporary release programs, conditional and early release, parole, search for a lawyer, and directory of legal and social services for prisoners.

With the needs of prisoners across the country in mind, the Columbia Human Rights Law Review has endeavored, to the extent feasible, to make the Sixth Edition of the JLM useful to all prisoners without regard to where they are incarcerated. The information on federal actions will be helpful to an inmate in a federal prison, or pursuing federal claims, no matter where the inmate is located. The law, procedures and forms relating to state actions vary from state to state, however. Where possible, we have provided information that is generally applicable, although we have used New York forms and procedures as specific illustrations. We regret that the size and scope of the book prevent us from providing forms and specific procedural information for all states. Nevertheless, prisoners outside New York will find the JLM a valuable research tool.

In the past few years, the United States Congress has created more obstacles to keep prisoners out of the courthouse. These new laws include the Prison Litigation Reform Act, which severely restricts prisoners’ ability to bring civil lawsuits, as well as their ability to be represented by an attorney. Similarly, the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act sharply limits the availability of the writ of habeas corpus, used by prisoners for centuries to challenge unlawful confinement. Finally, the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act denied judicial review in many circumstances to immigrants that are ordered deported because of past criminal activity. The Sixth Edition responds to these developments with up-to-date information about changes in the law.

In addition to the English language JLM, a Spanish-language JLM is now available to provide an accessible resource for those prisoners who speak only Spanish.

An important part of managing and revising the JLM is responding to the heavy volume of mail we receive from prisoners. We thank the many jailhouse lawyers whose helpful comments have contributed to the improvements that may be found in both books. The process of improving the JLM never stops, and we ask that readers of the manual continue to share with us their ideas and comments.

In short, we hope the books will help you to protect your rights under the law. Although the current political climate is discouraging for inmates seeking justice, jailhouse lawyers should not abandon hope. We urge you to keep standing up for your rights and enforcing your humanity against those who would try to deny it. Remember—we will be standing behind you.

JLM Pricing

For prisoners: The JLM Sixth Edition is $25 per volume, or $45 for both volumes purchased together. We highly recommend that both books be used together. However, because inmates’ finances may be limited, you may purchase them separately. Standard shipping is included in the price. If you would like your books faster, include $5 per book for first class shipping, or $10 for both volumes.

The Spanish JLM is $15. Standard shipping is included in the price; however, you may include $5 for first class shipping.

See the pricing chart on the JLM order form. Prices and availability may be subject to change.

For non-prisoners, organizations, or institutions: The JLM Sixth Edition is $90 for a two volume set. Institutions may not purchase volumes separately. The Spanish JLM is $30. Standard shipping is included in the price; however, you may include $5 per volume for first class shipping.

If you are ordering for a prisoner, follow the instructions for prisoner pricing. See the pricing chart on the JLM order form. Prices and availability may be subject to change.

To Place an Order for the JLM

Complete and send the order form (link to JLM and SJLM Order Form) (formulario para su orden) with a check or money order, payable to Columbia Human Rights Law Review to:

Columbia Human Rights Law Review

Attn: JLM Order

435 W. 116th St.

New York , NY 10027

If you send a money order, keep the receipt in case there is a problem with your order. We do not accept postage stamps as payment and also do not accept credit cards. Due to the nature of the institutional mail systems, we request that you allow up to eight weeks from the date of your order. Because our office is student run, your order may not be processed as quickly over school breaks. Orders to be sent to facilities in Michigan must be sent first class. Also, please inform us on this form of any restrictions on incoming mail that your facility may have (for example, no padded envelopes or first class mail only).

*Please note - these prices are valid as of December 2005. If this form is more than two years old, prices have probably changed. Please contact A Jailhouse Lawyer’s Manual for updated pricing.

Last updated January 2006

Posted by lois at 11:08 AM | Comments (0)

Immigration crackdown creates new profit opportunity for CCA

Prison operator competes for federal contracts to house detainees

By GETAHN WARD, Staff Writer
Sunday, 05/21/06
http://tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060521/BUSINESS01/605210386/1003/NLETTER01

At the T. Don Hutto Residential Center in Taylor, Texas, there's a playground for children and murals painted on the walls. There's carpet on the floors of detention cells but no locks on the doors.

Only the second detention facility in the nation designed to house families, the center is part of a new push by U.S. immigration authorities to detain rather than release illegal immigrants awaiting deportation.

The location is owned and run by Nashville-based Corrections Corporation of America, which, like other private prison operators, is bracing for an increase in business from measures to curb illegal immigration. The Hutto Center opened last week under a contract with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, reversing last year's decision by CCA to shut down the then-underutilized prison.

"We do expect there'll be an increased need for detention beds," said John Ferguson, chief executive with CCA, citing the spotlight on immigration including legislation being discussed in Congress.

Opportunities being eyed by private prison operators include:

• The 2007 federal budget calls for 6,000 new detention beds for ICE, which doesn't build prisons but contracts space from county and other governments and from private operators such as CCA.

• CCA and its rival The GEO Group are among bidders vying to build and run a 2,800-bed U.S. Marshals Service detention Center in Laredo, Texas, to serve a federal court loaded with immigration cases.

• Under the second phase of ICE's secured border initiative, the agency is tracking down 600,000 undocumented immigrants who are fugitives from the immigration system. If caught, some are expected to go through the prison system before deportation.

Tougher enforcement

The broader ICE initiative includes ending a "catch-and-release" approach, under which people from countries other than Mexico who are caught trying illegally to cross the border are released and asked to return for a deportation hearing at a later date. Only 10 percent to 20 percent return. Under the new initiative, they would be detained until an expedited hearing, at which the government seeks to return them to their own countries.

CCA's 500-bed Hutto Center will house immigrant families caught within 100 miles of the border with Mexico or Canada or of a coastal border after being in the United States for 14 days or less. It addresses the lack of a facility along the Southern U.S. border to detain families that generally now are released pending a court hearing.

"Now we have a center that can hold families for removal back to their respective countries," said Ernestine Fobbs, spokeswoman for ICE, a part of the Department of Homeland Security. Berks County, Pa., has the only other such center nationwide. It is much smaller.

At Hutto, families will be housed based on age or sex of children and whether they include fathers or have mothers only, Ferguson said. Most detainees are expected to be single mothers with one to two children between the ages of 6 and 12, according to CCA officials. The center requires more Spanish-speaking staff and has technology that allows for connection with companies that offer translation services.

Office space is available for government staff such as deportation officers, ICE enforcement officers and clerical staff. ICE said families can have the dignity of staying together while getting the message that those entering the U.S. illegally will be sent home.

Judith Greene, a policy analyst at Justice Strategies in New York, sees alternatives to detention. She cited a study that showed 90% of people released to a nonprofit group returned for their hearing.

While private operators are seeing benefits from the spotlight on immigration, any significant windfall from changes passed by Congress won't necessarily be immediate because immigration policy isn't going to change overnight, said Geoffrey Segal, director of government reform with Reason Foundation, a Los Angeles think tank and free-markets organization. "There's some lag time between development of new policy and implementation of it," he said. He said, however, that with access to capital and other resources, private companies are better suited to meet a need for more beds.

"It's a tremendous opportunity for CCA because they have some empty facilities," said Richard Crane, a Nashville privatization consultant and director of Houston prison operator Cornell Cos.

Room for growth

CCA, the industry's leader, has more than 5,000 beds available, including space at a company-owned Georgia prison in contention for a deal from the federal Bureau of Prisons to house 1,200 non-U.S. citizens serving crime sentences.

The company also is trying to create more room for growth. It plans to spend $38.9 million on a 722-bed expansion of its 480-bed Webb County Detention Center in Laredo, Texas, which could be expanded again if it wins the 2,800-bed U.S. Marshals contract.

Overall, private prison companies have built or proposed to add 7,000 new beds in Texas during the past two to three years, said Bob Libal, co-director of Grassroots Leadership of Austin, a group that monitors the private prisons industry. "There has been a dramatic explosion in the number of immigrant detention beds in the last several years," Libal said, adding that district attorneys in border areas have boosted prosecution of immigrant offenders, including those caught crossing the border for the first time. "It's a tremendous waste of resources to be prosecuting people, having them serve jail time and deporting them. It doesn't make sense, but companies like CCA are set to make a lot of money off this trend."

Overall, CCA generates nearly 40% of its annual revenue from federal contracts — 16% from the Bureau of Prisons, 15% from the U.S. Marshal Service and 8% from ICE. CCA's ties with ICE date back to the company's early days in 1983, when it was hired to build and run the Houston Processing Center for the agency that was then called INS.

Last year, the company housed 1,200 ICE inmates who had to be moved out of Florida because of Hurricane Wilma.

"They're our largest single customer with needs south of the border," said Damon Hininger, vice president of federal customer relations at CCA. "With all the national emphasis on enforcement on the Southwest border and more resources available for patrol, that's going to have direct correlation with the need for detention."

Posted by lois at 11:05 AM | Comments (0)

Growing Old Behind Bars

Philadelphia Daily News (PA)
May 8, 2006
Page: 03
Memo:GROWING OLD BEHIND BARS

GROWING OLD BEHIND BARS
THE HIGH COST OF CARING FOR AGED AND SICKLY INMATES

Large gray area for prisons

Aging inmates raise questions from health care to whether they should be sprung
DANA DiFILIPPO

GEORGE DAVID Smith's home is a 6-by-12-foot concrete cell in Graterford state prison, where his arthritis-crippled hands can barely fasten the ties on his jail-issued jumpsuit and where guards have to shout at him so he can hear.

He's 79 now, the same age as the man he shot dead in a gas-station robbery in 1953. Smith doesn't remember his victim's name, maybe because he chooses not to or because he's grown increasingly forgetful with age.
But he vividly remembers his hometown of Cleveland, Tenn., where he dreams of returning to revive his carpentry business.

After bouncing in and out of jail since the 1940s, he knows he could die here on Cell Block D.

"Me, I can get by on the outside. Most old folks like me can't do nothing - they're lucky they can go to the toilet and use toilet paper. I ain't that messed up," Smith said. "But they won't ever let me out of here."

It costs taxpayers up to three times as much as other inmates to keep seniors like Smith behind bars. As the number of geriatric jailbirds climbs each year, a controversy is brewing over what to do with prisoners like Smith.

Smith and the 2,850 other seniors locked up in Pennsylvania's prisons should be freed, some argue, because they're too old and infirm to kill or maim again, and cost too much to keep them behind bars.

"In addition to the economic burden, the incarceration of the elderly poses fundamental questions of how we as a society treat our elders," wrote Brie Williams, lead author of a study on geriatric prisoners in last month's Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. "What do we want to do with a prisoner who is so demented he doesn't remember his name, or who has had a stroke and is completely paralyzed?"

But prosecutors and victims' families say old age can't erase convicts' crimes and shouldn't earn them an early exit from jail.

"Why should they be in a nursing home where their family gets to come and comfort them and say goodbye to them at their death bed? I can't say goodbye to my loved one," said Shawn Chambers-Galis, whose brother and another man were slain by an acquaintance in 2003. "[An early release is] not what my justice system assured me would happen. I will agree with this the day they show me my brother's appeal process to get out of his grave."

The debate promises to deepen as state lawmakers take sides. Pennsylvania legislators now are considering a "compassionate release" bill that would allow judges to free infirm, elderly inmates and others crippled by chronic health conditions.

The bill comes in the wake of a growing, graying trend that has lawmakers racing to contain correctional costs.

Prisons in Pennsylvania and nationwide have more older inmates than ever, as aging baby boomers, stricter laws and mandatory sentencing put more people behind bars into their golden years.

In Pennsylvania, where life sentences don't allow parole, many elderly inmates believe a toe tag is their only ticket out of jail, since paroled killer Reginald McFadden's murderous 1994 crime spree brought commutations to a screeching halt.

Nationally in 2004, about 67,200 inmates were 55 or older - the age most states consider elderly - representing about 5 percent of prison populations, according to the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Experts predict that one third of the nation's prisoners will be geriatric by 2030. Inmates age 50 and older surged from 4.5 percent of Pennsylvania's prison population in 1980 to 13 percent last year, according to state data.

Still, insiders say terror might trump budget concerns when it comes to releasing cellblock seniors.

"About 75 percent of these older inmates are murderers and rapists. That's not a group of people that the community feels real comfortable with," said Jeffrey Beard, superintendent of the state Department of Corrections. "But if nothing changes, an already expensive prison system is going to become more expensive."

Not there for their health

For Smith, it's the stairs.

Graterford is full of them. Navigating the state's largest maximum-security prison, built in 1929, is a workout for inmates with mobility problems. Smith, who shuffles glacially because of his ailments, typically leans on the arm of another inmate on stairases.

For inmates like Thomas Moore and Florence Caesar, it's the feeling that they need to fight for medical care. Moore, 66, a lifer in Graterford for a 1988 Monroeville homicide, has had to file grievances to get contact lenses.

"Medical treatment sucks. They are only going through the motions for elderly lifers," agreed Caesar, 64, serving life at the state prison in Muncy for a 1987 West Philadelphia arson murder.

Smith added: "I had a hearing-aid and it went ka-blink. I asked for another one and they won't give me one."

Professional studies suggest such complaints aren't groundless. Elderly prisoners tend to be less healthy than the general population, experts agree. Many led risky lifestyles before incarceration, making them more susceptible to chronic conditions. And institutional settings can exacerbate medical problems, with contagions spreading quickly in close quarters and inmates staying less active than they might in the community.

Consequently, prison life poses big challenges for mature inmates, researchers assert in April's Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

Besides such daily tasks as bathing and using the toilet, they might have trouble hearing orders from correctional officers, standing in line to be counted, walking to dining halls or moving quickly in response to orders or alarms, according to the study.

Older inmates also are vulnerable to attack by younger inmates, said Julia Glover Hall, a Drexel University criminologist who specializes in gerontology.

Younger inmates "have absolutely no respect for people with age," Caesar agreed. "They stampede through us and knock us down - they don't care you got a cane or a walker."

And while the state considers prisoners geriatric at age 55, "there's no retirement system in the system," said Moore, who heads the senior-advocacy inmate group Gray Panthers at Graterford. "Everyone must work. But everyone's not capable of working."

Prisoners can be excused from working if health problems are verified, said Sheila Moore, a Corrections spokeswoman.

Old age also doesn't guarantee any mercy from prisons' rigid rules, inmates complain. Smith has been sent to "the hole" - solitary confinement, where inmates are freed from their cell an hour a day - four times in the past six years for infractions such as talking back to guards.

Simple policy changes and modest physical improvements can alleviate some problems for elderly inmates, said author Brie Williams, a geriatrician at the San Francisco VA Medical Center and research fellow at the University of California-San Francisco.

Williams recommends that prisons assign elderly inmates bottom bunks, install grab bars near toilets in cells and in showers, house older inmates closer to the cafeteria and give them more time to comply with orders. Such measures already exist at Pennsylvania's Laurel Highlands prison, where many of the state's senior inmates live.

But others insist legislative change is necessary.

State lawmakers in 2002 directed the Joint State Government Commission - the General Assembly's research arm - to study the issue.

A 46-member advisory committee - of prosecutors, judges, victim advocates, health-care experts and criminologists - aims to file a final report by June.

Its 256-page draft report offers three recommendations: Allow judges to release seriously or terminally ill inmates, create mental-health courts that would place mentally ill inmates in community institutions and give lifers the chance for parole.

While lawmakers haven't hurried to help parole elderly lifers, the first option was introduced as a bill and now is in the state House Judiciary Committee.

A "Compassionate Release Act" - enacted in 1919 - already exists, but applies only to infirm inmates whose care can't be accommodated in prison.

The current bill would expand that law to allow the release of seriously sick inmates with little risk of reoffending, without regard to whether the system can accommodate their needs. The proposal also would expedite such releases.

Such a change could save the state millions, its chief proponent argued.

"Sometimes those people cost the state $100,000 or more - their care is more expensive in the prison" than the community, said state Sen. Stewart Greenleaf, R-Montgomery County, chairman of the task force.

The average inmate cost is $31,000 a year, but can fluctuate depending on the institution and inmates' needs, according to 2005 state corrections data. The state prison at Albion was lowest at $21,900, while Laurel Highlands was highest, at $45,000, according to the data. Laurel Highlands inmates receiving long-term care were even pricier, averaging $63,500 a year, the task force found.

Prison inmates aren't eligible for Medicaid - but would be, if freed into the community, Greenleaf added.

Critics complain that releasing them would merely shift the cost from the state prison system to other forms of public assistance, meaning taxpayers would still foot the bill. The average cost per patient in a publicly funded county nursing home was $62,000 in 2004, according to state data.

Greenleaf countered that some could be cared for by relatives - surely cheaper than state incarceration or nursing homes.

Hall agreed: "Statistically speaking, they are not likely to reoffend. The public is paying a premium price for no additional protection."

The other side of the story

Such sentiment inspires a simple gut reaction from Shawn Chambers-Galis that she can express in one emphatic, unapologetic word: "Bull----!"

After the agony of her brother's murder, she has no sympathy for his killer. She hopes he dies in prison.

"One of the sorriest parts of our world is this: Everybody knows the Menendez brothers and Charles Manson. But nobody remembers the victims' names. We as a society have a celebrity culture, where people say: 'Boo-hoo! These poor prisoners!' We have to stop that. We have to put the focus back on the victims," said Chambers-Galis, 43, of Mount Joy, Lancaster County.

The victim Chambers-Galis most mourns is her brother, Mark Edward Chambers, an Alaskan hunting guide who was gunned down at age 42 by Michael DeNeut, an acquaintance who also killed another man and a dog in an ambush in Fairbanks.

DeNeut, a schizophrenic who denies his crime, is 55 - elderly by some states' corrections standards.

He, like other convicts his age and older, doesn't deserve a "free pass" just because he has a few wrinkles, Chambers-Galis said.

When Chambers-Galis heard about the legislative effort under way to free infirm and elderly inmates, she got busy.

She and John Show - father of Laurie Show, a 16-year-old stabbed to death by three classmates in 1991 in Lancaster County - co-founded Justice for Homicide Victims in 2004 and have battled to beat the bill through a letter-writing campaign. Although her brother's killer wouldn't be affected by the legislation because he's in Alaska, Chambers-Galis felt driven to fight it on principle, she said.

"We need to stop running our prisons on a budget," she said. "These people are in jail for horrific acts. They're there for a reason. If in our society, we want to curtail murders and violence, we have to make sure we are clear to people what the consequences will be."

She has the backing of some powerful people.

Philadelphia District Attorney Lynne Abraham called the proposal to release geriatric inmates "a misguided and dangerous attempt to balance the budget on the backs of the victims of crime."

Anyone feeling any sympathy for elderly inmates need only consider their crimes, Chambers-Galis and Abraham said.

After stints in jail for other crimes, Thomas Moore was imprisoned in 1988 for killing Douglas Baskin in a botched Monroeville robbery. Authorities alleged that Moore mistakenly shot Baskin as the duo robbed a homeowner, because he lost his eyeglasses and couldn't see his partner.

Florence Caesar set fire to a friend's West Philadelphia home in 1987 after he tried to settle an argument between her and another woman. The fire spread and burned the homeowner, James Murchinson, who died 11 months later from his injuries.

George David Smith was a career criminal from Tennessee who spent time in prisons in Ohio and Pennsylvania for armed robberies before he killed David Fawber, a Harrisburg gas-station attendant and motel operator, in 1953.

Smith also was a prison rioter and habitual jail escapee who nonetheless had his life sentence commuted in 1973. Since then, repeated parole violations kept him pingponging in and out of prison, with his most recent commitment in 2000 for leaving the state without permission and threatening to kill a prison guard.

Changing profile

In person, Smith is a far cry from the hardened, incorrigible thug his criminal record suggests.

His right arm curls uselessly into his chest, paralyzed from a 1984 mugging and beating that almost killed him. That attack also left him with a severe limp, short-term memory loss, facial scars and a speech impediment that gives him the growl of Karl the slow-witted killer from the 1996 flick "Sling Blade."

He can hear only shouted queries and comments. And with his eyesight eroding, he squints to see, explaining that his eyeglasses are missing a screw and keep falling off his face.

"And I got these knots in my belly - feel 'em, here," he offered, inviting a pat-down of his stout, lumpy torso. He coughed violently into a crumpled, yellowed hanky and shrugged at the cause of both his belly bumps and frequent hacking fits.

Despite his ailments, he expects to be around awhile.

"My mom lived to be 100 years old," he said.

He remains steadfastly unrepentant for his crimes, saying authorities have trumped up his alleged parole violations to keep him behind bars because "they get $52,000 a year for me."

He's not sure what's in store for him if he's released.

"My wife - she got married three times since I left, I think," he said.

He gets no visitors at prison and doesn't know where his children - "at last count, I had six" - are.

Still, he longs for freedom.

"As you grow older, when you hit that 60-mark, you start forgetting things and you get worse, worse, worse," he said. "But not me. I am getting in better health. I'd like to get out of this dump. I don't like no prisons." *

Illustration:PHOTO

Homicide victim Mark Chambers with his daughters; his sister leads effort to remember victims.

Thomas Moore, 66, doing life at Graterford state prison 1988 for 1988 Monroeville homicide.

J.D. CAVRICH/For the Daily News

Many prisoners at Laurel Highlands negotiate the hallways on wheelchairs and crutches.

J.D. CAVRICH/For the Daily News

An elderly inmate walks with a cane at Laurel Highlands prison, an increasingly familiar sight in state correctional facilities.Graterford state prison inmate George David Smith, 79, is doing time for a 1953 murder; he realizes at this point he could die in prison.

Posted by lois at 10:49 AM | Comments (0)

May 20, 2006

Chicago: Judge Rules Report on Police in Chicago Should Be Released

May 20, 2006
Judge Rules Report on Police in Chicago Should Be Released
By MONICA DAVEY

CHICAGO, May 19 — A judge here ruled on Friday that a special prosecutor's report on accusations of torture by Chicago police officers over two decades should be made public, as a United Nations panel in Geneva urged American authorities to investigate the claims further.

The result of an investigation that has taken four years and cost Cook County more than $5 million, the report is likely to be released in several weeks, prosecutors said.

The investigation stems from accusations by 192 people that police officers at two city stations tortured them — beating them, shocking them with electric devices and trying to suffocate them — from the 1970's to the early 1990's.

"After the third torture session, I understood that these guys weren't going to let me out of there alive if I didn't say what they wanted," said David Bates, who was among the people whose cases were investigated by the special prosecutor. Mr. Bates said police beat him and covered his head with a typewriter cover in 1983 until he confessed to a crime he says he did not commit.

About two dozen people marched outside of the criminal courthouse on Friday morning, calling on Circuit Judge Paul P. Biebel Jr. to make the report public, though lawyers for some of the officers have argued it should be kept from public view.

Judge Biebel, responding to inquiries from prosecutors as to whether they could make the report public, said the public's right to learn details of the investigation outweighed the privacy rights of individual officers.

"The release of the report will address the issues which have led to rumor and speculation which have spread unimpeded over the fabric of the Cook County criminal justice system for more than 30 years," he wrote.

Spokeswomen for the city of Chicago's law department and for the police department said those entities supported release of the report.

Many of the accusers have pointed to officers who were overseen by Commander Jon Burge, who was fired from the Chicago Police Department in 1993. Richard Sikes, a lawyer who represents Mr. Burge in three lawsuits against him, said he has seen no signs of torture in the cases he has handled.

He suggested that Mr. Burge may have become a magnet for people in Chicago who want to claim they were wrongfully convicted, saying, "I think there's a lot of bandwagon here, in my view."

In Geneva, the United Nations Committee against Torture released its own report, which, along with calling on the United States to close the detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and criticizing interrogation techniques, took note of the "limited investigation and lack of prosecution" in connection to the accusations of torture in Chicago.

It called on American authorities to "promptly, thoroughly and impartially" investigate the accusations, and provide the committee with more information.

It was uncertain whether the special prosecutor's report in Chicago could lead to indictments.

Robert D. Boyle, who was appointed as assistant special state's attorney in the case beside Edward J. Egan, the special prosecutor, said the report had to be "fine-tuned" and was not yet ready for release. In addition, a small part of it, including identifying information about a former assistant state's attorney, will not be made public for at least two weeks, a second judge ruled on Friday.

Gretchen Ruethling contributed reporting for this article.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Posted by lois at 02:16 PM | Comments (0)

NY Times Editorial: Prison-Based Gerrymandering

May 20, 2006
Editorial, NY Times
Prison-Based Gerrymandering

Prison inmates are barred from voting in 48 states. Even so, state legislatures typically count the inmates as "residents" to pad state legislative districts that sometimes contain too few residents to be legal under federal voting rights law. This unsavory practice exaggerates the political power of the largely rural districts where prisons are built and diminishes the power of the mainly urban districts where inmates come from and where they inevitably return.

Prison-based gerrymandering has helped Republicans in the northern part of New York maintain a perennial majority in the State Senate and exercise an outsized influence in state affairs. A recent ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has pushed this little-known problem into the public eye and could one day be remembered as the beginning of the end of the practice.

The court held that prison inmates did not have the right to vote, as the plaintiffs were contending. But the court expressed interest in the question of whether counting minority inmates in prison as residents there, instead of in their home districts, unfairly diluted the voting power of minority voters in urban districts. The issue was referred to the lower court for consideration, and this in turn has already led to a broader public discussion of the role that inmates play in the political process.

New York State's Republican leadership dismissed the court's ruling out of hand and tried to argue that counting inmates as residents of a prison's district was legal and no different than counting college students at their dormitories. That's absurd. Students live in dormitories voluntarily - and can actually vote. Inmates cannot vote, and their home districts lose representation when they are counted elsewhere.

Voters who come to understand how this system cheats them are unlikely to keep rewarding the politicians who support it.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Posted by lois at 11:05 AM | Comments (0)

Hedge Fund dumps CCA

*Farallon Dumps Corrections Corporation of America*
After national campus pressure, world’s fourth largest hedge fund
divests from controversial for-profit private prison corporationMay 19, 2006

National - Following a year-long campaign by students, graduate
teachers, faculty, and community members, Farallon Capital aid Silky Shah, co-director of the /Not With Our Money!/ campaign. “We hope other investment firms such as Lehman Brothers will follow Farallon’s lead and and refuse to do business with the for-profit private prison industry.”

In 2001, Grassroots Leadership’s /Not With Our Money!/ campaign, a
network of student and community activists working to end the use of
prisons for profit, successfully forced Sodexho, a campus caterer and at the time the largest CCA shareholder, to fully divest from the
corporation and to withdraw its representative from the CCA board of
directors.

Sarah Haley, a GESO member and primary author of the report /Endowing
Injustice/, which first exposed Yale’s investment in CCA through
Farallon holdings, welcomed the news.

“I am delighted that Yale and Farallon have listened to the outcry
against CCA and have done the right thing. On Yale’s campus and at
colleges around the country, teachers and students were firmly opposed to this investment,” Haley said. “This is a major victory for the values of higher education.”

At Yale, GESO collected over 1250 signatures in opposition to the CCA
investment. Students and faculty at eight other colleges and
universities had invested in Farallon also organized for divestment from
CCA.

The Graduate Employees and Students Organization works to represent and promote the interests of graduate students at Yale. GESO is a leader in the national movement to unionize graduate students.

www.notwithourmoney.org |

Posted by lois at 11:02 AM | Comments (0)

U.S. Should Close Prison in Cuba, U.N. Panel Says

May 20, 2006
U.S. Should Close Prison in Cuba, U.N. Panel Says
By TIM GOLDEN, NY Times

UNITED NATIONS, May 19 — An important United Nations panel roundly criticized the United States on Friday for its treatment of terrorism suspects, and called for shutting down the detention camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

The panel's criticism came as military officials at Guantánamo disclosed the most serious disturbances by prisoners there since the camp opened four years ago, and reported new suicide attempts that had left two detainees hospitalized and unconscious.

The disturbances, which took place on Thursday, included a violent attack on guards that was put down by antiriot soldiers firing shotgun blasts and pepper spray, and an episode involving two other groups of detainees who tore apart their quarters and attacked guards in a showcase unit for the camp's most compliant inmates.

Military officials said the prisoners' actions were apparently aimed at raising political pressure on the Bush administration over its detention policy. Pressure was also ratcheted up by the report issued in Geneva by the United Nations Committee Against Torture.

After a lengthy review of United States policies, the committee dismissed several basic legal arguments the Bush administration had offered to justify such practices as the incommunicado detention of prisoners overseas and the secret transfer, or "rendition," of suspects for interrogation by other governments.

The panel, which monitors compliance with the Convention Against Torture, the main international treaty that bans such conduct, also concluded that the Central Intelligence Agency's widely reported practice of holding detainees in secret prisons abroad constitutes a clear violation of the convention.

The United States "should investigate and disclose the existence of any such facilities and the authority under which they have been established," the committee said in its 11-page preliminary report. It also called on the Bush administration to "publicly condemn any policy of secret detention."

The recommendations of the committee are not legally binding. But they are likely to be more influential than previous international reviews, in part because the Bush administration clearly took the process seriously, sending a delegation of more than two dozen officials to Geneva earlier this month to present its legal case.

On Friday, some of those administration officials responded to the report by defending the United States' treatment of suspected terrorists, and criticizing the committee's evaluation as flawed and superficial.

"I think the committee was guided more by popular concerns than by a strict reading of the convention itself," said the State Department's legal adviser, John B. Bellinger III, who led the delegation.

"It obviously causes us to question whether our extensive presentation was worth it," Mr. Bellinger said.

"Unfortunately, I think the committee really had essentially written its report" beforehand, he said.

The report was delivered as part of the committee's periodic review of actions by signers of the torture convention, which the United States ratified in 1994.

The committee's report "welcomed" and "noted with satisfaction" several steps by the United States, including the administration's formal statement that all United States officials are prohibited from engaging in torture at all times and in all places.

But the panel, which is made up of 10 independent human rights experts from around the world, was hardly generous in its praise.

It took a broad swipe at the administration's argument that some of its policies — like the indefinite detention of prisoners without charge at Guantánamo — were defensible under laws of armed conflict.

It called for the United States to immediately end its practice of refusing to register some of the so-called high-value terrorism suspects it holds overseas or make them accessible to the International Committee of the Red Cross. The Bush administration, the panel wrote, "should ensure that no one is detained in any secret detention facility under its de facto effective control."

The committee also urged the United States to make sure that its interrogation methods did not violate the convention, and it specifically called for an end to techniques like sexual humiliation and "water-boarding," a form of simulated drowning that reportedly has been used by the C.I.A.

In their presentation to the panel, Bush administration officials insisted that although abuses had taken place, those who committed them were consistently punished. But the panel appeared less than convinced, saying the United States should "promptly, thoroughly and impartially investigate any responsibility of senior military and civilian officials authorizing, acquiescing or consenting, in any way, to acts of torture committed by their subordinates."

The committee also recommended that the United States enact a federal criminal law against torture to supplement the prohibitions already in place. It also insisted that United States officials "should investigate, prosecute and punish" American citizens who are guilty of torturing people overseas.

"None of this is binding," said Kenneth Roth, the executive director of the advocacy group Human Rights Watch. "The U.S. can just reject the judgment. But this is the judgment of the authoritative body of experts for interpreting the convention."

He called the panel's conclusions "a complete repudiation of virtually every legal theory that the Bush administration has offered for its controversial detention and interrogation policies."

The committee's appeal to close Guantánamo is only the latest in a recent series of calls from around the world. The senior Pentagon official in charge of detainee affairs, Charles D. Stimson, indicated that the administration was no more persuaded by the committee than it had been by others.

"That is one body's opinion," Mr. Stimson, a deputy assistant secretary of defense, said in an interview.

In recent remarks, President Bush and other officials have suggested that they would readily do away with the Guantánamo prison if they had a better alternative.

Meanwhile, the nearly 500 detainees appear determined to increase pressure on their captors.

The suicide attempts on Thursday came four months after military officials broke a wave of hunger strikes by force-feeding detainees while they were strapped into "restraint chairs" for hours at a time. But before the attacks on the guards, Guantánamo commanders said they had been gaining steadily greater compliance from the detainees, in part by improving their living conditions.

"This was probably the most violent outbreak here," the new commander of the detention camp, Rear Adm. Harry B. Harris, Jr., said Friday. "This is a way to bring attention to their detention."

At a briefing for reporters unusual for its candor and detail, Admiral Harris said the disturbances began Thursday morning when a prisoner was found unconscious after ingesting "a large quantity" of anti-anxiety drugs that had apparently been hoarded by detainees.

In the early afternoon, guards discovered a cache of drugs hidden in the toilet of a cell. Minutes after that, a second prisoner was found in his cell, Admiral Harris said, "frothing at the mouth."

Both of the detainees were stable but still unconscious more than 24 hours after being hospitalized. Two other detainees also complained to the guards of nausea, military officials said, including one who said he tried to kill himself but did not have enough drugs.

At about 6:30 p.m., military officials said, guards noticed a detainee who appeared to be preparing to hang himself from the ceiling with sheets in Camp 4, the showcase, medium-security wing where detainees live together in dormitories.

But the guards were set upon by detainees who had slickened the floor with urine, soapy water and feces. After the prisoners hit the guards with blades from ceiling fans, pieces of metal and other improvised weapons, a riot-control unit was sent in with batons and shields.

The military police officer in charge of Guantánamo's detention operations, Col. Michael Bumgarner, said the detainees had continued fighting, even jumping off beds onto the guards. "Frankly, we were losing," he said.

At that point, Colonel Bumgarner said, guards shot five rounds of "nonlethal" pellets from a 12-gauge shotgun, and a rubber grenade from an M-203 launcher.

Rioting then broke out in two other blocks of Camp 4, as some 50 detainees demolished their quarters to make weapons to attack the guards. It was an hour, Colonel Bumgarner said, before the disturbances were entirely brought under control.

A military spokesman said 60 of the detainees were later transferred to more secure areas of the camp.

Posted by lois at 10:56 AM | Comments (0)

May 19, 2006

NY:Prisoners And The Right To Vote

Gotham Gazette -
Prisoners And The Right To Vote
by Emily Jane Goodman
18 May 2006

New Yorkers in prison do not have the right to vote. That is the ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit in a class action lawsuit brought by inmates and former inmates. Only the United States Supreme Court can reverse the decision by this federal court, and it is considered unlikely to do so.

The plaintiffs in the lawsuit, Hayden v. Pataki, claimed that the Voting Rights Act of 1964 and its amendments applied to them and those they represented, who sought access to the ballot. In recognition of the fundamental importance of suffrage in a democracy, the Voting Rights Act forbids "denial or abridgement of the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color... ." The plaintiffs in this case argued that the high rate of imprisonment for African-Americans and Latinos led to an inference of racial discrimination.

Felony Disenfranchisement

The issue of what is called felony disenfranchisement is a long and contentious one. (See Felons and the Right to Vote.) It was a phrase heard around the world during the election debacle of 2000, when a state law in Florida that terminated suffrage for convicted citizens was erroneously applied to some Floridians who did not in fact have a criminal record.

In a far from unanimous decision in the New York case, the judges of the Circuit Court, which is one level below the Supreme Court, were divided, with eight in the majority and powerful dissents filed by five others. Judge Jose A. Cabranes writing for the majority concluded that the federal Voting Rights Act, generally considered one of the most outstanding accomplishments of the American civil rights movement, was not intended to eliminate felon disenfranchisement, and that it could not be used to infringe upon the states' discretion to deprive felons of the right to vote. The court concluded that New York Election Law, which specifies that "no person convicted of a felony 'shall have the right to register for or vote at any election' unless he has been pardoned, his maximum sentence of imprisonment has expired, or he has been discharged from parole" does not violate the Voting Rights Act and that the denial is not based on race. The court rejected the claim of disenfranchisement on account of race or color despite the disproportionate number of African-Americans and Latinos in custody or on parole.

The concept of felon disenfranchisement is sometimes called civil death, in which anyone convicted of a serious crime loses the right to participate not only in elections, but in society in general. Thus they are removed from society by incarceration, and rights afforded others are terminated, including voting, holding public office, and obtaining certain licenses.
Dissent

Judge Barrington D. Parker's dissent focused on the vastly different rates of incarceration for African-Americans and Latinos contrasted with the white population, which he said resulted from discrimination in New York's criminal justice system, which in turn leads to discriminatory disenfranchisement. He noted that according to the complaint, African-Americans and Latinos make up 86 percent of the total current New York prison population and 82 percent of parolees, even though they comprise only 31 percent of the state's overall population. While Judge Parker conceded that the 14th amendment did allow for felon disenfranchisement but he suggested it could still be unconstitutional and a violation of the Voting Rights Act.
Upstate Incarceration
The court did return one issue to the lower federal court for resolution. That is the issue of urban (usually New York City) prisoners being incarcerated upstate or being counted for census, apportionment, representation, and revenue purposes, as residents of that area, thereby bringing funds and increased representation to northern counties, while diluting their impact in their home regions. In fact, about two thirds of New York State inmates come from New York City, and of that at least 90 percent are incarcerated upstate. The question for the District Court is whether the effect of these New Yorkers’ disenfranchisement dilutes the voting impact and representation for non-felons in their communities. . (See Imprisoned in New York.)

One way or another, both issues will surely reach the Supreme Court of the United States.
Emily Jane Goodman is a New York State Supreme Court Justice

Gotham Gazette - http://www.gothamgazette.com/article/law/20060518/13/1856

Posted by lois at 12:39 PM | Comments (0)

May 18, 2006

Immigrants, other minorities must find unity

Immigrants, other minorities must find unity
- María Blanco, Eva Paterson, Hector Preciado and Van Jones
Sunday, May 7, 2006
During the unprecedented mobilizations for immigrants' rights, much has been written and said about tensions between the African American community and the immigrant community.

The common theme in many of these reports is that African Americans feel immigrants are responsible for the economic displacement of African Americans and for the lowering of wages, particularly in blue collar and service jobs. Reading between the lines, there is also a sense of a different kind of displacement when headlines, sound bites, and some immigrant rights spokespersons refer to the "new civil rights movement."

In the face of this much-publicized division (much of it based on the statements of a few individuals), many leaders in both communities have stepped forward to express unity between our two movements, fully aware that both of our communities have faced similar discrimination and scapegoating. The expression of unity is welcomed and needed.

But sometimes the rush to close ranks cuts short a discussion that is necessary in order to build genuine unity between our communities. For example, some of us wince when we hear the rallying cry: "We do the jobs that nobody else will do." Is that a positive, unifying message? Yes, it is positive because it rebuts the unfounded argument that immigrants drain, rather than contribute to the economy.

The May 1 marches publicly demonstrated what we all know to be the case from our personal experience: Immigrants are an integral part of our economy and our communities. But this statement of pride can have unintended divisive effects. African Americans in particular are acutely sensitive to the existence of a highly exploited, second tier work force.

It also prompts the question of why those subsistence jobs exist, and whether we should accept them as an unavoidable part of today's economic landscape.

The fact is that immigrants in the United States predominantly occupy jobs that cannot be outsourced by U.S. businesses seeking to compete in the global economy. As much as they may want to, companies cannot outsource jobs in the hotel, agriculture, construction, restaurants or meatpacking industries the way they have other jobs that used to be the mainstay of the U.S. worker: auto, steel, shoes, garment, textile, electronics and so on.

Instead of viewing immigrants who take low-paying jobs to help their families survive as the cause of low wages, effective unity in the civil rights movement involves taking a hard look in the opposite direction: at political and economic policies that have lowered wages, created jobs with no health insurance or safety regulations, and eliminated the safety net.

According to a recent study by the Commonwealth Fund, 41 percent of adults with incomes between $20,000 and $40,000 a year did not have health insurance for at least part of 2005, up from 28 percent without coverage in 2001. Blame for the existence of jobs without health insurance cannot be laid at the feet of immigrants. Nor can the demise of unions and extensive layoffs due to companies who go overseas.

Communities that face unemployment should focus on the policies that have created an unprecedented number of billionaires and millionaires and an unprecedented economic divide.

As for the new civil rights movement, perhaps much of the discomfort created by this phrase is due to the fact that there is still much unfinished business in the "old" civil rights movement. The immigrant rights movement has to be sensitive to that reality.

The spark that generated the mass mobilizations over the past month -- a federal law that would make it a felony to be an undocumented immigrant or to provide any service to them -- echoes the fugitive slave laws of the 1840s.

Latino immigrants who today march for dignity know that they are part of the great tradition of the freedom marches, launched and led by African Americans. While immigrants have clearly mobilized in new ways, never to go back to an era where politicians and demagogues could use anti-immigrant rhetoric and policies to launch their political careers, maybe it is more accurate to say that the civil rights movement has grown and crossed borders, both literally and culturally.

Just before Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, he was expanding the reach of the civil rights movement with the "Poor People's March on Washington," a movement that brought together the issues of race and poverty.

The immigrant rights marches are part of that continuum. So are concerns about backlash that are making the rounds. The same was said in response to the huge civil rights marches and sit-ins of the 1960s. The naysayers will always be there. So will those who want to divide us. What we have before us is an opportunity to reinvigorate our mutual work with the energy captured by the spirited expression that rang out across the nation on May 1 -- sí se puede!

María Blanco is the executive director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights. Eva Paterson is the president of the Equal Justice Society. Hector Preciado is the director of strategic communications at the Greenlining Institute. Van Jones is the executive director of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights. Contact us at insight@sfchronicle.com.

Page E - 1
URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/05/07/INGRFILDO11.DTL

Posted by lois at 06:28 PM | Comments (0)

Counter Recruitment Comic on Paper Bags

Dear Peacemakers and Counter-Recruiters,
The 1st page of my comic book, "Mixed Signals" is being emblazoned on paper bags, to be distributed to delis and bodegas by a mysterious cadre of activist artists known as "Friends of William Blake."
Sabrina

Check it out in this week's "Time Out NY" or on the Wm Blake website: http://tinyurl.com/z2eem http://counterrecruitmentguide.org/bag.php

Check out my counter-recruitment comics: http://www.brethren.org/oepa/CRMixedSignals.html

Posted by lois at 06:24 PM | Comments (0)

Nation's population 1/3 Minority- U.S. Census

MAY 10, 2006 (WEDNESDAY)
Nation’s Population One-Third Minority

About 1-in-every-3 U.S. residents was part of a group other than single-race non-Hispanic white — according to national estimates by race, Hispanic origin and age released today by the U.S. Census Bureau. In 2005, the nation’s minority population totaled 98 million, or 33 percent, of the country’s total of 296.4 million.

“These mid-decade numbers provide further evidence of the increasing diversity of our nation’s population,” said Census Bureau Director Louis Kincannon.

Hispanics continue to be the largest minority group at 42.7 million. With a 3.3 percent increase in population from July 1, 2004, to July 1, 2005, they are the fastest-growing group.

Unless otherwise specified, the data refer to the population who reported a race alone or in combination with one or more other races. The tables show data for both this group and those who reported a single race only.

The second largest minority group was blacks (39.7 million), followed by Asians (14.4 million), American Indians and Alaska natives (4.5 million) and native Hawaiians and other Pacific islanders (990,000). The population of non-Hispanic whites who indicated no other race totaled 198.4 million in 2005. (See Table 1 Excel | PDF.)

Highlights for the various groups follow:

Hispanics

* Hispanics accounted for almost half (1.3 million, or 49 percent) of the national population growth of 2.8 million between July 1, 2004, and July 1, 2005.
* Of the increase of 1.3 million, 800,000 was because of natural increase (births minus deaths) and 500,000 was because of immigration. (See Table 2 Excel | PDF.)
* The Hispanic population in 2005 was much younger with a median age of 27.2 years compared to the population as a whole at 36.2 years. About a third of the Hispanic population was under 18, compared with one-fourth of the total population. (See Table 3 Excel | PDF.)

Blacks

* The black population increased by 1.3 percent or 496,000 between 2004 and 2005.
* Of the increase of 496,000, about 407,000 was because of natural increase and 89,000 was because of immigration.
* The black population, in 2005, was younger with a median age of 30.0 years compared to the population as a whole at 36.2 years. About 31 percent of the black population was under 18, compared with 25 percent of the total population.

Asians

* The Asian population rose by 3 percent or 421,000 between 2004 and 2005.
* Of the increase of 421,000 in the Asian population between 2004 and 2005, 182,000 was because of natural increase and 239,000 was because of immigration.
* The Asian population in 2005 was younger with a median age of 33.2 years compared to the population as a whole at 36.2 years. About 26 percent of the Asian population was under 18, compared with 25 percent of the total population.

American Indians and Alaska natives

* The American Indian and Alaska native population rose by 1 percent or 43,000 from 2004 to 2005.
* The American Indian and Alaska native population in 2005 was younger with a median age of 30.7 years, compared to the population as a whole at 36.2 years. About 29 percent of the American Indian and Alaska native population was under 18, compared with 25 percent of the total population.

Native Hawaiians and other Pacific islanders

* The native Hawaiian and other Pacific islander population rose by 1.5 percent or 15,000 from 2004 to 2005.
* The native Hawaiian and other Pacific islander population in 2005 was younger with a median age of 28.2 years compared to the population as a whole at 36.2 years. About 31 percent of the native Hawaiian and other Pacific islander population was under 18, compared with 25 percent of the total population.

Non-Hispanic whites

* The non-Hispanic, single-race white population, which represented just under 67 percent of the total population, accounted for less than a fifth (19 percent) of the nation’s total population growth.
* Of the increase of 500,000, about 300,000 was because of natural increase with 200,000 attributed to immigration.
* The non-Hispanic, single-race white population in 2005 was older than the population as a whole: the respective median ages were 40.3 and 36.2. About 22 percent of the population of this group was under 18, compared with 25 percent of the total population.

Also released today were tabulations by age and sex, which showed:

Age and Sex

* There were 36.8 million people age 65 and older, accounting for 12 percent of the total population. (See Table 3 Excel | PDF.)
* The number of people age 85 and older reached 5.1 million.
* In 2005, working-age adults (18- to 64-year-olds) totaled 186.2 million, which was 63 percent of the population.
* The total number of preschoolers (under age 5) in the United States in 2005 was estimated at 20.3 million.
* The number of elementary school-age (5 through 13) children was 36.1 million, with high-school age (14 though 17) children numbering 17.1 million.
* There were 104 males per every 100 females under 18. This ratio declines with age, however, to 72 men for every 100 women 65 and over and 46 men per every 100 women age 85 and over.

-X-

The federal government treats Hispanic origin and race as separate and distinct concepts. In surveys and censuses, separate questions are asked on Hispanic origin and race. The question on Hispanic origin asks respondents if they are Spanish, Hispanic or Latino. Starting with Census 2000, the question on race asks respondents to report the race or races they consider themselves to be. Thus, Hispanics may be of any race. (See U.S. Census Bureau Guidance on the Presentation and Comparison of Race and Hispanic Origin Data.)

These data are based on estimates of U.S. population for July 1, 2005. The Census Bureau estimates population change from the most recent decennial census (Census 2000) using annual data on births, deaths and international migration. More detailed information on the methodology used to produce these estimates can be found at .

Posted by lois at 06:15 PM | Comments (0)

Colorado eyes two bids for private prisons

Rocky Mountain News

State, companies don't reveal sites

By Ann Imse, Rocky Mountain News
May 18, 200

Colorado has moved a step closer to solving its desperate need for more prison space, deciding that two bids for new private prisons are "potentially acceptable."

The two companies are Corrections Corp. of America and The Geo Group, formerly Wackenhut. The companies and the state refused to reveal the location or any other details of the proposed medium-security prisons, pending a final decision.

But CCA and Geo have sought support from local officials for possible prison projects in Burlington, Las Animas, Florence and Sterling. There's no guarantee that any would be built.

Colorado is trying to buy more cell space to house 1,000 more prisoners each year.

Tough sentencing laws are sending more people to prison for longer periods. During the recession, the state fell behind on construction and it now expects to run out of cell space by this fall.

In the short term, the Department of Corrections will resort to double-bunking prisoners, crowding them in a way that raises the risk of rioting.

The longer-term solution is to contract with private companies to build and operate lockups.

Earlier this year, the state sought bids from private prison companies to house 2,250 additional male inmates and 750 more women.

There has been no decision on the women's prison, which is likely to end up near an existing one in Brush.

For the more urgently needed men's prison, Colorado is on a tear. It wants the first 750 beds open by February 2008, just 21 months from now. The next 750 must be ready six months later and the final group a year after that.

The contract should have been awarded in April. Now, the state has asked CCA and Geo, two of the five bidders, to provide more details by June, squeezing the time frame further.

The rush gives an edge to CCA, which already owns four private prisons in Colorado, because it already has the land and zoning to expand its facilities in Burlington and Las Animas.

The company's private prison in Crowley County was the scene of a riot in 2004. An inquiry found CCA's staff-to-inmate ratio was one-seventh of a state prison's at the time. The state now levies heavy fines on private prisons for short-staffing.

Geo, also one of the nation's largest private prison companies, has been struggling to build a pre-release prison in Pueblo for three years, but has yet to start construction due to recurring zoning issues.

Dave Schouweiler, of the Department of Corrections, said there is no guarantee that either Geo or CCA will win the bid. In the end, the department can reject their proposals and negotiate a contract for a private prison without bidding, as it has done previously, he said.

CCA has told local officials it has submitted a package deal, said Bent County Commissioner Bill Long. It includes expansion of its existing facilities in Las Animas in Bent County, and in Burlington in Kit Carson County, according to officials in those communities.

But the bid apparently does not call for expansion of CCA's other Colorado facilities in Olney Springs in Crowley County, and in Walsenburg in Huerfano County.

CCA's package might also include a new prison elsewhere in the state, Long said. He did not know where.

Long said that CCA left open the size of its proposed expansion in Las Animas, which now has 703 beds.

CCA has told Burlington that it would like to double its 758-bed prison there, said city clerk Margo Wilkinson.

Burlington is very happy with its existing CCA prison and favors expansion, especially as the drought damages the town's agricultural economy, said town prison monitor Norma Pankratz.

"We're sure hoping we get the bid," she said.

Geo representatives have spoken with officials in three towns in eastern Colorado. It is not clear if the company submitted more than one possible location.

Geo has held talks with city and county officials about building a prison just outside Florence that would gradually grow to 3,000 beds. But approval will depend on the outcome of yet-to-be-held public meetings, likely to focus on water supplies and the effect of another prison in Fremont County, which already has 12 prisons.

A state-run penitentiary is due to be built soon, so a new private prison would make 14.

The small town of Florence, population 3,600, could end up with nearly twice as many prisoners as residents.

Geo also won a letter of support for a new prison from city and county officials in Sterling, said Brett Challenger of the local economic development group.

A Geo consultant also spoke to Police Chief Tracey McCoy in Ault, a small town north of Greeley. But it did not go so far as requesting official support for its bid.

Colorado inmate population

• 1990 7,398

• 1995 10,564

• 2000 15,441

• 2005 21,336Source: Department Of Corrections

Copyright 2006, Rocky Mountain News. All Rights Reserved.

URL: http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_4707991,00.html

Posted by lois at 09:19 AM | Comments (0)

Pro-bono Resources for Prisoners

PRO-BONO RESOURCES FOR PRISONERS
VIRGINIA
POST-CONVICTION ASSISTANCE PROJECT
PO Box 506
Richmond VA 23204 - 0506
Tel: 804 - 643 - 6845
Fax: 804 - 643 - 6819

VIRGINIA POVERTY LAW CENTER
201 West Broad Street, Suite 302
Richmond Virginia 23220
Tel: 804 - 782 - 9430

WASHINGTON, DC
Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson
1001 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20004
phone: 202-639-7000
fax: 202-639-7003
Contact: Karen T. Grisez, Public Service & Pro Bono Counsel
no eMail listed

NEW YORK
Stroock, Stroock & Lavan, LLP
180 Maiden Lane
New York, NY 10038
phone: 212-806-5400
fax: 212-806-6006
Contact: Robert Lewin & Gretchen Mullins-Kim
Web Site: www.stroock.com
no eMail listed

Rogers & Wells, LLP
200 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10166-0153
phone: 212-878-8000
fax: 212-878-8375
Contact: Warren Feldman
no eMail listed

NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE FUND
99 Hudson Street, 16th Floor
New YorkNY 10113
Tel: 212 - 219 - 1900
Fax: 212 - 219 - 2052
Attn: George Kendall

AMERICAN BAR ASSOCIATION
Death Penalty Representation Project
Contact: Elisabeth Semel
740 15th Street NW, Suite 1060
Washington
DC 20005-1009
Tel: 202 - 662 - 1995
Fax: 202 - 662 - 1995
E-mail: Esemel@aol.com
Web: http://www.abanet.org/

HABEAS ASSISTANCE & TRAINING PROJECT
1900 Center Point Boulevard, No 80
Tallahassee FL 32308
Tel: 904 - 877 - 7210
Fax: 904 - 671 - 7210
Attn: Mark E Olive

HABEAS ASSISTANCE & TRAINING PROJECT
PO Box 11744
Columbia SC 29211
Tel: 803 - 765 - 1044
Fax: 803 - 765 - 1143
Attn: John H Blume
_________________
Resource Information Help for the Disadvantaged - RIHD, Inc.
Self-Help Rehabilitation for At-Risk Youth, Prisoners & Ex-0ffenders
PO Box 55 - Highland Springs, VA 23075
(804) 737-9624
Web Site: www.RIHD.org

Posted by lois at 09:16 AM | Comments (0)

WI:Privately built prison needs $5 million fix

Scandal-linked site violates code
By STEVEN WALTERS

Posted: May 17, 2006
Madison - The Stanley prison that a private company built - and which the state ended up buying for $87.1 million - violates electrical, plumbing and safety codes that will cost taxpayers an additional $5 million to repair.

The State Building Commission on Wednesday voted to spend that money to fix a long list of major problems at the Stanley prison. The vote came after commissioners complained that buying the prison built by Dominion Asset Services of Edmond, Okla., was a major mistake.

The commission also told the state Department of Corrections to investigate whether the Oklahoma company can be sued over the code violations.

The prison played a role in the corruption conviction of former state Senate Majority Leader Chuck Chvala (D-Madison). Dominion executives gave $125,000 to Independent Citizens for Democracy, a campaign group Chvala illegally controlled in the summer of 2001, records in Chvala's criminal case show.

Chvala changed his position on the prison and agreed to the state purchase of the facility after the donations.

Chvala was convicted last year of two felonies and is serving a nine-month sentence on home detention

State officials said they had no choice but to correct dozens of code violations at the prison, which held 1,511 male inmates last week.

"This is the Legislature's fault," said Sen. Luther Olsen (R-Berlin). "Now, we have to fix it up."

Olsen said legislators should have demanded a discount on the purchase price of the Stanley prison, since state officials had a strong bargaining position and could have decided whether or when it opened.

"This was a serious mistake, and a boondoggle of the nth degree," said Sen. Fred Risser (D-Madison). "They sold it to us, and it didn't meet code."

Risser said the Dominion firm "made a nice profit" when the Legislature and then-Gov. Scott McCallum agreed in 2001 to buy the prison. Dominion employees also donated $4,000 to McCallum's re-election campaign.

Proper procedures ignored
"We're wasting $5 million on this," said Sen. Carol Roessler (R-Oshkosh). "This company totally did not follow (code) requirements."

Gov. Jim Doyle, chairman of the Building Commission, said proper procedures were not followed when the state purchased the prison. As attorney general in 2001, Doyle had advised legislators that no inmates could be placed in the prison until it was either leased or bought by the state.

The process normally used in state building projects was circumvented for the Stanley prison, the governor said, noting that the Legislature and governor must jointly agree on what is needed, and then the Building Commission must formally approve the plan.

The Stanley fiasco led to new laws prohibiting the speculative construction of prisons.

State government bought the prison in 2002, with the code violations "not readily observable upon inspection," state officials said.

Code problems that must be corrected include those in heating and cooling systems. Also, the state must install smoke controls in housing units and electrical grounding wires, rebuild electric conductors, and move metal stairs. Construction is expected to start next April and be finished by June 2008.

Assistant Milwaukee County District Attorney David Feiss, who prosecuted Chvala, said he mentioned at sentencing the $125,000 that Dominion officials gave to the campaign group the Democratic senator controlled.

Told of the code violations, Feiss said, "The entire transaction is sordid, so it is not surprising that there are details that were not known then."

Calls to Dominion were not returned Wednesday.

In 2001, Dominion Asset Services hired several lobbyists to push state purchase of the Stanley prison through the Legislature. Also lobbying for the purchase were western Wisconsin legislators and Stanley elected officials.

In 2001, according to state Ethics Board records, those lobbyists included former Senate Majority Leader Joe Strohl (D-Racine) and former Rep. Rosemary Potter (D-Milwaukee); John Matthews, former chief of staff to Republican Gov. Tommy G. Thompson; and Ray Carey, a friend of then-Assembly Speaker Scott Jensen (R-Town of Brookfield).

Jensen pushed for state purchase of the prison during the 2001 legislative session.

Jensen was sentenced to 15 months in prison Tuesday after being convicted of three felony and one misdemeanor counts of having Assembly workers campaign on state time.

From the May 18, 2006 editions of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Original Story URL:
http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=424656

Posted by lois at 09:13 AM | Comments (0)

May 16, 2006

Legislation renews push for sentencing reform

The Oakland Press
May 16, 2006

Her brother just turned 69, is approaching his 15th year of a mandatory life sentence at the Macomb Correctional Facility and was recently denied a commutation request.
But Gayle Garcia isn't giving up hope over her quest to free Larry Drum from prison.

With new legislation to reform Michigan's mandatory minimum drug laws in the pipeline, Garcia, of Lapeer, is one face behind a new push to change drug sentencing laws hailed as the stiffest in the nation.

Drum, a former Marine and Lake Orion businessman, was arrested in Birmingham for helping an accomplice deliver 650 grams of cocaine. Under the socalled "650 Lifer Law" of 1978, he was sentenced to mandatory life without parole plus two consecutive 10- to 20-year sentences.

Two subsequent rounds of reforms to the law - inserting parole-eligibility windows into 650 Lifer sentences and giving judges more flexibility in determining sentencing for drug crimes - contained unintended loopholes that largely have not helped Drum.

But legislation introduced this session by state Rep. Bill McConico, a Detroit Democrat who championed earlier reforms in 2002, may change that. His three-bill package would provide earlier parole eligibility for those sentenced before the latest reforms took effect in 2003 and, most importantly for Drum's case, make consecutive sentences concurrent.

What that could mean for Drum, a model prisoner whose record is otherwise clean, is eligibility for parole in December 2008. Under current law, Drum would have to first serve at least half of each of his consecutive, 10-year minimum sentences, making him ineligible for parole until 2018, at age 82.

"If these three bills from McConico are passed, his case would automatically be reviewed by the parole board," Garcia said. "If not ... we would try for another commutation."

That would have to wait another two years, however. In November, the Michigan Parole Board recommended against Garcia's request to commute her brother's sentence. Gov. Jennifer Granholm turned down the request Jan. 30.

In the meantime, Garcia has been writing letters and participating in roundtable discussions in Lansing with lawmakers and the advocacy group Families Against Mandatory Minimums, which is pushing the legislation. Garcia said she talks with her brother at least twice a week.

"He's doing pretty good, actually. His spirits are pretty up, considering the fact that he was turned down."

Laura Sager, national campaign director for Families Against Mandatory Minimums, said the new bills address unintended glitches in previous reforms that excluded prisoners such as Drum. She said about 155 inmates remain imprisoned under the 650 law in spite of earlier reforms.

The proposed reforms would also affect those imprisoned on lesser drug offenses whose sentences are longer than those convicted for possessing larger quantities of drugs, she said.

"People will still serve very severe sentences even after these reforms. ... It doesn't change the sentence; it only changes the parole availability," Sager said.

Sager said the original 650 Lifer Law succeeded mostly in snaring low-level, nonviolent offenders, many of them addicts with minor involvement in the drug trade. Many could easily become productive, taxpaying citizens, she said.

Garcia has said her brother was a user who rarely sold drugs.

"A person cannot give up hope," she said. "Because if they give up hope, all is lost. And Larry has a lot of life left."

Click here to return to story:
http://www.theoaklandpress.com/stories/051506/loc_2006051505.shtml

Posted by lois at 11:03 PM | Comments (0)

Using Boot Camps, Prisons to Control Black Children

Using boot camps, prisons to control black children

By Leonard Pitts, a syndicated columnist based in Washington: Tribune Media Services
Published May 16, 2006
Chicago Tribune

So now we know how Martin Lee Anderson died.

We can forget the original autopsy report filed by Charles Siebert, a doctor so inept he wasn't technically a doctor (he had allowed his license to lapse) when he issued the report. A doctor so inept he once described a person he autopsied as having "unremarkable" testes. The person was a woman.

Siebert claimed that after being hit, manhandled and choked by guards Jan. 5 at a so-called boot camp in Panama City, Fla., the 14-year-old Anderson died of sickle cell trait, a genetic blood disorder carried by 1 in 12 Americans of African heritage. That finding has been roundly hooted by real doctors, who say it is unlikely in the extreme the condition could lead to death. Recently, a new autopsy told a different story. Dr. Vernard Adams, Tampa's chief medical examiner, found that the teen died because guards covered his mouth and forced him to inhale ammonia.

Just so you know, Martin Lee Anderson was an A and B student, good at math. He wound up in the boot camp after he took his grandmother's car for a joy ride.

In other words, hardly the second coming of Al Capone.

As it happens, news of how he died came almost simultaneously with news of another appalling mistreatment of children in detention. According to a report from an advocacy group, the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana, more than 100 teenagers were left locked in a flooded prison in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. They had to scramble to the top bunks to avoid drowning. They went up to five days with nothing to eat or drink. Some drank floodwater. Many had not been convicted of any crime.

And, the vast majority was, like Anderson, black. While New Orleans was about 67 percent black, the report says the prison was well over 95 percent black. No surprise. Human Rights Watch reports that black people are more than eight times as likely to wind up behind bars as whites.

It is telling how mutely we absorb that fact, which gives tacit approval to this means of controlling a population whose mere existence we have historically found threatening and inconvenient.

In the Jim Crow years, the institutions of government and society could hardly have been more brazen in pursuit of that goal. White teachers told black students they should aspire to no goal higher than to work as janitors and cooks. White cops turned black suspects over to lynch mobs.

It could never happen that way in this enlightened era, of course. And yet, it happens in other ways. A 2002 report by the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University says black kids are labeled as emotionally disturbed or mentally retarded and shipped off to special-education classes at rates of up to four times those of white kids. A 2000 study co-sponsored by the Justice Department tells us that, of people who've never done time in juvenile facilities, a black drug defendant is 48 times more likely to be jailed than a white one with the same record.

The means have changed, but the end--repression, control--remains the same.

Granted, there may have been some white kids in that fetid, flooded prison. There were certainly some in that brutal boot camp. Yet, it's no accident African-American children are always so well represented in those lousy places.

So our concern for them now feels--well, let's call it belated. And self-deluding.

Those children were right where we wanted them to be.

----------

E-mail: lpitts@miamiherald.com

Posted by lois at 07:32 PM | Comments (0)

No home means no parole for inmates

Tues, May. 16, 2006

By CARLOS CAMPOS
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Geoffory Sanders could have been out of prison on parole five years ago. But he has nowhere to go, so he waits behind bars.

Sanders is unable to provide the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles an acceptable address ‹ a residence where officials can feel comfortable the convicted burglar will stay out of trouble after being freed.

STEPHEN MORTON / Associated Press

Jesse Lee Spears, shown April 15 at the Inner City Night Shelter in Savannah, was in prison an extra 14 years because he had nowhere to go after release.

If he can't find a suitable place, Sanders will serve his entire 15-year sentence, getting out in 2011.

"It's kind of frustrating," Sanders said in a telephone interview from Calhoun State Prison in southwest Georgia. "So far, all the places I've tried come back that they're full or they disapprove me."

Sanders is one of about 500 inmates in Georgia's packed prison system who don't qualify for parole only because they have nowhere on the outside to live. It might be hard to muster sympathy for the criminals, but the problem has implications for law-abiding taxpayers as well.

The parole board estimates that housing the parolees costs a total of about $23,000 per day ‹ more than $8 million a year. The $47 per inmate average daily cost can run much higher if an inmate has special mental health or medical needs.

With the help of a $700,000 federal grant, the board and several other state agencies are trying to provide temporary housing for so-called "residence-problem inmates."

"There's two primary ingredients that you've got to have for parole success," said parole board Chairman Milton E. "Buddy" Nix Jr. "You've got to have a place to live, and you've got to have a job."

So far, 17 inmates have been released under the program since April, staying in housing provided largely by faith-based organizations in Atlanta, Macon, Savannah and Winder. The organizations are paid $600 per month to house the parolees. The temporary, transitional housing helps inmates ease back into mainstream society.

Georgia law states that inmates should not be granted early release unless the parole board finds "reasonable probability that ... [the inmate] will live and conduct himself as a respectable and law-abiding person and that his release will be compatible with his own welfare and the welfare of society."

Scheree Lipscomb, spokeswoman for the parole board, said, "If you release someone with no place to live, no social support whatsoever, what are their chances of being successful in society?" Transitional housing is relatively scarce throughout the state, and most programs charge parolees to recoup room and board costs.

Sara Totonchi, public policy director for the Southern Center for Human Rights in Atlanta, a group that advocates for inmates, said the state should focus more money and effort on helping inmates succeed outside of prison. "It's fiscally irresponsible to pour money into locking people up beyond the time that the parole board has deemed appropriate," Totonchi said. "The more we spend limited taxpayer dollars inside prisons, the less resources we will have in the community that can help formerly incarcerated people successfully re-enter society and keep them from going back to prison."

Parole officials agree that more focus needs to be placed on moving inmates successfully from prison back into society, but they say they need more funding to make it happen.

Sanders, 33, said he's encouraged by the prospect of getting state help and he's ready to put his drug and alcohol problems behind him and start anew. "I'm working with the counselors here to find a place," he said. Sanders said both of his parents are dead, and his two brothers are also doing time in the Georgia prison system. One of his uncles recently died, and another uncle isn't able to help him. "There's really nobody out there," he said.

Sex offenders and inmates with moderate to severe mental problems ‹ roughly half of those unable to find a residence ‹ are not eligible for the program, officials said.

Officials say 95 percent of prison inmates eventually return to the streets. Those left behind are either on death row or have life without parole. Inmates typically are released on parole into the homes of either their parents, boyfriends or girlfriends, spouses, or other relatives, officials said. Others occasionally go into halfway houses, substance abuse recovery programs, social service agencies or similar venues.

But many have been shunned by frustrated family and friends. Officials say others try to return to the same law-breaking crowd they hung out with prior to prison. If parole officials suspect the proposed residence provided by the inmate could lead to trouble, release from prison is denied.

Jesse Lee Spears spent 14 years in prison beyond his parole date, trying to find a place to live. In April, he was released to a shelter in Savannah. The 62-year-old man has a rap sheet dating back to 1962 that includes burglary and auto theft. He drew a 20-year sentence in 1991 for burglary in Cobb County for stealing his sister's 19-inch TV and selling it for $25. His prior convictions were a factor in the sentence length. He became eligible for parole in April 1992.

By the time he went to prison in 1991, Spears' father had died and his mother lived in a nursing home. When he was eligible for parole, a female relative's one-bedroom apartment in Smyrna was deemed too small. Several social service agencies declined to take him in.

Spears, who cannot read or write, sent several letters to the parole board written by fellow inmates, asking for their help. A June 2005 letter reads: "I have been waiting since 1992 to get paroled out. I am tired of being locked up."

"It wasn't funny, I know that," Spears said from the Inner City Night Shelter in Savannah, where he's now staying. Spears said the shelter is "fine," adding: "It's better than where I came from."

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/stories/0516metparole.html

Posted by lois at 07:23 PM | Comments (0)

Justice Probe of Prison Computer Recycling Operations

MAY 15, 2006, Common Dreams

http://www.commondreams.org/news2006/0515-04.htm

CONTACT: Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER)
Chas Offutt (202) 265-7337

Justice Probe of Prison Computer Recycling Operations
Inspector General to Investigate Health Risks and Failure to Acknowledge Hazards

WASHINGTON - May 15 - The Inspector General for the U.S. Justice Department will investigate computer recycling enterprises operated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons to determine the extent of health hazards to staff and inmates, and why the Bureau failed to act on red flags raised by its own safety managers, according to letters released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

This investigation arises out of the formal whistleblower filings of Leroy Smith, the former safety manager at Atwater Federal Prison, a maximum-security institution located just outside of Merced, California. This past April, the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, an independent agency that reviews whistleblower disclosures, validated Smith’s concerns and faulted the Bureau of Prisons for ignoring the exposure of both its staff and inmates to “excessive levels of toxic metals” from prison industries in which inmates wielding hammers smashed computer terminals using only cardboard boxes for “containment” of lead, cadmium, barium and beryllium particles.

Six other federal prisons have computer recycling plants, all run by the prison industry authority called UNICOR, similar to the one at Atwater. Even though test results at two of the prisons, Elkton, Ohio, and Texarkana, Texas, found similarly excessive exposure levels, the Bureau declined to investigate conditions at these facilities.

Although the Bush-appointed Special Counsel who formerly served in the Department of Justice (the parent agency overseeing the Bureau of Prisons), called for a “thorough, independent, and impartial investigation into recycling operations at [Bureau of Prisons] institutions,” no follow-up occurred until Smith’s lawyer, Mary Dryovage of San Francisco, and PEER called on the Justice Department Office of Inspector General to open a probe into health and safety violations at all the prison computer enterprises.

“The prison officials, including UNICOR managers, who are responsible for perpetuating these unsafe conditions and retaliating against their own safety staff need to be identified and disciplined,” said Dryovage, who also successfully represented Smith in a complaint of reprisal for raising safety concerns at Atwater. Smith has since accepted a transfer to another prison.

“The wheels of Justice do indeed turn slowly but it remains to be seen whether, once engaged, they will finally find traction,” stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch., noting that Smith came forward back in December 2004 with documents showing that computer terminal disassembly plants were spewing particles of heavy metals over inmates and civilian prison staff.

In its letter of May 9, 2006 to Ms. Dryovage and PEER, Carol Ochoa, the Assistant Inspector General for Oversight and Review noted that “We also received a referral of the matter from the BOP (Bureau of Prisons) and the Department of Justice.” While the original Bureau of Prisons review of Smith’s whistleblower disclosure was begun under Attorney General John Ashcroft, it was completed by his successor, Alberto Gonzales, who signed off on the final report that was found to be “unreasonable” and “inconsistent with documentary evidence” by the Special Counsel.

Posted by lois at 09:41 AM | Comments (0)

May 14, 2006

Mass. Senate Delays Vote on Bill That Would Allow Nonprescription Sale of Hypodermic Needles

May 8, 2006

The Massachusetts Senate on Thursday postponed a vote on bill S 1312 that would authorize the nonprescription sale of syringes to people age 18 and older to curb the spread of HIV/AIDS, hepatitis C and other bloodborne diseases, after Senate Minority Leader Brian Lees (R) objected to the legislation, the Boston Globe reports (Ebbert, Boston Globe, 5/5). The bill is sponsored by Sen. Robert O'Leary. The state House in November 2005 voted to approve similar legislation (H 4176) that would require pharmacists dispensing the needles to provide consumers with a brochure created by the state Department of Public Health. The brochure includes information about the proper use and disposal of syringes and needles, the risk of contracting bloodborne diseases through such devices and the state's toll-free number for HIV/AIDS and hepatitis C information (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 5/2). Lees' objection will delay a vote on the bill for at least a week and possibly up to several weeks because the Legislature is about to consider the state budget. Lees objected to the measure on procedural grounds, saying it would help illicit drug users break the law. He said that he would suggest amendments to the bill when it returns to the agenda (Boston Globe, 5/5). The state health department supports the measure. About 39% of HIV cases in Massachusetts are linked to injection drug use (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 5/2).

Posted by lois at 10:51 PM | Comments (0)

Court Asks if Residency Follows Inmates Up the River

By SAM ROBERTS

Published: May 13, 2006
New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/13/nyregion/13prisoners.html

For years, New York Republicans have propped up their slim majority in the State Senate partly by seizing on a quirk in the federal census: counting prisoners as residents of the rural districts where they are incarcerated, rather than of the urban neighborhoods where they last lived.

That way, predominantly Republican rural districts wind up with more seats in the state Legislature, since seats are apportioned on the basis of population.

But last week, a federal appeals court in New York hinted that counting prisoners as upstaters might illegally dilute the voting rights of downstaters.

If that legal argument is pursued and upheld, the political implications could be profound. Republicans now have a four-seat margin in the Senate. A shift in only a few seats could give the Democrats, who already control the Assembly, a majority in the Senate, and with it, enormous power over legislative and Congressional redistricting.

Except for a brief hiatus in 1965, Republicans have dominated the Senate since 1939.

States typically use the census to reapportion legislative and Congressional districts. But the impact of this practice is magnified in New York, where most of the inmates come from downstate and are shipped to prisons upstate.

Voting rights advocates estimate that without the inmates, as many as seven upstate Senate districts might have to be redrawn, with downstate picking up some seats.

The issue came up in passing in a lawsuit seeking to give prisoners the right to vote. While the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit rejected that request, it did express interest in the argument that counting inmates upstate dilutes the voting power of minority groups in urban districts, and kicked that matter back to the District Court for consideration.

Eric Hecker, a lawyer who pursued an earlier voting rights case involving inmates, said, "I don't think there's any question but that if the prisoners were counted where they lived the legislative districts would be unconstitutional."

Eric T. Schneiderman, a Manhattan Democrat who is the deputy Senate minority leader, agreed. "The court has clearly remanded to the district judge to consider the voting rights argument ‹ that people who live in districts that are net exporters of prisoners to districts upstate may have a voting rights claim," he said. "I think it has to be pursued."

Senator Schneiderman has urged the Census Bureau to change its policy and has introduced legislation that would require the state to use prisoners' home addresses in apportioning legislative districts.

The 8-to-5 appeals court decision opens a "small window," said Juan Cartegena, general counsel of the Community Service Society, which joined the appeal.

"It's an opening that we really don't know what to do with yet," he said.

Peter Wagner, executive director of the Prison Policy Initiative, a Massachusetts-based research and advocacy group, suggested that wherever the window leads, the mere mention by the court seems meaningful.

"I think it is a significant signal that the New York's reliance on bogus census counts of prisoners creates a serious problem for democracy," he said. "The court has given us a great opportunity."

Noting that the same appeals court also ruled that an inmate whose home was in California but is imprisoned in New York does not have standing to sue here, Mr. Wagner added: "He remains a resident of California, much like the 43,760 residents of New York City incarcerated upstate remain residents of New York City."

Mr. Wagner estimated that while 66 percent of state prisoners come from New York City, 91 percent of them are imprisoned upstate. "In one assembly district," he wrote, "seven percent of the reported census population is actually prisoners from other parts of the state. The votes of each group of 93 residents in that district are unconstitutionally equated with the weight of 100 voters elsewhere in the state who do not happen to live near a prison."

The average population of Senate districts is about 306,000. In one rural district, according to Mr. Wagner, not counting the nearly 13,000 or so prisoners as residents would reduce the population to about 286,000, compared with more than 320,000 in some Queens districts.

Just by calling attention to what amounted to a footnote in the advocates' case, the judges almost seemed to be prodding the plaintiffs, and the lower court, to examine the case against counting prisoners where they are incarcerated in drawing legislative districts.

"That's the way I read it," said Michelle M. Aronowitz, the deputy solicitor general, who successfully defended the state.

The advocates argued that because most inmates are black or Hispanic, disenfranchising convicted felons is not only racially discriminatory, but also waters down the voting power of people who live in the same districts that the prisoners hail from or where parolees now live. But the appeals court was uncertain whether the advocates for prisoners and parolees also claimed that ordinary citizens are disenfranchised because of the way inmates are counted for reapportionment.

"Inasmuch as this question was neither considered by the District Court nor briefed by defendants," the court continued, "we intimate no view on the question and remand to the District Court to consider whether plaintiffs have indeed properly raised the claim, and, if so, to rule on the merits of the claim."

The Census Bureau has said changing the way it counts would be too difficult.

Senator Schneiderman introduced legislation last year that would make counting for legislative apportionment purposes conform to the New York Constitution, which says that "no person shall be deemed to have gained or lost a residence, by reason of his presence or absence ... while confined in any public prison."

John McCardle, a spokesman for the Senate Majority Leader, Joseph L. Bruno, an upstate Republican, said yesterday: "What we do with the lines and with reapportionment is based on the law, and this is what the law allows for. I don't want to equate students with prisoners, but we count both where they are."

Posted by lois at 10:45 PM | Comments (0)

May 12, 2006

RI: If ballot measure is approced, DOC would have to assist people leaving prison on voting

Rhode Island: Senate Approves Bill That Would Streamline Restoration Process
May 12, 2006
The state Senate has approved a bill that details the registration process for restoring voting rights to persons with felony convictions on probation or parole. The bill, known as the Rhode Island Restoration of Voting Rights Act, follows an approval last year from the General Assembly to place the issue of re-enfranchisement on the November ballot. If the ballot proposal receives voter approval, the bill would require the Department of Corrections to provide voter registration forms and offer assistance to incarcerated persons prior to leaving prison. More than 15,500 residents of Rhode Island have lost their right to vote due to felony convictions; 86% of those persons are not in prison, but are on probation or parole. “Rhode Island has the nation’s second highest rate of people on probation and is the only state in New England that prohibits voting for residents serving time in prison or on probation or parole,” reports the Associated Press. The bill would hold the Department of Corrections responsible to initiate and streamline the restoration process.

Posted by lois at 09:32 PM | Comments (0)

Democracy Behind Bars: Interview ith Sasha Abramsky about his new book: "Conned; How Million sof Amaericans Went to Prison, Lost the Vote....."

Democracy Behind Bars
By Cole Krawitz, AlterNet
Posted on April 25, 2006, Printed on May 12, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/34773/

In his new book, "Conned: How Millions of Americans Went to Prison, Lost the Vote, and Helped Send George W. Bush to the White House," award-winning journalist Sasha Abramsky takes us on a journey across the nation, documenting through personal interviews of people in prison, former prisoners, state legislators and advocates how felon disfranchisement laws fundamentally undermine America's democratic ideals.

Today, nearly 5 million Americans are disfranchised from the right to vote either because they are in prison, on parole or probation, or because they live in a state that extends disfranchisement beyond the end of one's sentence. Racial, ethnic and economic disparities in the criminal justice system, and the "war on drugs" have resulted in the most severe impact hitting communities of color. Where African-Americans comprise only 12.2 percent of the population and 13 percent of drug users, they make up 38 percent of those arrested for drug offenses and 59 percent of those convicted of drug offenses, causing critics to call the war on drugs the "New Jim Crow." Nationally, an estimated 13 percent of African-American men are unable to vote because of a felony conviction. That's seven times the national average.

The United States is the only "democracy" in which people who have served their sentences can still lose their right to vote. As Jamaica S., a 25-year-old on probation in Tennessee who lost her right to vote shared in "Conned," "It seems when you're convicted of a felony, the scarlet letter is there. You take it everywhere with you."

We met up with Sasha to learn more about his time writing "Conned," the impact of disfranchisement and the reform measures being fought at the state level to repair our broken democracy.

Cole Krawitz: Sasha, tell us how you started to cover the impact of disfranchisement and voter restoration on the nation.

Sasha Abramsky: I had been writing about criminal justice issues for years, and was particularly fascinated with the broader political and economic impact of a series of policy choices made from the 1970s to the present day that had the effect of massively expanding the country's criminal justice system. The numbers were extraordinary: America had gone from having fewer than half a million people in jail and prison in the early 1970s to having over two million people behind bars by the turn of the century. I knew that, as the war on drugs, in particular, played out, it was having a huge effect on labor markets, on family structure, on community viability in poor neighborhoods; quite simply, in many instances so many people were being hauled off to jail and prison that entire communities were being dislocated. I also knew that ex-prisoners faced an array of post-sentence penalties -- from restrictions on what kinds of jobs they could get through to denial of welfare benefits, student loans and public housing if their felony convictions were drug-related. I had also heard that there were limits placed on their voting rights.

The day after the 2000 presidential election, I posted a story on Mother Jones online about a "purge" of suspected felons and about the impact it had clearly had on the Gore-Bush outcome. From there, I was hooked. The topic was, quite simply, too juicy to ignore.

CK: I was fascinated by your choice to use Alexis de Tocqueville's "Democracy in America" to help narrate "Conned." Why de Tocqueville?

SA: De Tocqueville has always fascinated me. He's a European aristocrat who comes over to America in the 1830s to study the country's prison system; and he ends up spending nine months touring the country, absolutely intrigued by its democratic possibilities and by the expanding institutions of democracy and culture of democracy that he sees all around. In some instances he romanticizes the country -- and he certainly underestimates the central role of slavery. But his enthusiasm for the best aspects of American life is infectious.

Like de Tocqueville, I also grew up in Europe; in London. And I, too, have found myself, as an adult, fascinated by America's culture and politics.

In deciding to travel around the country for several months exploring what I saw as a major failing of America's democratic institutions -- its failure to protect the vote for millions of Americans caught up in a seemingly ever-expanding penal system -- I wanted a literary companion who could be used to compare the country's democratic potential with the somewhat more tawdry realities I was encountering. De Tocqueville struck me as the perfect companion. Over four months, his writings continually provided insight and prescient observations. I hope that, in using de Tocqueville in this way, my book becomes something more than a narrow criminal justice book, becoming instead a commentary on American democracy, its successes and its shortfalls.

CK: One of the myths that I think "Conned" strongly helps dispel is the idea that people who have been disfranchised don't want to vote. Why do some legislators continue to disregard how, when people are actually asked if they want to vote, they overwhelming say yes, and in states where law allows and advocates have helped let people know about their rights, that people do vote?

SA: There's a pervasive stereotype out there that criminals, as a group, have absolutely no political interests or desire to participate in any communal goings-on. Now, in reality there is no such thing as a single, monolithic "criminal type." Some people convicted of crimes are indeed utterly sociopathic -- hardened, violent and predatory and, yes, it may well be true that these individuals (a) wouldn't want to vote, and that (b) we as a society are safer with them behind bars and better off not participating politically. But you can't craft umbrella disenfranchisement legislation for all felons based on the behaviors and attitudes of a minority of felons.

The large majority of people who get caught up in the criminal justice system do not fit the sociopathic profile: In fact, over one million jail and prison inmates were sentenced after committing nonviolent offenses. They commit crimes, many of them drug-related or generated by dire poverty, they serve their time, and at the end of their sentence, they want to get on with their lives. Now, some of these men and women are apolitical -- just like millions of their nonfelon counterparts -- and don't see the importance of voting. Many of them, however, desperately want to vote and feel shamed and, in a sense, emasculated by being unable to vote.

It was this burning desire to vote, expressed to me in numerous interviews I conducted around the country, that most surprised me. Before starting my reporting, to a degree I'd bought into the stereotype: I'd assumed I was covering a story with a vast philosophical implication, one that went to the heart of theories of democracy and universal suffrage, but with only limited practical impact, precisely because I'd assumed most felons wouldn't vote even if they could.

In a sense, I thought, going in, that Florida 2000, when the nonvotes of felons clearly mattered, was an aberration rather than something that spoke to a larger issue. Instead, I found people in state after state, many in states with closely divided electorates, who were absolutely devastated by not being allowed to vote. There were people like Jamaica S., who had been convicted of a low-end felony, had been put on probation instead of being sent to prison, but had lost her voting rights; there was a 30-something-year-old man who owned a small taxi fleet, who couldn't vote because of a drug crime from when he was a teenager; there was a furniture store employee in rural Virginia who'd been trying for the better part of a decade, without success, to get back his voting rights after being convicted of a drug crime.

To me, that became the central focus of my book: the fact that so many people who so want to participate in the political process are being told by their own government officials that they cannot and should not vote.

CK: Public opinion data shows strong support for reform -- 80 percent of the public supports restoration of voting rights for ex-felons who have completed their sentences, and 64 percent and 62 percent respectively support the right of probationers and parolees to vote. Has this impacted or translated into legislative action?

SA: Over the past several years, many states have enacted limited reforms. In Maryland, for example, permanent disenfranchisement was replaced by a waiting period - which itself is now being challenged by Democratic legislatures. In Alabama, at least in theory, the process by which felons can apply to regain their vote has been simplified, though only to a limited degree. New Mexico has abandoned permanent disenfranchisement, as have several other states since 2000. Last year, Iowa governor Tom Vilsack signed an executive order granting clemency regarding voting rights to tens of thousands of ex-felons.

Yet, a core number of holdout states remain, and unfortunately, these are the states with the largest concentration of disenfranchised citizens: Florida, Virginia, Alabama still to a large extent has an extremely restricted franchise, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky. And several other states place extreme, though not permanent, restrictions on the voting rights of felons.

CK: You start your trip not in Florida or New York, but in Seattle, Wash., highlighting how people's inability to fully pay off court fees -- known as Legal Financial Obligations (LFOs) -- were blocking them from the ability to vote. What do you think the impact will be of the recent suit brought forward and won by the ACLU in Washington state overturning this requirement?

SA: I started in Washington state because I wanted this to be a book national in its scope, and I also wanted my readers to really get a sense that this problem was not something that could be located solely in the Old South. Washington, in many ways, is a very liberal state, and thus the scale of disenfranchisement present there was, to me, both surprising and also deeply disturbing. I got a sense that these really were invisible people. In Washington, I interviewed numerous ex-prisoners who were living law-abiding lives in the community, but they were unable to pay off all the fines and court costs levied in responses to criminal actions that, in some instances, had occurred decades earlier. As a result, they were not allowed to vote.

The recent lawsuit overturned this state of affairs. The courts ruled that people couldn't be deprived of their voting rights simply because they were too poor to pay off all their fines and court fees. It's an important ruling, because it significantly broadens the franchise, by many tens of thousands of people - and, remember, this is in a state in which the governor was elected by only a couple hundred votes last time around. The big question, though, and it's one that I address in my book in some detail, is whether theoretical reenfranchisement will translate into a real expansion of the franchise. For this to happen, there's going to have to be a pretty intense public education campaign to make people aware of the new state of affairs surrounding voting rights.

CK: Your book documents how the lack of dissemination of correct information about the law -- by the Department of Corrections or the Board of Elections -- continues to disfranchise thousands. This has been reconfirmed by numerous studies, including a recent survey by Brennan Center for Justice, Legal Action Center and Demos of 63 county boards of elections in New York. How were advocates and organizers on the ground tackling this all too common problem of when policy doesn't get implemented effectively?

SA: It's a huge problem. In state after state, researchers have found, and my reporting confirmed, that many election officials simply do not know the state laws surrounding felons' voting rights. Moreover, other public officials who deal directly with prisoners and ex-prisoners also don't know the law. This goes for probation and parole officials as well as prison employees.

In my book, I tell the story of a group of elderly ladies in Utah who greet prisoners as they come out of prison and try to break through their misapprehensions about voting rights by getting them to register to vote the minute they regain their freedom. I also write about lawyers and community activists in various states who are working to educate public officials as well as ex-prisoners about voting laws in their states.

It's an extremely hard issue to get a handle on, but it's vital if we, as a country, are going to meaningfully seek to restore the principle of universal adult suffrage.

CK: In each state, "Conned" demonstrates the link between racism and voting rights restrictions, as well as many legislators' unwillingness to discuss the issue of race and reenfranchisement -- how has this impacted the work that people are trying to do on the state level?

SA: While the concept of felon disenfranchisement goes back to early-modern Europe, and while colonial-era America imposed restrictions on felons' political participation, it's also undeniable that the South's political leadership in the post-civil war period redefined felony codes with the specific intent of disenfranchising as many African-Americans as possible.

No politician today will go on the record and defend disenfranchisement by embracing the notion that it falls most heavily on African-Americans. In fact, politicians generally swear blind their support for disenfranchisement is entirely race-neutral, and consciously, that might well be the case. But, the impact is clearly not race-neutral. Moreover, I can't conceive of a situation in which one quarter of white voters were removed from the voter rolls that wouldn't immediately lead to dramatic political action to overturn the injustice.

Does it impact how people organize against these laws at the state level? The answer has to be "yes." By default, this is a civil rights issue. Felon disenfranchisement in an era of mass incarceration clearly has done more to undo the gains of the 1965 Voting Rights Act than any other single event. Lawsuits have been filed on 14th and 15th Amendment grounds -- though these lawsuits have generally had very limited results. And, increasingly, black caucuses in state legislatures have embraced the cause of reenfranchisement.

CK: People of color rightfully critique a primarily white political and activist establishment, including many progressives and liberals, as being all too comfortable with the high incarceration rates of people of color in this country, and the resulting disfranchisement from housing, jobs and voting that has disproportionately harmed communities of color. How do you think "Conned" might help to change this so that the systemic problems with, and those created by, our criminal justice system are better understood?

SA: "Conned" demonstrates how "criminal justice" cannot be understood as a hermetically sealed issue. Instead, the policies and practices that have so dramatically enlarged the number of people convicted of felonies in America, and the number of people sentenced to spend parts of their lives behind bars, need to be understood as part of a larger societal transformation.

In an era of mass incarceration, progressives need to be looking for linkages, seeking to explore ways in which society responds to poverty and to social disorder. At the moment, our society has made a series of choices that means we devote an increasing number of dollars to funding punishment-based institutions. At the same time, we dramatically underfund community drug rehabilitation programs, community mental health services, job training programs and the like. Not surprisingly, given these priorities, prisons have come to be first-tier response mechanisms for a host of deep-rooted social problems.

Now, obviously, most everyone wants to live in a peaceful society, one not driven by crime and violence. The question is how best to achieve that. I'd hope that "Conned" opens up the debate here: Does simply locking up ever larger numbers of people best serve this goal? Does an over-reliance on incarceration come with a host of other, largely hidden costs? In the arena of voting rights, my book explores these costs. It looks at how society as a whole is now being impacted by out-of-whack sentencing policies and by the overlap of criminal justice institutions with the voting rights of citizens.

I'd hope that readers of my book come away with a better understanding of the ways in which current incarceration policies produce a host of dysfunctional societal outcomes.

Cole Krawitz is communications and events associate at Demos. His work has appeared in New Voices Magazine, Clamor Magazine, and Nashim journal. Cole can be found blogging on Jewschool.com.
© 2006 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/34773/

Posted by lois at 09:26 PM | Comments (0)

May 10, 2006

District Judge Rules U.S. Policy Requiring Overseas HIV/AIDS Groups To Condemn Commercial Sex Work Violates Free Speech

Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Politics and Policy

District Judge Rules U.S. Policy Requiring Overseas HIV/AIDS Groups To Condemn Commercial Sex Work Violates Free Speech

U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero on Tuesday in New York ruled that a U.S. policy requiring recipients of federal HIV/AIDS service grants to pledge to oppose commercial sex work violates the groups' First Amendment right to free speech, the AP/Long Island Newsday reports (Neumeister, AP/Long Island Newsday, 5/10).

The Bush administration in June 2005 notified U.S. organizations providing HIV/AIDS-related services in other countries that they must sign the pledge to be considered for federal funding. The policy stems from two 2003 laws, including an amendment to legislation (HR 1298) authorizing the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief that prohibits funds from going to any group or organization that does not have a policy "explicitly opposing prostitution and sex trafficking." The Open Society Institute, the Alliance for Open Society International and Pathfinder International last year filed the lawsuit against USAID over the policy. OSI has said the policy "weakens efforts to provide lifesaving services and information to sex workers" and is unconstitutional because it is vague and requires private organizations to adopt the government's position. Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard Rosberger argued that the 2003 law mandating the pledge did not contain any provision intended to deter HIV/AIDS treatment efforts, including those for commercial sex workers (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 4/18).

Ruling
Marrero on Tuesday said the U.S. Supreme Court 'has repeatedly found that speech, or an agreement not to speak, cannot be compelled or coerced as a condition of participation in a government program" (AP/Long Island Newsday, 5/10). Marrero in his opinion said that AOSI, OSI and Pathfinder "allege that adopting a policy opposing prostitution violates" their principles of governance, including opposition to "adopting any policy positions that would lead to the stigmatization of socially marginalized groups." Marrero ruled that the U.S. policy "impermissibly discriminates based on viewpoint and compels speech, [and] it also violates the First Amendment." He added, "Given these circumstances, the court finds that plaintiffs have made the necessary showing of irreparable harm" (Marrero, opinion, 5/9). Marrero's ruling temporarily blocks the government from continuing the policy. A similar lawsuit currently is pending in Washington, D.C., the AP/Newsday reports.

Reaction
Lawyer Rebekah Diller, who represented the groups, said, "It's really a tremendous victory for public health," adding, "It will enable these organizations to serve very vulnerable women" (AP/Long Island Newsday, 5/10). "We're delighted that the court recognized the pledge requirement as unconstitutional and overreaching," Ricardo Castro, a board member of AOSI, said, adding that the policy "hampers organizations on the front lines of the AIDS epidemic working to save lives through proven prevention methods" (Ascribe, 5/9). Megan Gaffney, spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Manhattan, declined to comment on the ruling (AP/Long Island Newsday, 5/10).

Posted by lois at 11:49 PM | Comments (0)

New Orleans: Teenage Prisoners Describe Hurricane Horrors

May 10, 2006
Teenage Prisoners Describe Hurricane Horrors
By ADAM NOSSITER, NY Times

NEW ORLEANS, May 9 - More than 100 teenagers held in detention during Hurricane Katrina endured horrific conditions in the storm's aftermath, including standing for hours in filthy floodwater, having nothing to eat and drink for three to five days, and being forced to consume the waters as a result, according to a report released here Tuesday.

The report was prepared by the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana, a group that has long advocated changes in the state's troubled juvenile system. It was based on interviews with more than 60 teenagers held at the Orleans Parish Prison during the storm, as well as with prison staff members.

Youths who were interviewed described water rising in their darkened cells and a scramble onto top bunks to avoid it. They also said that when they were finally rescued - in some cases, after several days - they experienced dizziness and dehydration because of lack of food. One reported being "roped together" with plastic handcuffs as he and others were led out through neck-high water.

"There was food floating in the water and we tried to catch it and eat it; that's how hungry we were," said one 15-year-old identified as E. F. in the report.

T. G., 16, said, "Kids were going crazy, shaking their cells for food and water."

Another youth, R. S., 16, said: "We went five days without eating. Kids were passing out in their cells."

Among the many wrenching stories of evacuation after Hurricane Katrina, including the chaotic removal of more than 7,000 prisoners from the Orleans Parish Prison, that of the teenagers ranks as one of the more disturbing - an anarchic portrait of about 150 youthful inmates fending for themselves in dire conditions.

The prison was under the supervision of Marlin Gusman, the Orleans Parish criminal sheriff, who, through a spokeswoman, declined to respond to the report. The authors of the report said city and parish officials should have ordered the prison to be evacuated but lacked a formal plan to do so.

The report described what happened after the storm as symptomatic of a juvenile justice system recognized as one of the country's worst, an outpost of a sprawling prison empire where more people were locked up, per capita, than in any other state.

Only a week ago, a federal judge in Baton Rouge released the juvenile system from Justice Department control, six years after Louisiana was ordered to make changes and after numerous investigations and lawsuits. Several youth prisons in the state had achieved infamy as places of routine beatings and systematic deprivation, and federal authorities concluded that conditions were unconstitutional.

For years, advocates and a handful of state legislators had pushed for an overhaul but had met with resistance from state prison bureaucrats and indifference from elected Louisiana officials. Finally, the Legislature agreed in 2003 to a series of changes, shutting down the most notorious youth prison, in the northern part of the state.

At the same time, Louisiana agreed to move away from simply locking up hundreds of teenage offenders, instituting a more residential model of incarceration, as other states were doing.

But those changes, while lauded by advocates, were not all in place in August of last year, and the teenagers taken handcuffed and shackled to the Orleans Parish Prison ahead of the hurricane were exposed to the deficiencies of the old system.

"They left us in there with no food and no water," said Eddie Fenceroy, 15, a former detainee against whom charges have since been dismissed, advocates said.

Mr. Fenceroy described standing in the floodwater for "a whole day" before being rescued. "Some people were drinking the water," he said.

The advocacy group's director, David J. Utter, said that in a telephone conversation Monday evening, Sheriff Gusman pledged not to continue holding juveniles in the jail system here.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/10/us/10prison.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Posted by lois at 06:48 PM | Comments (0)

Report: $7 Gain for Every $1 Spent on Treatment

Report: $7 Gain for Every $1 Spent on Treatment
May 9, 2006 http://www.jointogether.org/news/research/summaries/2006/report-7-gain-for-every-1.html?print=t

A recent study concludes that society earns $7 in benefits for every $1 spent on addiction treatment, including savings on medical care, mental-health services, and welfare payments, increased employment, and reductions in criminal activity.

The report, "Benefit-Cost in the California Treatment Outcome Project: Does Substance Abuse Treatment 'Pay for Itself'?", (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=16430607&dopt=Abstract) estimated that the average stay in treatment cost $1,600 and yielded $11,500 in benefits during a nine-month study period. The latter included a $7,500 reduction in crime- and incarceration-related costs, and $3,400 in increased work earnings.

Outpatient treatment was estimated to have a benefits-to-cost ratio of 11:1, while inpatient treatment had an estimated 6:1 benefits-to-cost ratio.

"Even without considering the direct value to clients of improved health and quality of life, allocating taxpayer dollars to substance-abuse treatment may be a wise investment," the study concludes.

The study appears in the January 2006 issue of the journal Health Services Research.

Visit www.jointogether.org for complete news coverage, resources and advocacy tools to advance effective drug and alcohol policy, prevention and treatment.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Economic Benefits of Treating Substance Abuse Outweigh Costs

Research partially funded by RWJF suggests that every dollar invested in substance abuse treatment yields $7 worth of economic benefits

The Problem

In 2002, the Office of National Drug Control Policy estimated the economic cost of illicit drug abuse at more than $180 billion, making drug abuse one of the most costly health problems in the U.S. Lost productivity is the largest component of the economic cost.

New research by Ettner et al. confirms previous studies in finding that treatment for substance abuse is associated with net benefits. Findings from the study, “Benefit-Cost in the California Treatment Outcome Project: Does Substance Abuse Treatment ‘Pay for Itself’?”, funded in part by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, suggest that every dollar invested in substance abuse treatment yields $7 worth of economic benefits to society. The study considered the effects of treatment on medical care, mental health services, criminal activity, employment earnings, and government transfer payments (e.g., welfare payments). The Facts

* From a societal perspective, every dollar invested in substance abuse treatment yields $7 in benefits. On average, treatment costs $1,600 and is associated with $11,500 in benefits during a nine-month follow-up period to treatment initiation. The net benefits are primarily due to reduced costs of crime and increased employment earnings. The total costs related to crime and incarceration decreased by $7,500 per person treated, while employment earnings increased by $3,400.
* Treatment is associated with a $200 reduction in costs for emergency room visits. Costs for inpatient hospital visits and mental health services also decreased, but these results were not statistically significant.
* Benefits of treatment outweigh costs for both outpatient and residential treatment settings. The type of treatment necessary varies with the needs of the individual patient and all treatment modalities studied had higher benefits than costs. Outpatient treatment has an 11:1 ratio of benefits to cost, while residential treatment has a 6:1 ratio. The benefit-cost ratio for methadone maintenance programs was not statistically significant, possibly due to small sample size.

Policy Perspective

Policy-makers may perceive the cost of providing substance abuse treatment to be prohibitively high—especially because only 10 percent of the current treatment need is being met. However, making treatment more readily available may actually result in cost savings due to reduced crime and increased work productivity. Health care costs may also decrease, particularly those related to emergency room visits.

As the authors conclude, “Even without considering the direct value to clients of improved health and quality of life, allocating taxpayer dollars to substance abuse treatment may be a wise investment.”

Copyright 2006 The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation http://www.rwjf.org The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, based in Princeton, N.J., is the nation's largest philanthropy devoted exclusively to health and health care..

Posted by lois at 03:37 PM | Comments (0)

May 09, 2006

New prisons, for whom?

Claremore, OK
Claremore Progress
May 9, 2006
While most Americans are worried over the price of gasoline, the NBA playoffs and the latest scandal of the Desperate Housewives, a subsidiary of the Halliburton company has secured a $385 million no-bid contract to build new large-scale detention centers in case of an “emergency influx” of immigrants.

Even more worrisome than the $385 million is the language of this most unusual contract, calling for Halliburton to build a network of detention “centers” across the country large enough for each to “detain” up to 5,000 people. Keep in mind that “centers” is a euphemism for “prisons” and “detain” a softer word for “incarcerate.”

Why does America suddenly need to spend a third-of-a-billion dollars to establish a new mass prison complex in our country? The feds and Halliburton cryptically say that the detention centers could be needed for “some kind of mass migration” or for “the rapiddevelopment of new programs.”

Just what rapidly developing new programs?

Just who might be considered dangerous enough to the administration to qualify as a detainee?

We shudder when we recall President Bush stating that his job would be much easier if we were a dictatorship, and his later remarks that in the event of some kind of a flu pandemic he might have to invoke martial law.

In view of such off-handed remarks, coupled with president’s well-documented anti-democratic penchant to extend his power over the law and the people, the term “detention centers” raises the specter of WW II Japanese internment camps, and for what purpose?

Perhaps to be used for rounding up Muslim Americans or other American citizens tagged as “enemy combatants” ... such as, maybe ... registered Democrats?

http://www.claremoreprogress.com/archive/

Posted by lois at 09:42 PM | Comments (0)

Chicago's Abu Ghraib: UN Committee Against Torture Hears Report on How Police Tortured Over 135 African-American Men Inside Chicago Jails

Chicago's Abu Ghraib: UN Committee Against Torture Hears Report on How Police Tortured Over 135 African-American Men Inside Chicago Jails

Tuesday, May 9th, 2006
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/05/09/1415210

For nearly two decades a part of the city’s jails known as Area 2 was the epicenter for what has been described as the systematic torture of dozens of African-American males by Chicago police officers. In total, more than 135 people say they were subjected to abuse including having guns forced into their mouths, bags places over their heads, and electric shocks inflicted to their genitals. Four men have been released from death row after government investigators concluded torture led to their wrongful convictions.

Extraordinary rendition. Overseas prisons. Abu Ghraib. Guantanamo Bay. Practices and places that have become synonymous with the abuse of detainees in US custody are getting renewed attention at the United Nations this week, where the UN Committee Against Torture is holding hearings on U.S. compliance with its international obligations. But there is one name expected to arise this week that few people in this country will have heard about – and it’s the one that’s closest to home.

It’s called Area 2. And for nearly two decades beginning in 1971, it was the epicenter for what has been described as the systematic torture of dozens of African-American males by Chicago police officers. In total, more than 135 people say they were subjected to abuse including having guns forced into their mouths, bags places over their heads, and electric shocks inflicted to their genitals. Four men have been released from death row after government investigators concluded torture led to their wrongful convictions.

Yet the case around Area 2 is nowhere near a resolution -- to date, not one Chicago police officer has been charged with any crime.

The most prominent officer, former police commander Jon Burge, was dismissed in the early 1990s. He retired to Florida where he continues to collect a pension. Today, a special prosecutor is now in the fourth year of an investigation. Just last week, a group of Chicago police officers won a court ruling to delay the release of the prosecutor’s preliminary report.

* David Bates, one of dozens of men to come forward with allegations of abuse at the hands of the Chicago police.
* Flint Taylor, an attorney with the People’s Law Office in Chicago, which he helped found in the late 1960s. He has represented many of the torture victims and was directly involved in spearheading the special prosecutor’s investigation.
* John Conroy a journalist and author who has covered the case for over a decade. He has written several articles for the Chicago Reader, and is the author of the book "Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People: The Dynamics of Torture."

RUSH TRANSCRIPT

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AMY GOODMAN: We go now to Chicago, where we're joined by three guests: David Bates, Flint Taylor and John Conroy. David Bates is one of dozens of men to come forward with allegations of abuse at the hands of the Chicago police. Flint Taylor is an attorney with the People's Law Office in Chicago, which he helped found in the late 1960s. He has represented many of the torture victims and was directly involved in spearheading the special prosecutor's investigation. And John Conroy is a journalist and author who's covered the case for over a decade. He’s written several articles for the Chicago Reader and is the author of the book, Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People: The Dynamics of Torture. We welcome you all to Democracy Now! I want to begin with Flint Taylor for an overview. You have been working on this case for years. You have represented people who said they were tortured. Give us the scope of this story.

FLINT TAYLOR: Well, the scope started out with one man who was tortured by electric shock and having a plastic bag put over his head and being beaten by Jon Burge and others at the Area 2 police station. He, on his own, brought a lawsuit in the mid-‘80s. That lawsuit, we got involved in, and over the years we were able to uncover, with the help of journalists such as John Conroy, others such as David Bates, who had also been tortured and had told their stories in various courts, but no one had put all this evidence together.

e were able to assimilate, over many years, over 60 cases of torture, and when I say “torture,” I mean electric shock, I mean suffocation with bags, I mean mock executions, I mean racial attacks, that kind of thing. And they were all coming out of the same station, and they were all headed up by this man, Jon Burge, who came out of Vietnam, started out as a detective and quickly rose in the ranks through sergeant, lieutenant and commander. This went on -- the actual documentation now shows that this went on for over 20 years, from 1972 to 1992, when in fact Burge was finally, after community outrage, suspended and fired from his job.

As you said, he has never been prosecuted. The State's Attorney of Cook County at the time this evidence first came to light in the mid-‘80s was none other than the now major Richard Daley. The Superintendent of Police at that time contacted him with the evidence of torture and said, “Are you going to prosecute this?” Daley did not intervene or prosecute at that time. Later on, his first assistant, Richard Devine, became State’s Attorney of Cook County. Remarkably, Devine, while he was in private practice, had been Burge’s lawyer, defending many of these civil cases. He then became prosecutor in 1997. Of course, he did nothing either, because his clients were the ones that needed to be investigated. So for 20, 25, 30 years, no one in the prosecutor's office, the current mayor or the current state's attorney, no one else did any investigation.

Finally, the community outrage was so strong with regard to all of that that a special prosecutor was appointed. That was four years ago, as you said. Four years of investigation has led to his publicly saying that he now has 192 cases of torture and abuse at Area 2 and later at the Area 3 station, where Burge was transferred to later on. He now is talking about releasing a report. He still is not talking about indicting anybody. The rumor has it that, because it is so long, that we're going to have a catch-22 situation, and we're going to have the statute of limitations invoked by the special prosecutor, who's going to release a report but say it's too late to indict anybody.

Of course, we all say that that's ridiculous, that there are ongoing conspiracy allegations and evidence that there's an obstruction of justice going on in the various courts. There's perjury going on. So, no one's going to be satisfied if, in fact, all that happens is a report, no matter how damning the report may be. So the struggle here in Chicago continues and will continue, as long as people are still in jail because of the confessions that were tortured from them, and as long as Burge and others sit in Florida and other places and collect hundreds of thousands and even millions of dollars in police pensions, rather than to face criminal charges, whether they be state charges, federal charges or charges before the International Court of Justice.

AMY GOODMAN: We are also joined by David Bates. Can you tell us what happened to you? When did it happen? Tell us the whole course of events.

DAVID BATES: Well, I believe it was October the 28th or 29th of 1983, when a few officers knocked on my mom's door and announced that they were police officers and let my mom know that I’ll be taken away and that I’ll be coming home shortly. There were supposed to be some questions regarding a case. Of course, I got to the police station. I was questioned. I let the officers or detectives know that I had nothing to do with the case. I knew nothing. This went on for two days.

At that time, it was five sessions of torture, starting with two with slaps and kicks and threats. It was two particular sessions of torture that was very devastating, in which a plastic bag was placed over my head. I was punched and kicked. And I’ll tell you, when you talk about torture, you're talking about individuals who, most part, were young, had a few brushes with the law, but never in a million years thought that they would have a plastic bag placed over their head.

More importantly, the torture has never been resolved. No one has ever owned up to the torture. So we have hundreds of individuals who have psychologically been warped, been destroyed. There's never been any clinical resolution to the torture. No one has owned up to it.

And I tell you, the fact that this attorney and this journalist have spent years trying to uncover the truth and community organizations and individuals -- we're talking about a city. We're talking about a state. We're talking about legislators, who have not looked into the issue of torture, and I say it's a shame. And I would like to commend these gentlemen for working hard to bring the issue of torture out. But I say it's time for the legislators and mayor and individuals who had firsthand knowledge of it to come clean with it and bring these individuals to justice.

AMY GOODMAN: Flint Taylor, I remember years ago with a especially active group of mothers, mothers in Chicago of men on death row, who kept raising the issue of this police commander, Burge, and saying that their sons had been tortured, that one had engraved in a metal bench in the police station, “I am tortured, I’m forced to confess,” something like that. What about this? What about death row cases, where men ended up on death row?

FLINT TAYLOR: That's been a major, major piece of this whole struggle against police torture. In the early and mid-‘90s, the movement against police torture and for human rights came together with the anti-death penalty movement here in Chicago and raised a very strong set of voices, some of whom you’ve just mentioned. For people, there were at least ten to twelve people on death row here in Illinois who alleged and had evidence to show that Burge and his men had tortured them into giving confessions, one of whom was Aaron Patterson, whom you just mentioned, who during a break in one of his torture sessions etched in a bench that he had been suffocated with a bag and was being tortured. That later came out.

Ultimately, due to the combination of the factors, and articles that John wrote, and speaking out by David and others in the community, and the work of various lawyers, Governor Ryan looked at all of these cases, and as you know, he not only commuted the sentence of all of those on death row, some 160-odd people, but he looked specifically at four cases of torture by Burge and others and found that those individuals were innocent, that they had been tortured into giving false confession, and he gave full innocence pardons to those four individuals. That’s Aaron Patterson, Stanley Howard, Madison Hobley and Leroy Orange.

Those four men are now “fortunate” enough -- and I put that with quotes around it -- to be able to, because they've been exonerated, bring lawsuits in federal courts. So there is not only the special prosecutor, but there are these lawsuits by the individuals who have been pardoned in federal court, where we are fighting the issues of torture and bringing out evidence in that forum, as well.

And there's an obstruction of justice going on in that courtroom, as well as against the special prosecutor, as the city has paid over $5 million to a set of private lawyers to represent the police officers, including Burge, in all these cases. Burge now and his men -- and there's now over 50 detectives that are named in one or more of these192 cases -- they are all getting free lawyers, and they’re getting the advice from the city-paid lawyers to take the Fifth Amendment. So you now have the spectacle of, in these federal cases and in front of the special prosecutor, that former and present law enforcement officers, rather than to answer questions about whether they tortured and abused people like David Bates and the men on death row, they have all lined up and taken the Fifth Amendment as to each and every allegation of police torture.

AMY GOODMAN: John Conroy, you’re a journalist and author. You've covered the torture case for over a decade for the Chicago Reader, and you wrote the book, Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People: The Dynamics of Torture. How has this taken so long to come out, though it has come out in parts over the years and in certain communities well-known? And now the question of whether, in fact, it will be released, this report that among other people calling for this, four black aldermen are calling for the public release of this report.

JOHN CONROY: Well, it hasn't taken that long to be out. It was out in 1990, when we did the story in the Chicago Reader, the first story, and we’ve done more than 100,000 words since. And I think that what's dragged on -- the reason why it's dragged on -- I differ with the estimable Mr. Taylor here on this -- is that there is no community outrage. People don't care. As in every society in which people are tortured, there's a torture book class in Chicago. It's African American men, most of them with criminal records. And they’re just beyond the pale of our compassion. We just don't care.

And that's why it's taken 15 years for you probably to do this program and many others now interested in this report, when the information has been out there for a very long time. The New York Times, I think, it’s covered this twice: once, when the men were pardoned; and once, when there was a float in the St. Patrick's Day parade that was going to honor four of the officers who had been accused, and the float never came to be in the parade, but there was a controversy about it. So, that shows you, I think, the level of concern in the United States about this issue.

AMY GOODMAN: We are talking to John Conroy, author of Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People: The Dynamics of Torture. We're also joined by David Bates, a torture victim, and Flint Taylor, an attorney who has worked on this case for decades.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: Our guests in the Chicago studio are John Conroy, who is a journalist and author, covered the torture case for over a decade for the Chicago Reader, author of Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People: The Dynamics of Torture; David Bates is also with us, as is Flint Taylor, attorney with the People's Law Office in Chicago. David Bates, are you going to sue the police department?

DAVID BATES: Well, I have to consult with my attorneys regarding that. I’ll just have to say that in conjunction with what Flint said and John, this has been going on for so long, and there hasn't been the outrage needed to bring attention to the torture in order to get those convictions. But, again, I just want to commend individuals who have been tirelessly working to keep this issue of torture in the news. We have to look at this from a human perspective. These are individuals who were tortured and beaten at the hands of people who basically are supposed to serve and protect them. And imagine keeping this thing and not being able to talk to people about this. A lot of these gentlemen went to prison and served long stints of time incarcerated. There was no one to talk to about the torture. Even contact with public officials or community leaders, it was no one to talk to about it. And, again, I just want to commend everybody for coming on board with this issue. But there's a lot need to be done.

AMY GOODMAN: David Bates, did you hear about this happening to other people at the time that this happened to you?

DAVID BATES: Well, see, the problem comes in, is that when you’re in prison and you're in an environment like that, you do not want to let anyone know that you made a confession, whether you were tortured, whatever -- however you made the confession, it was not in your best interest to expose that while you were in prison. You would be considered weak. So, imagine these individuals in prison not able to even seek legal help and advice. I liken it to being raped, honestly. Individuals not able to be -- go for help. Then, when you did go for help, when you had the opportunity to go for help, people said it didn’t happen. So, I tell you, when you get rid of all -- when you get down to the human aspect of this problem, you're going to deal with a lot of sick men, a lot of sick men that need clinical -- some type of clinical help to deal with the torture.

AMY GOODMAN: David Bates, when you saw the pictures at Abu Ghraib, what were your thoughts?

DAVID BATES: Well, the pictures, I’ll say this. My thoughts on the whole process was: how the hell did they get hearings, and torture from anywhere is wrong. But as we’ve spoke on, this torture has taken place for over two to three decades in America, on the Southside of Chicago. Why didn't we have public hearings? Why didn't the state legislators come in and do investigations? We actually had to go outside the country to an international court to deal with police torture. On October the 14th, the People's Law Office and other attorneys met in front of the Organization of American States to bring attention to the issue of torture, and we're looking for delegation of individuals to come in and to ask Mayor Daley questions that he hasn't been able to answer to the public since this Jon Burge stuff has been going on. And I tell you, it's going to be an embarrassment to a lot of people, but like my good friend Conroy said, they've been knowing about it.

AMY GOODMAN: Let me ask about the knowledge to the very top. Some are saying -- and I want to put this question to Flint Taylor, attorney with the People's Law Office in Chicago -- that the report could well implicate, as you were talking about, the State's Attorney, Richard Daley, his assistant Richard Devine, who now holds the top job. Can you talk more about how they knew, the whole issue of them being told early on?

FLINT TAYLOR: Well, as I said, Richard Daley was previously the State’s Attorney of Cook County. In 1982, when one of the major -- the first major case broke with regard to police torture, the Andrew Wilson case, the superintendent of police was informed by the head of the hospital, the prison hospital where Andrew Wilson was being held, that there was serious evidence of torture, that Andrew Wilson not only said, but had physical evidence that supported the conclusion that he had been tortured by electric shock, by beating, and he had 15 injuries all over him, burns and everything like that. And the head of the hospital was so shocked, he brought it straight to the superintendent of police.

The superintendent of police then brought it straight to Richard Daley. He knew that Andrew Wilson had been charged with very serious offenses, shooting two police officers and killing them. So Daley decided that rather than to investigate the criminal activities of Jon Burge in torturing Andrew Wilson, that that would, in fact, undercut and undermine, he thought, the prosecution of Wilson, so he did nothing. He did no prosecution at that time.

He then presided over the next eight years over the State's Attorney's office, which was complicit in taking over 55 confessions from 55 different victims of Burge and police torture. In all of those or many of those cases in the individual courts, there was testimony from those victims that they had been tortured. However, Daley defended all those cases, put all those people behind bars, many of them on death row, and in no instance did he investigate the continuing allegations that were coming out of Burge's police headquarters that people were tortured. Daley then went on to be the mayor of the City of Chicago.

There was -- and John and I disagree in the sense that there had been at times public outrage. The public outrage reaches certain proportions at different times. We're at one those key points again today. We had been in the early ‘90s. And one the reasons for that was this Andrew Wilson trial that brought out all this evidence and put together all these different allegations of torture. Because of all of that, the police department was forced to reinvestigate. This was in the early 1990s.

They put an honest investigator in charge of the investigation, and lo and behold, he came to an obvious conclusion. He said there was systematic torture at Area 2. He said he had looked at 50 cases, and there was systematic torture. Well, what did the superintendent of police do? He suppressed that report. He then met with the mayor of the City of Chicago, after we had gotten that report released by a judge, and he and the mayor, who is now Richard Daley, instead of saying, “Now we have the evidence to prosecute. Now we should proceed. Now we should lock Burge up,” what did they do? They not only attempted to suppress the report, but then they went publicly and discredited it. Daley stepped forward and said, “These are only rumors and innuendo.” So, at every point, as I’ve mentioned, Daley, rather than taking his responsibility as chief law enforcement officer and chief executive officer of the City of Chicago, moved to suppress and to do nothing.

AMY GOODMAN: Legally -- let me ask you, Flint Taylor. Legally, if crimes are known about, and they are covered up, is Mayor Daley criminally liable?

FLINT TAYLOR: Well, at this point, is he criminally liable? I suppose you could see him a co-conspirator, in that it was certain obstruction of justice over the years, certainly. But I think at this point what we're looking is if a special prosecutor comes out with a report and says, “I can't indict, because it's too late,” then the people of the city of Chicago have to look in two directions. They have to look backwards to Daley and Devine and say, “Well, the special prosecutor was hamstrung by the fact that Daley and Devine didn't act when they should have,” and then we have to look forward and say, “That's not sufficient. That's not right.”

There are continuing criminal violations here, and if the special prosecutor won't do anything about them, then Fitzgerald, who is the U.S. Attorney here and who, of course, has made his name in the Valerie Plame case and has already indicted Daley's people in a wide-ranging truck scandal, he has to open his investigation into federal RICO or racketeering charges, as well as obstruction of justice and perjury. And as David has mentioned, it has been taken to the international forum, not only last fall to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, which is the Organization of American States, who is still looking into this issue, but this past week and right now, it's been presented to the Committee Against Torture of the United Nations in Geneva, and one of our people has spoken with and presented evidence to the Committee Against Torture, and that committee has ordered the government to respond and to speak to the issues of torture here in this country. And in its concluding remarks, it put with Abu Ghraib and put with Guantanamo the situation of Chicago.

And so, perhaps there's not enough public outrage here, but the international community is looking at it in a very strong way, and to hear Chicago put in the same breath with Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib is something that -- if that doesn't wake up the powers that be here in the City of Chicago and that doesn't wake up the U.S. Attorney’s office and that doesn’t, in fact, put on the carpet the State’s Attorney of Cook County and the Mayor of the City of Chicago, I don't know what will.

AMY GOODMAN: John Conroy, the Midwest Coalition for Human Rights will present a report that includes the Chicago torture allegations to the U.N. Human Rights Commission. How significant is this? And, finally, why do you call your book “Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People”?

JOHN CONROY: Well, let me take the second question first. I call the book “Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People,” because torture is always done by -- we want our torturers to be monsters, but it turns out that they're just ordinary people like you and me. And I can go back and cite you all kinds of psychological experiments in which they have found that people will do extraordinary things, inflicting pain on other people, if they are simply ordered to do so, simply following orders someone else is taking responsibility. And it doesn't require any sort of a twisted mind to do this. We are all -- most of us are given to obedience. And so, I’ve interviewed torturers from around the world, former torturers, and they all struck me as very ordinary men.

How significant the international attention will be remains to be seen. It's a unique turn, and it's somewhat thrilling, I think, for those of us who have been watching this for a long time to see it finally raise to the level of being mentioned in a phrase with Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. But whether this will just be one of those media -- you know, where the media comes in for a day or two and then leaves remains to be seen.

AMY GOODMAN: And what's the timetable on this?

JOHN CONROY: The special prosecutor is supposed to -- I’m sorry. The judge who oversees the prosecutor is supposed to rule, I believe, on the 12th of May, as to whether the report will be released or not.

AMY GOODMAN: That will be Friday, and we will certainly follow it up. I want to thank you all for being with us: David Bates, torture victim himself, telling his own story; Flint Taylor, attorney with the People's Law Office in Chicago, who has represented many of the victims; and John Conroy, who has written about this for years for the Chicago Reader, author of Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People: The Dynamics of Torture.

www.democracynow.org

Posted by lois at 05:34 PM | Comments (0)

U.S. Defends Itself on Torture

By TOM WRIGHT
GENEVA, May 8 — More than 100 American soldiers and intelligence officers have been disciplined for abusing detainees, United States officials said Monday before an international panel investigating the country's treatment of prisoners in its fight against terrorism. The number is nearly twice that cited by human rights groups.

In the second and final day of questioning by the United Nations Committee Against Torture, members of a United States delegation responded to queries on topics including the definition of torture and policies on transferring prisoners to countries with poor human rights records.

The delegates said the United States was acting to ensure that it adhered to its treaty obligations to prevent the torture of prisoners. It is one of 141 signers of the Convention Against Torture, a 1987 treaty. Problems of abuse found in prisons like Abu Ghraib in Iraq were isolated missteps, the delegates said.

"We recognize much of the world does hold the United States to a high standard," said the State Department's legal adviser, John B. Bellinger III, who led the delegation. "Without question our record has improved."

Nora Sveaass, a panel member from Norway, said the United States had given "very reassuring answers" on efforts to bring those responsible for torture to justice.

Charles Stimson, deputy assistant secretary of defense for detainee affairs, said the United States had court-martialed 103 American service members and intelligence officers since 2001, leading to 19 convictions with jail terms of a year or more.

That figure contrasted with numbers quoted by the panel last week and provided by Human Rights Watch, a nonprofit organization based in the United States. The group identified 54 courts-martial, 10 of which resulted in jail terms of a year or more.

But human rights groups said the numbers cited by American officials were still low. Last week the panel cited data from rights groups saying that more than 600 service members or intelligence officers had been involved in suspected acts of torture.

In the two days of questioning, the panel pushed the delegation to define the scope of torture. On Monday, Fernando Mariño Menéndez, a panel member from Spain, asked whether torture could be defined to include the forced disappearance of terrorism suspects and the establishment of secret prisons.

"I don't think one can say per se that it is," Mr. Bellinger replied. He said the United States believed that some terrorism suspects posed such a threat to security that they had forgone their rights to communicate with their families and others.

As for the interrogation technique known as waterboarding, in which a suspect is made to believe that he is drowning, Mr. Stimson said the revised Army Field Manual would not include the practice.

When asked about the practice of sending prisoners for questioning to countries where they could be at risk for torture, American officials said the terms of the antitorture convention did not ban that policy.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/09/world/09rights.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print

Posted by lois at 04:17 PM | Comments (0)

AZ: Bill Requiring Jail Time for Sex Workers Now Law

Bill requiring jail for prostitutes now law
Associated Press
May. 9, 2006

Gov. Janet Napolitano on Monday signed into law a bill to require jail time for prostitutes and their customers.

The bill requires 15 days in jail for a first offense, 30 days for a second offense, 60 days for a third offense and 180 days for any additional offenses.

Prostitution is a misdemeanor punishable by up to six months in jail, but the bill mandates jail time and makes a fourth or subsequent offense a low-grade felony.

The bill's sponsor, Republican Sen. Chuck Gray of Mesa, said it would provide a statewide solution to a situation in which prostitutes go from one city to another to avoid local crackdowns.

Gray said that the jail mandate is intended to get prostitutes off the street and into rehabilitation programs and that the felony provision would encourage repeat offenders to leave the state.

Opponents criticized both the mandatory jail time and the felony provision as obstacles to rehabilitation efforts.
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0509prostitution0509.html

Posted by lois at 04:05 PM | Comments (0)

May 06, 2006

Limbaugh---A Taste of His Own Medicine

May 6, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist, NY Times
A Taste of His Own Medicine
By JOHN TIERNEY

Now that Rush Limbaugh has managed to keep himself out of prison, the punishment he once advocated for drug abusers, let me suggest a new cause for him: speaking out for people who can handle their OxyContin.

Like Limbaugh, Richard Paey suffers from back pain, which in his case is so severe that he's confined to a wheelchair. Also like Limbaugh, he was accused of illegally obtaining large quantities of painkillers. Although there was no evidence that either man sold drugs illegally, the authorities in Florida zealously pursued each of them for years.

Unlike Limbaugh, Paey went to prison. Now 47 years old, he's serving the third year of a 25-year term. His wife told me that when he heard how Limbaugh settled his case last week — by agreeing to pay $30,000 and submit to drug tests — Paey offered a simple explanation: "The wealthy and influential go to rehab, while the poor and powerless go to prison."

He has a point, although I don't think that's the crucial distinction between the cases. Paey stood up for his belief that patients in pain should be able to get the medicine they need. Limbaugh so far hasn't stood up for any consistent principle except his right to stay out of jail.

He has portrayed himself as the victim of a politically opportunistic prosecutor determined to bag a high-profile trophy, which is probably true. But that's standard operating procedure in the drug war supported by Limbaugh and his fellow conservatives.

Drug agents and prosecutors are desperate for headlines because they have so little else to show for their work. The drug war costs $35 billion per year and has yet to demonstrate any clear long-term benefits — precisely the kind of government boondoggle that conservatives like Limbaugh ought to view skeptically.

Yet conservatives go on giving more money and more power to the drug cops. When critics complained about threats to civil liberties in the Patriot Act, President Bush defended it by noting that the government was already using some of these powers against drug dealers. Why worry about snooping on foreign terrorists when we've already been doing it to Americans?

Limbaugh objected when prosecutors, unable to come up with enough evidence against him, demanded to be allowed to go through his medical records in the hope of finding something.

He managed to stop them in court, but other defendants can't afford long legal battles to protect their privacy.

Drug agents and prosecutors go on fishing expeditions to seize doctors' records and force pharmacists to divulge what they're selling to whom. With the help of new federal funds, states are compiling databases of the prescriptions being filled at pharmacies. Once their trolling finds something they deem suspicious, the authorities can threaten doctors, pharmacists and patients with financially crippling investigations and long jail sentences unless they cooperate by testifying against others or copping a plea.

Paey was the rare patient who refused to turn on his doctor or plead guilty to a problem he didn't have. He insisted that he'd been taking large quantities of painkillers because he needed them. He wanted to protect his own right to keep taking them, and others' rights as well.

"They say I was stubborn," he told me last year. "I consider it a matter of principle."

Limbaugh got off partly because he could afford the legal bills (which he says ran into millions of dollars) and partly because he cooperated with prosecutors. He confessed to being an addict, went into rehab and swore to remain clean.

Perhaps he really was one of the small minority of pain patients who hurt themselves by compulsively using drugs like OxyContin for emotional, not physical, relief. But most pain patients can become physically dependent on large doses of opioids without being what doctors consider an addict. They take the drugs not to escape reality, but to function normally.

Even if Limbaugh believes that drugs like OxyContin are a menace to himself, he ought to recognize that most patients are in Richard Paey's category. Their problem isn't abusing painkillers, but finding doctors to prescribe enough of them. And that gets harder every year because of the drug war promoted by conservatives like Limbaugh.

It has been said that a liberal is a conservative who's been arrested. I wouldn't wish such a conversion on Limbaugh. But a two-year investigation by drug prosecutors should be enough to turn a conservative into a libertarian.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Posted by lois at 09:58 AM | Comments (0)

FL: Autopsy Ties Boy's Death to Boot Camp

May 6, 2006

By CHRISTINE JORDAN SEXTON

Martin Lee Anderson, a 14-year-old boy who died in January a day after entering a boot camp in northwest Florida, died from suffocation and not sickle cell trait, a new autopsy released yesterday concluded.

The initial medical examiner in Bay County contended that the boy had died from the rare condition of sickle cell trait despite a video that showed guards at the boot camp beating him. But State Attorney Mark Ober, who was appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush to investigate Martin's death, ordered a new autopsy.

Mr. Ober released the autopsy results, but did not make any arrests yesterday and said in a statement that he had no "timeline" for completing the investigation.

At a press conference in Tallahassee the boy's parents, Gina Jones and Robert Anderson, and their lawyer, Ben Crump, thanked Governor Bush, Mr. Ober and the Hillsborough County medical examiner, Vernard I. Adams, a medical doctor who conducted the second autopsy.

"The truth is out," Ms. Jones said. "We all knew how Martin passed away so I am relieved and happy today. It's a beginning. Justice needs to be served."

Dr. Adams concluded that the beating on Jan. 5 by boot camp guards left bruises but did not directly cause Martin's death. Guards punched and choked the boy after he said he was unable to finish running laps. The beating was captured on tape.

"Martin Anderson's death was caused by suffocation due to actions of the guards at the boot camp," Dr. Adams said in a release.

He added, "The suffocation was caused by manual occlusion of the mouth, in concert with the forced inhalation of ammonia fumes that cause spasms of the vocal cords, resulting in internal blockage of the upper airway."

Dr. Adams consulted with several pathologists as well as a pediatric critical-care specialist and a pediatric hematologist. He also asked NASA to improve the quality of the videotape, and it reduced glare and inserted a digital clock.

While the parents were satisfied with the release of the second autopsy, members of the Florida Black Legislative Caucus expressed anger that no arrests had been made.

"If the guards caused his death, then they need to be arrested immediately," said State Senator Frederica A. Wilson, a Democrat from Miami, who added, "We can't accept that."

The death has sparked protests and was partly to blame for the sudden resignation of one of Florida's top law-enforcement officials. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement executive director, Guy Tunnell, resigned after the discovery that he had sent e-mail messages to the Bay County sheriff discussing the continuing investigation into the death. After the discovery, Mr. Ober removed Mr. Tunnell's agency from any role in the investigation.

Governor Bush appointed Mr. Ober after criticism of the initial autopsy done by the Bay County medical examiner, Dr. Charles Siebert. It concluded that Martin died from complications of sickle cell trait.

Dr. Siebert said yesterday that he stood by the findings of his autopsy.

"I am still sticking to my findings at this point, since I don't have any proof of his findings, said Dr. Siebert, who added that he had ruled out suffocation as a cause of the boy's death based on hospital reports that, Dr. Siebert said, indicated that the amount of carbon dioxide in the blood were low.

Dr. Siebert said that there was an "automatic" assumption that Dr. Adams's results were correct and that "is very premature at this point." He also said he expected the Florida Medical Examiners Commission to assemble a probable-cause panel to review if there was any wrongdoing and whether his licenses should be revoked.

"I don't see a way of avoiding it," Dr. Siebert said.

Mr. Bush said in a release that he considered the actions of the Bay County boot camp guards "deplorable" and that he was committed to providing any resources Mr. Ober might need to complete the investigation "as quickly as possible."

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Posted by lois at 09:55 AM | Comments (0)

May 05, 2006

IMMIGRANT APARTHEID: Immigrant Rights Movement At The Crossroads

* * * * * * * *
IMMIGRANT APARTHEID: Immigrant Rights Movement At The Crossroads by Subhash Kateel. Left Turn Magazine. April 2006, Issue # 20 For more information on Left Turn Magazine, visit www.leftturn.org

As an immigrant rights organizer in New York after September 11, I
watched immigrant communities of color face an onslaught of detentions and deportations. At the time, my organization, Families For Freedom, predicted that what we were witnessing was not just a backlash to September 11, but something more frightening and long term - the development of Apartheid institutions in the US, institutions to ensure that immigrants, non-citizens specifically, would permanently have less rights than citizens.

Five years ago, as I watched families be split apart, immigrant
businesses closing, and names from around the world fill the rosters

September 11 forced detentions, deportations, and immigrant rights onto the national stage like never before. Politicians from both parties made no qualms about equating immigrants with terrorists, and
anti-immigration policies became anti-terrorism. In the shrinking
progressive world, many still had yet to grasp the immigrant rights
movement for what it was - the fight of our lives. Instead, the emerging
war on immigrants was perceived as a fight for civil liberties. So many people were fighting against the secrecy of the recent detentions and deportations, and for basic due process, that they often forgot that the stakes where significantly higher.

Although significant, the issue in immigrant communities was not simply whether big brother was going to go through your library list, or if you had access to your attorney while you were locked up. Families were being torn apart, breadwinners were becoming dependents, and yet another community was becoming accustomed to seeing its loved ones confined to prison bars or life exile.

Much of what happened after September 11 was not particularly new. For more than a decade before, a political consensus was developing. People in power were coming to understand that policing immigration status was
a key to policing people.

In American cities, suburbs, and workplaces, communities of color were
increasingly becoming immigrants of color. Globally these immigrants
were using their labor in the First World and remittances to their
families back home to replace foreign direct investment and
international loans as a primary source of income in the Third World. Immigrants of color were bringing into the country more than submissive
labor. They were bringing their ideas and ingenuity in much the same way
immigrants such as Marcus Garvey and Stokely Carmichael helped bring
black consciousness to the civil rights movement and an earlier
generation of immigrants like Emma Goldman helped bring a radical,
democratic vision to the labor movement.

Immigrants were starting to utilize the underground economy they were
relegated to in ways that surpassed subsistence and survival, siphoning bits of capital and other resources to others in their communities. In other words, they threatened to change the landscape of America and its relationship to the world.

The political elites understood that while America needs immigrants,
much of America does not particularly like immigrants, or is afraid of them. They could not be complacent in fostering a climate where
immigrants would have full access and impact in the social, political, and economic spaces of others.

APARTHEID'S GROUNDWORK

The groundwork for immigrant Apartheid and its corresponding war on
immigrants was laid in exploitative trade policies like NAFTA, the broad
criminalizing of people of color under the guise of the war on drugs,
and first remnants of anti-terrorism policies that emerged in the late 80's and early 90's. The first contemporary Apartheid policies can be traced to the 1996 so-called Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act, passed by Bill Clinton - not by Bush - on the one-year anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing.

The 1996 immigration laws identified the US deportation system as the
primary tool for policing immigrants. It created provisions for
mandatory detention and deportation of noncitizens-including green card holders, cut back on immigrants' rights in the courts, and expanded the prison bed space meant for immigrant detention. More significantly it was one of the first signs that non-citizens, who were once brought right from the boat to the voting booth, would clearly have less rights
than citizens based solely on their lack of citizenship.

In the decade since then, more than 1.3 million immigrants have been
deported. Immigrants have become the fastest growing segment of the
prison population and the federal government on any given year detains almost a quarter of a million immigrants. In addition, immigrant families, even those with citizen spouses and children, have been devastated. Whole communities have been uprooted. The tools that have been used to marginalize communities of color and poor people have
become more refined and efficient. In New York, Black immigrants are
disproportionately subject to deportation. Throughout the country the
government is jointly using the criminal justice and the deportation
system to criminalize immigrants out of being human.

In the process, whole other sectors of society: private prison
companies, Halliburton, bail bondsmen, bounty hunters, local county
sheriffs, and depressed rural towns have seen immigrants from Jamaica, Mexico, El Salvador, Pakistan, and even the Albania as the next cash crop.

September 11 was a dream for the anti-immigrant, pro-apartheid right. It allowed them to accelerate policies that would permanently make
immigrants a de facto underclass. Meanwhile the fight for immigrant
rights would also change. You would hear little mention of 1996. The new
talk shifted to important but inaccessible discussions on civil
liberties, something most immigrants probably never knew they had.

Talk shifted from dismantling the huge deportation system and fixing the 1996 laws to merely removing the secrecy and due process violations of this system. A minority of groups even shifted discussions away from
broad based legalization to make compromises on bracero-type
guest-worker programs. Around the country dignified and dedicated
organizers were feeling dejected. Many were forced to fight harder and harder for less progressive, and impressive gains. Sometimes our biggest fights were merely to stop worse things from happening.

NEW COMMITMENT

If 2006 is bringing a new legislative advance in the quest to bring
Apartheid to immigrants in America; it must also bring a new long-term commitment from social justice movements to escalating our efforts. At
one level, progressives connected to communities must dedicate ourselves
to the mundane yet necessary work of beating back bad legislation. This
involves the tedious and not particularly inspiring labor of targeting -
via letter writing, mass action, and congressional outreach -those that
pass laws they never read, about people they never meet.

If we cannot slow down the pace of policy change, we can at least
identify which lawmakers are the most complicit in creating Apartheid.
The previously mentioned Sensenbrenner-King Bill for example may go to
the Senate floor by March but most of our Democratic Senators have had
no response to it.

The fight /for/ Immigrant Apartheid is broad-based and grassroots. Right
wing policies are backed by an unlikely combination of think tanks,
militia groups, and seemingly folksy characters that just want to
protect America from an "invasion." In other words, it resembles a movement.

For us to continue building a viable movement we need to revisit our
strategies, tactics, and long-term vision. For many years the immigrant
rights movement has been severely fractured. One major division has been
between those fighting to legalize the tens of millions of undocumented
workers and families in America, and those that are fighting against
/delegalization/- the growing ability of the government to detain and
deport both legal and undocumented immigrants. This schism has divided
our movement while reducing our struggle to one between "good" and "bad"
immigrants.

One look at the Sensenbrenner-King bill shows us that the dark side
decided to converge the myriad of issues affecting immigrants without
asking us (e.g. some provisions would render legalization meaningless).
Those of us fighting for legalization and against delegalization now
have an unfortunate opportunity to rebuild an immigrant rights movement
with a more inclusive and holistic vision and strategy.

*Our newest efforts must focus on building the base of power for our
immigrant communities.* We are stuck in a situation where the
overwhelming majority of people directly affected by Immigrant Apartheid
cannot vote and many are confined to the ranks of the underground
economy. But our people are politically active, and we must build on
that existing political power.

Locally, immigrants have become a major force in unions, churches,
school associations, and even local government. Internationally,
immigrants still vote in their countries' elections, are still part of
political and human rights groups focused on "homeland" issues, and are
increasingly more significant contributors to their home countries'
national incomes. Our ability to build a stronger movement will be
measured in the coming years by our ability to localize and
internationalize the fight for immigrant rights, maximizing our people's
political power where they have already built it.

As the membership of Families For Freedom-former immigrant prisoners,
deportees, children of deportees, and single parents left to fend for
themselves- has watched the various battles in DC over the fate of our
loved ones unfold, there has been a sense of sadness and anger. But the
reaction only sometimes leads to despair. Instead many of our most
experienced members, people that know all too well what the stakes are,
simply say: "We can beat this, we have to."

Subhash Kateel is a co-director of Families For Freedom, a multiethnic
network of families directly facing and fighting deportation based in
Brooklyn, NY. For more information see www.familiesforfreedom.org or
email subhash@familiesforfreedom.org. For more information on
congressional legislation, visit: www.detentionwatchnetwork.org/

Posted by lois at 11:01 PM | Comments (0)

May 04, 2006

Democracy Now: A Look Inside U.S. Immigration Prisons

DEMOCRACY NOW
Thursday, May 4th, 2006
Access at http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/05/04/147201

Undocumented immigrants are one of the largest growing populations being detained by the U.S government. We look at the issue of immigration detention, focusing on the treatment of immigrant detainees, the trend towards privatization of detention centers and the policies behind it all. [includes rush transcript - partial]

Judy Greene, justice policy analyst for Justice Strategies, an organization which conducts research and policy analysis on immigrant detention issues and policies and other issues relating to the criminal justice system.

Mark Dow, author of, "American Gulag: Inside U.S Immigration Prisons" He is also the author the co-editor of "Machinery of Death: The Reality of America's Death Penalty Regime."

Debi Sanders, executive director of the Capital Area Immigrant Rights Coalition and a member of the Detention Watch Network.

AMY GOODMAN: We're joined in our Firehouse studio by Sharon Nyantekyi. Sharon recently spent a number of days in a detention center run by Corrections Corporation of America in Elizabeth, New Jersey, taken into custody after applying for a green card, married to an American citizen. We are also joined in the studio by Judy Greene, an analyst with Justice Strategies, and by Mark Dow, who is the author of the book, American Gulag: Inside U.S. Immigration Prisons. We welcome you to Democracy Now! Judith Greene, C.C.A. and immigrant detention -- first, the overall prison system, and then, the specific subset of immigration prisons.

JUDY GREENE: Well, C.C.A. is the largest private prison corporation in the world and in the United States. They have some 60,000 prison beds that they manage. They house prisoners from the federal prison system, from state prison systems, and they have an increasing share of contracts to house immigrants in their detention centers. The company actually started -- the very first private prison in the world was an immigrant detention center in Houston, Texas: the Houston Immigrant Processing Center, which C.C.A. still operates. And Texas continues to be the ground zero of the immigrant detention industry.

AMY GOODMAN: And how has it grown? And is it increasing, the privatization of U.S. prisons?

JUDY GREENE: In the last decade, with increased emphasis on immigrant enforcement, the immigrant detention system, the little industry, has tripled in size to a capacity now of some 22,000 beds. Some of these beds are private. Some of these beds are operated by ICE. Some of these beds are in jails, contracted similar to the jail that Sharon was held in. But the private sector is gobbling up an increasing share of these resources. Now, since 9/11, there's been an increased blurring of the line between immigrant enforcement and law enforcement. And now, with the hyper-politicized immigration reform debate, we're seeing bills that would completely erase that line.

AMY GOODMAN: Talk about the significance of this. I mean, you have the situation of Sharon, you have the situation of Carolina. No criminal charges had been brought against them. What do you mean by the blurring?

JUDY GREENE: Well, pressure is increasing on state and local law enforcement to enforce immigration laws, and some states -- Florida, Alabama, Arkansas
-- have already made agreements with the federal government, so that state and local police are trained to look for undocumented immigrants and ostensibly to bring them into the immigrant detention industry or facilities for purposes of removal.

What we're seeing in Alabama, for example, immigrants are being stopped at checkpoints or stopped for making illegal left turns in their cars or even jaywalking. Local police then inspect whatever documents they may have, and if those documents appear to be false, they're being taken into custody, charged with felony fraud, held in jail with no bail, and processed in our criminal courts, which then, of course, if they're convicted and they go to prison, at the end of that, they get processed into the detention system for removal.

AMY GOODMAN: You could have a woman who calls the police in a domestic violence situation, and the police come and then arrest her?

JUDY GREENE: Absolutely.

AMY GOODMAN: Mark Dow, you've written this book, American Gulag: Inside U.S. Immigration Prisons. Can you talk about the difference between immigration prisons and other prisons? Is there a difference?

MARK DOW: Well, there's a difference, in name, and that's an important question. The reason I use the phrase "immigration prisons" is because we talk a lot about detention. We're hearing a lot about detention. But when people are detained, they are incarcerated. They are prisoners. They're stripped of their clothing. They're given inmate uniforms. It's not that they're treated like prisoners, they are prisoners. So even though this is administrative, quote-unquote, "detention," it has nothing to do with serving time for a sentence. These people are jailed as prisoners, and they are in jails, they are in prisons, and sometimes in what are called detention centers or processing centers, but as a warden once told me, these are all the same thing.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about some of these detention centers, from Krome in Miami, Dade County, to others?

MARK DOW: Well, the main thing to realize about them is that it's a whole network of detention centers and prisons around the country, so wherever someone is hearing this broadcast right now, there's most likely a prison or jail or detention center with non-citizens being held there pretty close to where they are. It's a decentralized system.

Part of the problem for these immigration prisoners, like some of the ones that have been talking to you today, is that they are isolated from families. They're isolated from legal help. They are often put in rural areas, where there simply aren't lawyers in the area who can help them. And none of that is an accident. In fact, often if immigration prisoners are in a big city, where they might have legal help or family support, the immigration agency, ICE, will often move them to isolated rural areas to make sure that they're more cut off and more isolated. So the immigration service actively works to cut them off from the little due process that's available to them.

AMY GOODMAN: The number of people who are immigrants, who are now detained?

MARK DOW: Something like 22,000 right now. And the important thing to remember about that number is that a lot of people think that immigration detention appeared after September 11th, and people think that, 'Okay, well, even if there are some problems, it was September 11th, so we had to detain people.' But on September 10, 2001, there were already some 20,000 to 22,000 immigration detainees around the country.

AMY GOODMAN: You're saying there aren't more.

MARK DOW: Well, we don't know the exact numbers, but -- and there's a lot of turnover. But what I'm saying is that this immigration detention system didn't just start recently because of a national emergency. It's been in place since the Reagan era in its current form, although it's expanding exponentially, particularly since the 1996 anti-immigrant laws.

AMY GOODMAN: With the legislation that's being debated right now in Congress, what applies to the jails?

MARK DOW: Well, it's not clear what the increase in bed space will be yet, but one of the provisions that's being talked about could increase the number of detention beds by the tens of thousands. 20,000, possibly. So we're talking about additional expansion, renting more beds in local jails, increased opportunities for the private prison companies that Judy is talking about.

AMY GOODMAN: And the difference in access that immigrants have to lawyers in immigrant jails versus regular prisoners?

MARK DOW: So-called administrative detainees, people in immigration detention, do not have a right to counsel. This is very important to realize, because they're subject to an adversarial system. They go into a courtroom where there's an immigration judge, where there's a prosecutor who works for the immigration service. But those immigration prisoners do not have the right to counsel.

Now, Michael Chertoff, Secretary Chertoff, during his confirmation hearings, seemed to imply that in retrospect, the post-September 11th detainees should have had lawyers. Now, I think he basically said that to escape from some questioning from the congressmen, but it's something that he should be held to, and I think the issue of counsel for any detained immigrant is something that should be on the table. And frankly, it would solve one of the problems that immigration complains about, which is that if you release people from detention, that they tend to abscond, because some statistics seem to show that if an immigrant who has to fight his or her case has a lawyer, then they're more likely to show up for any proceeding. So, giving them a lawyer will make the system work better all around.

AMY GOODMAN: Sharon, did you have access to a lawyer?

SHARON NYANTEKYI: Yes, I did have a lawyer at the time.

AMY GOODMAN: And how did you get out?

SHARON NYANTEKYI: Well, the lawyer, along with Rutgers University and my husband, had all been petitioning the judge and writing letters. The provost even wrote letters, all my professors wrote letters to the judge, you know, explaining my situation, and he decided to reopen my case. So that means I got out on bail, and I go before the judge again on May 9.

Posted by lois at 09:57 PM | Comments (0)

MA: Lawmakers in the House vote for Needle Exchange--Next vote in the Senate

Progress......

Mass. Lawmakers Debate Needle Law
May 3, 2006

News Summary
The Massachusetts House of Representatives has approved a bill to legalize over-the-counter sales of hypodermic needles, sending the bill to the state Senate for consideration, the Boston Globe reported May 1. Supporters say the law will slow the spread of HIV, hepatitis, and other illnesses transmitted by sharing dirty needles.

"People who are addicted to drugs will [use drugs] anyway -- and we need better provisions for them to stop using drugs," said Sen. Susan Fargo (D-Lincoln), chair of the Joint Committee on Public Health. "But a clean-needles bill doesn't encourage drug use, it doesn't encourage crime. It just makes sense." But some GOP lawmakers and Republican Gov. Mitt Romney oppose the move, saying it sends the wrong message about drug use. "We would be saying to people, 'What you are doing is illegal. But we'll at least give you the needle to do it,'" said Senate minority leader Brian P. Lees (R-East Longmeadow). "I don't think we would be sending the right message." Forty-seven other states now allow legal sales of needles; sales remain illegal only in Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Delaware. The Massachusetts bill would legalize needle sales to people over age 18 and decriminalize needle possession. Pharmacists would be required to hand out information on addiction treatment programs and proper needle use and disposal to buyers.
The House passed the bill 115-37.
A Romney spokesperson said the bill would be vetoed if it reaches the governor's desk. "Governor Romney believes that removing prescription controls on hypodermic needles is a bad idea," said spokesperson Eric Fehrnstrom. "It encourages heroin use, and because there is no system for the safe disposal of used syringes, it threatens to litter our parks, beaches, and neighborhoods with dirty needles."

Posted by lois at 09:54 PM | Comments (0)

Court Dismisses Muntaqim-Hayden Voting Rights Cases:

New York:( From The Sentencing Project)May 4, 2006
Court Dismisses Muntaqim-Hayden Voting Rights Cases:
Concludes Disenfranchisement Law Does Not Violate Section 2 of Voting Rights Act

Both felony disenfranchisement cases, Muntaqim v. Coombe and Hayden v. Pataki, consolidated in February 2005, were dismissed today by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

Muntaqim- Hayden challenged New York’s disenfranchisement law that bars people with felony convictions from voting while they are in prison or on parole. Because Blacks and Latinos are disproportionately arrested and convicted of felonies, the plaintiffs charged that the law dilutes the voting power of Black and Latino communities, and in doing so, violates Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act because of its denial of the right to vote on account of race.

In the first of two decisions, the Second Circuit today dismissed Muntaqim v. Coombe arguing that because Muntaqim was a resident of California before his incarceration and was never eligible to vote nor did he ever vote in New York, he lacks standing and consequently, the court lacks subject matter jurisdiction.

The Court contends:

“Because [Muntaqim’s] inability to vote in New York arises from the fact that he was a resident of California, not because he was a convicted felon subject to the application of New York Election Law
. . . he has suffered no ‘invasion of legally protected interest.’ . . . [A] favorable decision of this Court on his claim that New York Election Law . . . violates the VRA would do nothing to enfranchise him.”
The Second Circuit also dismissed Hayden v. Pataki concluding that “Congress did not intend the Voting Rights Act to cover such [felon disenfranchisement] provisions” and that such an application “would alter the constitutional balance between the States and the Federal Government.”

The decisions can be downloaded from the Decisions section of the Second Circuit’s home page at http://www.ca 2.uscourts.gov/

Posted by lois at 09:51 PM | Comments (0)

May 03, 2006

Community Alternatives to Jail Expansion - New Website

http://www.cajeproject.org/index.html

Community Alternatives to Jail Expansion (CAJE) Project seeks to stop the wide scale expansion of the population incarcerated in the United States in local jails, whose population has increased even as growth in prisons has slowed. As community members, advocates, and elected officials alike are faced with the critical decision of how to deal with the growing number of people in jail, the CAJE Project works to provide real alternatives that can help keep communities safe and strong, while cutting the social and economic costs of jail expansion.
This is an excellent new website created filled with useful and accessible information for organizers and others.

Posted by lois at 09:12 PM | Comments (0)

Juveniles in U.S. prisons win time-served right

SAN FRANCISCO

- Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday, May 3, 2006

A federal appeals court, in a ruling affecting hundreds of youths in federal custody nationwide, said Tuesday that juveniles have the same right as adults to get their sentences reduced by the amount of time they have been locked up since their arrests.

In a case from Arizona, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco overturned a 1999 U.S. Bureau of Prisons policy that refused to give juveniles who are sentenced for federal crimes any credit for presentencing confinement.

As a result of the ruling, the first by any federal appeals court on the issue, the policy will be changed to treat juveniles the same as adults, said Sandy Raynor, spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Phoenix, which represented the Bureau of Prisons. The court oversees federal courts in California, Arizona and seven other Western states.

The ruling affects youths charged with federal crimes committed before age 18. According to the Bureau of Prisons Web site, a majority of juveniles in federal custody are American Indians whose crimes were committed on reservations, subjecting them to federal jurisdiction. Other crimes, such as those involving drugs, guns or gangs, can also be federally prosecuted, but usually are handled by state authorities, said Robert McWhirter, the assistant federal public defender who argued Tuesday's case.

His client, a 17-year-old identified as Jonah R., was arrested in June 2001 for firing a gun from a car that police pulled over on the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Reservation near Phoenix, McWhirter said. After successfully appealing a decision to prosecute him as an adult, Jonah R. was charged and convicted as a juvenile and sentenced to 2 1/2 years in a federal juvenile prison in June 2004.

An adult receiving the same sentence would have been released at that point because he would have been credited with the nearly three years he had been confined before sentencing. But Jonah R. was denied any sentence reduction under the Bureau of Prisons policy and was sent to the juvenile prison, where he is being held. The ruling entitles him to immediate release. The policy was based on a 1998 ruling by a federal judge in the U.S. Virgin Islands, who said juveniles in federal custody were "delinquents'' in "official detention'' and thus were not entitled to sentencing credits available for criminal defendants jailed before their trials.

But the appeals court said Tuesday that the federal system for juvenile offenders, established in the 1930s primarily for rehabilitation, was not intended to be more punitive than the adult system.

"We can think of no sensible reason why Jonah's liberty, which he lost for almost three years before his culpability was adjudicated, is worth less than a similarly situated adult's," Judge William Fletcher said in the 3-0 ruling.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/05/03/BAG2FIJFEE1.DTL

Posted by lois at 06:57 PM | Comments (0)

ACLU Files Lawsuit Against Wis. Officials Alleging Inferior Medical Care for Women in State Prison

May 3, 2006
The American Civil Liberties Union on Monday filed a class-action lawsuit in a U.S. District Court to force Wisconsin officials to correct what it calls a "grossly deficient" medical system for female prisoners at the Taycheedah Correctional Institution in Fond du Lac, Wis., the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports. The suit alleges that the system's mistakes have caused female inmates to commit suicide or experience painful disabilities, as well as exposed them to a highly contagious staph infection.

The institution is a maximum- and medium-security prison that houses more than 700 female inmates (Zahn, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, 5/2). The 49-page lawsuit -- which was filed on behalf of four female Taycheedah prisoners and names top state officials, including Gov. Jim Doyle (D) and state Department of Corrections Secretary Matthew Frank, as defendants -- contends that substandard health care services constitute "cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth and 14th Amendments" of the U.S. Constitution (Antlfinger, AP/Duluth News Tribune, 5/1). The lawsuit also alleges that female inmates at the institution receive substandard gynecological care and pregnant women are required to "remain shackled for most of their labor and to be reshackled immediately after childbirth." In addition, the suit alleges that women receive "far inferior" mental health care services than those provided to male inmates. "These situations are not isolated mistakes," Larry Dupuis, ACLU of Wisconsin's legal director, said, adding, "They are manifestations of a system that has been in crisis for years, and the state has made no meaningful effort to address its underlying problems." Rather than seeking monetary rewards in the suit, ACLU hopes the court will require the state to correct the institution's medical system, according to Dupuis. John Dipko, a spokesperson for the state corrections department, said the agency had not yet reviewed the details of the suit. "However, we have made many strides just in the past six months to a year in the area of health care," Dipko said in a written statement, adding that the agency is seeking accreditation for the facilities, including Taycheedah, from the National Commission on Correctional Health Care. The NCCHC this spring is scheduled to meet with Taycheedah officials to review what is needed to obtain accreditation standards, Dipko said (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 5/1).

Posted by lois at 01:36 PM | Comments (0)

May 02, 2006

Ken Kopczynski : Court Unseals Lawsuit Against Prison Privatiziation

Court unseals lawsuit against prison privatization companies

The Associated Press
Published Monday, May 1, 2006 http://www.theledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060501/APN/605010930

TALLAHASSEE, Fla.
Two private companies are being sued for several million dollars for
overbilling and filing false bills at some of the state's prisons they operate under provisions of the Florida False Claims Act.
Attorney Gregg Goldfarb of Miami is seeking $5 million in recovery in
addition to triple damages and civil penalties from the Nashville,
Tenn.-based Corrections Corporation of America and the publicly traded Boca Raton-based GEO Group on behalf of plaintiff Ken Kopczynski.

C

GEO representative Pablo Paez said he had yet read the lawsuit and could not comment on it. Telephone messages left with representatives of the Corrections Corporation of America were not immediately returned.

The plaintiffs could receive up to 30 percent of any award under
provisions of the state's false claims provisions.

The suit, originally filed in August, was unsealed Friday by Leon County Circuit Court Judge Thomas E. Bateman III.

The state earlier declined to intervene in the suit by Kopczynski, a
private citizen, who filed it pursuant to the statute that allows citizens who believe the state has been falsely billed to help recover the money.

"It's common that when we do decline, we do monitor the case and leave it open for the possibility of intervening in the future," said Bob Sparks, spokesman in the attorney general's office, said Monday. "We're presented with several opportunities with cases like this, but we can't physically intervene in all of them."

An audit last year by the Department of Management Services said the
defunct Correctional Privatization Commission allowed the two for-profit companies to overbill the state by nearly $13 million for what the audit described as "questionable and excessive" costs.

Legislature voted two years ago to abolish the commission and let DMS
oversee the private contracts.

Posted by lois at 05:35 PM | Comments (0)

Louisiana Juvenile Justice System dismissed from federal oversight

Press Release from the LA Gov's office... __________________________
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
MONDAY, MAY 1, 2006
www.gov.state.la.us

Former Critics Credit Reforms, Hail System for Creating Potential "National Model"

BATON ROUGE, La. - A U.S. district judge today dismissed a 1998 federal lawsuit against Louisiana's juvenile justice system, citing substantial improvements in youth safety and treatment, as well as significant progress toward implementing a milestone statewide reform strategy for the way the state treats its troubled youth.

U.S. District Judge James Brady granted a motion from all parties to dismiss the eight-year-old lawsuit, which became part of litigation that had been ongoing for 35 years. He cited a reduction in the youth population in secure facilities, fewer incidents of youth violence in facilities, increased investigative resources to ferret out violence, more effective behavioral health and rehabilitation services, and comprehensive behavior management programs, including a specialized program for sex offenders.

The motion also hailed the state's new juvenile justice reform plan as an emerging national model. "As it has moved away from a correctional-based approach, the state has developed an innovative and unique model to care for youth in secure care: the Louisiana Model (LAMOD). To develop LAMOD, the state worked in collaboration with the Missouri Youth Services Institute and the Annie E. Casey Foundation. The program is not yet implemented throughout the system, but once it is the State of Louisiana stands to become a national model in the care of youth in secure care."

"When I took office more than 2 years ago, I set out to reform Louisiana's broken juvenile justice system to ensure that it was a system designed to rehabilitate youth not a system designed to feed our adult prisons," said Governor Blanco. "We want to keep kids in our classrooms and out of trouble. But for those who come to our juvenile system, we need to provide them with the best treatment possible so that they leave us well prepared to make good
decisions -- respectful decisions -- as they return to our communities. We
believe that the best way to ensure public safety is to provide rigorous programs and treatment to our youth."

Office of Youth Development head, Simon Gonsoulin said the continued support of the Governor, dedicated and hard working OYD staffers and determined partners will help ensure that a reformed juvenile justice system becomes a reality.

"As a state we must give these young people the promise of a brighter future, we must tell them there are communities, families and partners working for them in a united and directed manner. We have to say to them that they are valued. We must provide them with a safe environment to learn, and we must ensure that they will prosper," Gonsoulin said after the hearing.

Louisiana was one of 22 jurisdictions nationwide with juvenile justice systems under federal supervision. In the Louisiana case, the U. S. Department of Justice and the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana alleged that the state failed to provide reasonably safe conditions and adequate educational, medical, dental, mental health, and rehabilitative services.

The lawsuit focused on four facilities: Jetson Center for Youth near Baton Rouge, Swanson Center for Youth in Monroe, Bridge City Center for Youth near New Orleans and Swanson Correctional Center for Youth in Tallulah. The educational claims were dismissed in 2003. Claims against Bridge City and Tallulah, which is no longer a juvenile facility, were dismissed in 2004.

"We want to congratulate the Governor and her people for all their work and a job well done," said JJPL executive director David Utter. "We all recognize that the dismissal of the lawsuit marks a landmark step in the continuing reform process and frees the Office of Youth Development, advocates and families to work in partnership to deepen the reforms the Governor started with the Annie E. Casey Foundation, improve programs for our children and communities and work to turn the Louisiana system from worst to first."

"This is an important achievement for the Governor. She made juvenile justice reform a priority, recognizing that treating young people differently than adults and providing opportunities to rehabilitate increases public safety, and saves us money in the long run," said Utter.

Louisiana's progress toward a more community-based, treatment-centered approach accelerated in 2003 when the Legislature passed Act 1225 of the 2003 Regular Session to systematically restructure the juvenile justice system in Louisiana. In one of her first actions as Governor, Blanco separated juvenile services from adult corrections, making the Office of Youth Development an independent agency. This change underscored the commitment and energy of reforming juvenile justice in Louisiana from a corrections model to one that is centered on the treatment and rehabilitation of youth.

The state's commitment to reform attracted national partners in the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the Missouri Division of Youth Services, which is considered the leading system in the country.

In 2004, Louisiana began working with the Casey Foundation and Mark Steward, then director of Missouri's DYS, to develop Louisiana's Model for Juvenile Justice. Most notably, the model features a more homelike environment in secure facilities; group processes led by new staff called YouthCare workers; dorm sizes of 10-12 youth (down from an average of 37 in 1997); a focus on a therapeutic, child-centered environment versus a correctional, custodial model; and an emphasis on relationship-building that affords youth the opportunity to belong and contribute, make meaningful choices, develop transferable skills and mentor peers. The state introduced its reform pilot at Bridge City in July 2005.

The state released a five-year strategic plan in December that outlines specific reform objectives and measurements. Designed to reduce recidivism and improve the overall effectiveness of the system, the reform emphasizes the development of and funding for community-based programs, community and family involvement, regional placement of youth so they can stay closer to their homes and families, public and youth safety, development of a continuum of care at the local level and tracking and measurement of progress.
The plan was developed with significant public input, including 10 public meetings throughout the state last summer. More than 1,600 community members participated.

Louisiana now has about 406 youth in four secure juvenile facilities. For more information about Louisiana's juvenile justice system, visit the OYD website at www.oyd.louisiana.gov.

Posted by lois at 05:31 PM | Comments (0)

Policy makers forget recent history in new war on immigrants

ttp://www.timberjay.com/current.php?article=2285

Tuesday, May 02, 2001906 Volume 17, Issue 17
By Marshall Helmberger

Sometimes it seems that America¹s policymakers never learn. For more than 20 years, this country has engaged in a so-called war on drugs that has focused almost exclusively, and unsuccessfully, on the supply side, without addressing the reasons behind the growing demand for drugs in the U.S. Now, our policymakers want to apply this same failed model to the issue of illegal immigration.

Just think about this. Over the past two decades, the U.S. has poured hundreds of billions of dollars attempting to enforce drug laws that apply stiff criminal penalities to illicit traffickers. The primary effect of those efforts has been to swell the U.S. prison population, from about 350,000 in 1973 to more than 2.1 million today. Every year, our nation pours more than $7 billion into building new prisons and more than $35 billion into housing our massive prison population. Our drug laws are so Draconian that we now imprison almost 750 Americans for every 100,000 population. That¹s about 25 percent of the entire world¹s prison population, and it¹s despite the fact that the U.S. is home to just five percent of the world¹s population.

h
And the end result of this unprecedented effort to crack down on illicit drugs? According to the Drug Enforcement Administration, the use, the purity and availability of cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin, and other illegal drugs is as high as its ever been.

The war on drugs, by any measure, has been a failure. Waging a similar war on immigrants will be no different. It will result in greater prison populations, greater human suffering, greater expense, and little if any decline in the flow of illegal immigrants.

Just as our drug war has failed because we refuse to address the demand side of the problem, our war on immigrants will meet a similar fate if we do not honestly address the reasons that so many illegals head north. While U.S. policymakers touted NAFTA as a way to help stem the tide of illegal immigrants from Mexico, its passage in 1993 had exactly the opposite effect. According the Pew Hispanic Center, the flow of illegal immigrants from Mexico, which had actually been declining in the early 1990s, surged 61 percent in the wake of NAFTA.

While there are a number of factors behind that surge, one of the most significant is the breakdown in the rural Mexican farm economy caused by cheap, susidized U.S. farm products, which suddenly flooded the Mexican market as a result of NAFTA. The trade pact forced an estimated 1.7 million Mexican farmers off the land as they could not possibly compete against the Cargills of the world.

The devastation to Mexico¹s rural economy was cited as a major concern by US Catholic Bishops last year in responding to legislation to extend similar trade provisions to Central America. The so-called CAFTA agreement was narrowly approved in Congress last year, to predictions that it would further add to the stream of poor Hispanics looking for an alternative to grinding poverty.

What these people seek is an opportunity to better their lives and the lives of their families. In many cases, its a matter of basic survival.

To think that we can isolate ourselves from the reality of Third World poverty on our doorstep through the building of walls and prisons is an illusion. Criminalization has failed in the war on drugs and it will fail in our new, unfortunate war on immigrants. As long as our trade policies work against the interests of average workers in Latin America, immigrants will continue to find their way here. The question is, do we find a way to make room for them and reap the rewards to our economy, or do we punish them for hoping for a better life in America?

Posted by lois at 10:36 AM | Comments (0)

NY immigrants rally for rights

New York Daily News - http://www.nydailynews.com

This story was reported by DORIAN BLOCH, NANCY DILLON, ERIN EINHORN, AUSTIN FENNER, LISA MUÑOZ, JESS WISLOSKI,JOTHAM SEDERSTROM and WARREN WOODBERRY JR.
It was written by CORKY SIEMASZKO
Tuesday, May 2nd, 2006

It was a day without Mexicans - and Jamaicans, Chinese and Irish, too - as tens of thousands of undocumented New Yorkers skipped work, boycotted stores and pulled their kids out of school yesterday as they marched in a massive show of strength.

The huddled masses who toil in kitchens, clean offices, remove asbestos, work in car washes - many living in fear of deportation - took to the streets on May Day to show the city what life would be like without them.

"I walked over the border from Tijuana all alone with no documents and I want my kids to see the power of solidarity," said Teodoro Lucero, 39, of Brooklyn, as he proudly marched down Broadway with his three young sons.

"When they get older, they will be able to say they were part of this."

After massing in immigrant neighborhoods around the city, marchers waving the flags of their homelands and the U.S., converged in Union Square for a rally that overtook the area, then slowly made their way downtown to Foley Square.

Similar demonstrations were staged all over the country, drawing millions.

But the most-poignant voices of protest belonged to the kids who have one foot in the U.S., the other in their homelands.

Brooklyn-born Yeslie Maldonado said her Mexican parents wanted her to stay in school yesterday. "I had to put up a fight with my parents to come, but they realized that this is important," said Yeslie, 14. "Immigrants are the heart of New York."

Education Department reported that 79% of students citywide showed up for school, down from 86% last Monday. And attendance was even lower in high schools, where 68% of kids were in class.

Plans for a nationwide "Day Without Immigrants" protest began germinating on Dec. 16 after the House passed a bill that would turn more than 11 million illegal immigrants into felons.

In New York, at exactly 12:16p.m., thousands linked hands across all five boroughs and peacefully vented their anger.

"We're only coming here to cook and clean, we're not criminals," said Maria Tenesaca, 44, an Ecuadoran immigrant who rallied in Battery Park with the Statue of Liberty as a backdrop.

Hundreds of neighborhood businesses - from Washington Heights to Port Richmond, S.I., to Hempstead, L.I. - shuttered their doors in support of the protest. Many marchers skipped work, risking firing.

"Not even half of the drivers came to work," said dispatcher Nelson Ramirez at the Audubon Car Service in Inwood.

Many businesses posted handwritten signs on their doors.

"Closed Today. We are Latinos," read one at La Fonda Boricua, a restaurant on E. 106th St. in East Harlem.

In Chinatown, rumors of a crackdown from immigration agents sabotaged a planned protest, and instead of the expected thousands just hundreds turned out and very few stores closed.

In the Bronx, thousands clogged busy Fordham Road at lunch hour and chanted, "Si, se puede [Yes, we can]."

Short-order cooks wearing grease-spattered aprons and schoolchildren in uniforms joined hands to form a human chain several blocks long.

"This is an immigrant country," said Ibelisse Espinosa, 36, a Bronx mom from the Dominican Republic. "The people who came here illegally should have the same rights as me."

In the Colombian enclave of Jackson Heights, Queens, thousands rallied on 37th Ave., waving flags and chanting, "We are here, we won't go back!"

But Edison Acosta, owner of Sazon y Sabor sandwich shop on 37th Ave., was miffed when most of his staff took the day off. "I had no people to work with," he said.

Several doors away, Jose Moreno, owner of Eldorado Perfumes, cheered the demonstrators from his empty store. "It's all right," he said. "I don't mind because I am an immigrant, too."

City Controller William Thompson said the protest's impact on New York was "more symbolic than economically destructive," even as hundreds of businesses closed in solidarity - or because of a lack of manpower.

Support for the protesters was generally strong - even among established New Yorkers.

"This country is based on immigrants - Irish, Italians - they have a right to fight," said Sal Gambino, 23, who works at G&G Meat Market and Grocery on Fifth Ave. "These people are the backbone of this country."

But in Harlem, construction foreman Keith Collins reflected the mixed feelings of some.

"Their loyalty is not to the United States financially," said Collins, 46, of Queens. "On the other side, nobody's going to do the work that they do ... without health benefits."

Here are some of the stories of those who marched yesterday:

'We choose democracy'

Tjouned (Titi) Titikpina was a thriving fashion designer with two dozen people working for him back home in the West African nation of Togo. Seven years ago, he followed his dream to make it big in America and never looked back.

With no papers, he still managed to open his own tailoring store on Jerome Ave. in the Bronx, where he creates elaborate African suits and dresses.

"When you want to do something, you better go for it," says Titikpina, 38, who speaks nine languages.

But anyone looking for a kente cloth wedding dress yesterday had to wait for another day because Titikpina closed shop to attend the rally.

"We are human beings. We choose love, we choose democracy," he says. "We are hardworking."

Austin Fenner

'I'm here to represent mom, dad'

Oscar Vargas, 10, was born in the U.S., but yesterday he showed up on behalf of his Mexican immigrant parents.

"When I hear people say illegal immigrant, I feel like an alien, like from Mars," he said. "Like some people always call me Taco Boy. I always say, 'What's wrong with tacos. They're pretty good.' "

Oscar's parents couldn't join the demonstration because they feared they'd lose their jobs. So he came with a neighbor.

"My dad wanted me to protest and my mom, too," he said. "So I came here to kind of represent them."

Oscar said he fears for his future. "You know how the Statue of Liberty is supposed to represent freedom?" he said. "Well, it doesn't anymore."

Lisa Muñoz

'I love the United States'

Michelle Lim, 33, of Brooklyn, didn't know about the protest yesterday until she happened upon it in Chinatown.

"I wanted to be part of it. I wanted to give something," she said.

She put on a white T-shirt that read "Stand Up for Immigrants" that organizers were distributing and marched down a crowded East Broadway under the Manhattan Bridge. Lim came to New York seven years ago, fleeing oppression of ethnic Chinese in her native Indonesia.

"I went to Taiwan, but Taiwan didn't accept me, so I came to New York," she said. "I want to stay. I love the United States."

Erin Einhorn

'I lost my job to be here today'

Silvya Garcia didn't expect that joining fellow immigrants in Brooklyn would cost her a job, but it did.

Garcia, 32, and five co-workers, all Mexican immigrants, got the heave-ho yesterday after asking their boss at a midtown cafe for the afternoon off.

When he said no, Garcia and her co-workers walked out. And as a result she lost her $9-an-hour cashier job of two years. "I lost my job to be here today," read a poster she held yesterday on Fifth Ave. in Sunset Park.

Jotham Sederstrom

'I'm a hard worker'

Enrique Melendez risked his job at a Brooklyn bodega to attend yesterday's rally. "My boss didn't know. I called him and said I'm not coming to work today. He wasn't happy. I might be without a job tomorrow," Melendez, 45, said. "But I really don't care because I believe I had to be here."

Melendez, who is from the Dominican Republic, entered the U.S. illegally in 1995, crossing the border in Arizona on foot with hardly any money.

He now works long weeks at a bodega on Myrtle Ave., and sends $400 every month for his wife, five children and ailing mother back home in Santiago.

"We're here in a common struggle," he said. "If I lose my job, I'll find another job. I'm a hard worker."

Posted by lois at 09:20 AM | Comments (0)

On the Streets of NY, Solidarity Reigns

On streets of New York,
solidarity reigns,
by Juan Gonzales, NY Daily News

All you had to do was take one look down normally bustling St. Nicholas Ave. in Washington Heights yesterday afternoon to sense an astonishing event was underway.

Around 12:30 p.m., Luis Carillo and Abimael Classen stood in front of their shuttered Chavin Hardware store near the corner of W. 178th St.

"We're closed to support the immigrant protest," Carillo said, his arms folded serenely under a brilliant sun.

Carillo came here from Peru more than 35 years ago, and has long since become a citizen. He realized his American Dream. Now, it was time to take a stand for those less fortunate, he said.

Virtually every store owner along St. Nicholas made the same decision, even if that meant turning away a few almighty dollars for one day.

The Capri Restaurant on the corner. The Los Primos Fruit Store. The big Bravo Supermarket down the street. The Happy Land Chinese Restaurant.

All were closed yesterday, some for a few hours, most for the entire day.

Over on Broadway, it was the same story.

Yasmin's Fashion Store. Torres Bakery. Casa Linda Upholstery. Columbia Pharmacy. Angel Shoes. Fort Washington Hardware. Aztek Records. Santa Ana Botanica. Quisqueya Grocery. Fernandez Check Cashing.

All closed.

By the end of the day, thousands of immigrant-owned businesses all over America had pulled off perhaps the biggest one-day boycott this country has ever seen.

Even huge corporations like Tyson Foods and Cargill's reluctantly closed their factories so their largely immigrant workers could join - of all things - a national May Day demonstration for the legalization of millions of undocumented workers.

And once again those immigrant workers, both legal and illegal, poured into the streets of downtown Manhattan and scores of other cities and towns, their children and baby carriages in tow - in numbers too breathtaking for anyone to ignore.

"No one knows the pain we feel," said Miguel Baez, who came here illegally from Mexico five years ago and works as a bartender in Manhattan.

"We need these jobs to survive," he said. "But we can't visit our families back home for years for fear we'll get caught coming back."

It is that endless agony of living in the shadows that has driven so many to join these massive protests.

They march even though they risk being fired or being detained and deported by immigration authorities.

They boycotted schools and jobs and shut down stores yesterday even though Catholic Church officials and union leaders and politicians who support their cause urged them to ignore the call for May Day protests.

They took to the streets even though the pundits and the so-called experts in Washington warned of a political backlash from middle-class America.

Some have even tried to pit black Americans against the undocumented. But key African-American leaders like the Revs. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton and Transport Workers Union chief Roger Toussaint all attacked those divisive tactics at yesterday's Union Square rally.

"You can't talk about globalized capital and exporting jobs and not talk about global human and labor rights for immigrant workers," Jackson said. "Immigrants aren't sending good jobs overseas, corporations are."

Time and again this new immigrant movement has taken the politicians, the church and labor leaders by surprise with its discipline and its fury.

The experts, you see, are missing the point.

This movement is already a backlash - against decades of anti-immigrant scapegoating and hysteria in Washington. Congress ignores this cry for recognition at our country's peril.

Originally published on May 2, 200

Posted by lois at 09:15 AM | Comments (0)

May 01, 2006

50 state map of mental health care available in prisons

Frontline Map: link to map: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/asylums/etc/map.html

A map of the most recent information available on mental health care for all 50 state adult prison systems. Click on each state to find: the percentage of inmates diagnosed as mentally ill; an assessment of whether there is an adequate number of staff for mental health care; and details on the kinds of mental health training, if any, that correctional officers are required to receive. There is also contact information for each state's Department of Corrections.

Posted by lois at 11:42 PM | Comments (0)

John Kenneth Galbraith, 97, Dies; Economist Held a Mirror to Society

April 30, 2006

By HOLCOMB B. NOBLE and DOUGLAS MARTIN

John Kenneth Galbraith, the iconoclastic economist, teacher and diplomat and an unapologetically liberal member of the political and academic establishment he often needled in prolific writings for more than half a century, died Saturday at a hospital in Cambridge, Mass. He was 97.

Mr. Galbraith lived in Cambridge and at an "unfarmed farm" near Newfane, Vt. His death was confirmed by his son J. Alan Galbraith.

Mr. Galbraith was one of the most widely read authors in the history of economics; among his 33 books was "The Affluent Society" (1958), one of those rare works that forces a nation to re-examine its values. He wrote fluidly, even on complex topics, and many of his compelling phrases — among them "the affluent society," "conventional wisdom" and "countervailing power" — became part of the language.

An imposing presence, lanky and angular at 6 feet 8 inches tall, Mr. Galbraith was consulted frequently by national leaders, and he gave advice freely, though it may have been ignored as often as it was taken. Mr. Galbraith clearly preferred taking issue with the conventional wisdom he distrusted.

He strived to change the very texture of the national conversation about power and its nature in the modern world by explaining how the planning of giant corporations superseded market mechanisms. His sweeping ideas, which might have gained even greater traction had he developed disciples willing and able to prove them with mathematical models, came to strike some as almost quaint in today's harsh, interconnected world where corporations devour one another for breakfast.

"The distinctiveness of his contribution appears to be slipping from view," Stephen P. Dunn wrote in The Journal of Post-Keynesian Economics in 2002.

Mr. Galbraith, a revered lecturer for generations of Harvard students, nonetheless always commanded attention.

Robert Lekachman, a liberal economist who shared many of Mr. Galbraith's views on an affluent society they both thought not generous enough to its poor nor sufficiently attendant to its public needs, once described the quality of his discourse as "witty, supple, eloquent, and edged with that sheen of malice which the fallen sons of Adam always find attractive when it is directed at targets other than themselves."

From the 1930's to the 1990's Mr. Galbraith helped define the terms of the national political debate, influencing both the direction of the Democratic Party and the thinking of its leaders.

He tutored Adlai E. Stevenson, the Democratic nominee for president in 1952 and 1956, on Keynesian economics. He advised President John F. Kennedy (often over lobster stew at the Locke-Ober restaurant in their beloved Boston) and served as his ambassador to India.

Though he eventually broke with President Lyndon B. Johnson over the war in Vietnam, he helped conceive of Mr. Johnson's Great Society program and wrote a major presidential address that outlined its purposes. In 1968, pursuing his opposition to the war, he helped Senator Eugene J. McCarthy seek the Democratic nomination for president.

In the course of his long career, he undertook a number of government assignments, including the organization of price controls in World War II and speechwriting for Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt, Kennedy and Johnson.

He drew on his experiences in government to write three satirical novels. One in 1968, "The Triumph," a best seller, was an assault on the State Department's slapstick efforts to assist a mythical banana republic, Puerto Santos. In 1990, he took on the Harvard economics department with "A Tenured Professor," ridiculing, among others, a certain outspoken character who bore no small resemblance to himself.

At his death, Mr. Galbraith was the Paul M. Warburg emeritus professor of economics at Harvard, where he had taught for most of his career. A popular lecturer, he treated economics as an aspect of society and culture rather than as an arcane discipline of numbers.

A Polarizing Figure

Mr. Galbraith was admired, envied and sometimes scorned for his eloquence and wit and his ability to make complicated, dry issues understandable to any educated reader. He enjoyed his international reputation as a slayer of sacred cows and a maverick among economists whose pronouncements became known as "classic Galbraithian heresies."

But other economists, even many of his fellow liberals, did not generally share his views on production and consumption, and he was not regarded by his peers as among the top-ranked theorists and scholars. Such criticism did not sit well with Mr. Galbraith, a man no one ever called modest, and he would respond that his critics had rightly recognized that his ideas were "deeply subversive of the established orthodoxy."

"As a matter of vested interest, if not of truth," he added, "they were compelled to resist."

Nearly 40 years after writing "The Affluent Society," Mr. Galbraith updated it in 1996 as "The Good Society." In it, he said his earlier concerns had only worsened: that if anything, America had become even more a "democracy of the fortunate."

Mr. Galbraith gave broad thought to how America changed from a nation of small farms and workshops to one of big factories and superstores, and judgments of this legacy are as broad as his ambition. Beginning with "American Capitalism" in 1952, he laid out a detailed critique of what he saw as an increasingly oligopolistic economy. Combined with works in the 1950's by writers like David Reisman, Vance Packard and William H. Whyte, the book changed people's views of the postwar world.

Mr. Galbraith argued that technology mandated long-term contracts to diminish high-stakes uncertainty. He said companies used advertising to induce consumers to buy things they had never dreamed they needed.

Other economists, like Gary S. Becker and George J. Stigler, both Nobel Prize winners, countered with proofs showing that advertising is essentially informative rather than manipulative.

Some suggested that Mr. Galbraith's liberalism crippled his influence. In a review of "John Kenneth Galbraith: His Life, His Politics, His Economics" by Richard Parker (Farrar, 2005), J. Bradford DeLong wrote in Foreign Affairs that Mr. Galbraith's lifelong sermon of social democracy was destined to fail in a land of "rugged individualism." He compared Mr. Galbraith to Sisyphus, endlessly pushing the same rock up a hill that always turns out to be too steep.

Amartya Sen, a Nobel Prize-winning economist, maintains that Mr. Galbraith not only reached but also defined the summit of his field. In the 2000 commencement address at Harvard, Mr. Parker's book recounts, Mr. Sen said the influence of "The Affluent Society," was so pervasive that its many piercing insights were taken for granted.

"It's like reading 'Hamlet' and deciding it's full of quotations," he said.

Born on a Farm

John Kenneth Galbraith was born Oct. 15, 1908, on a 150-acre farm in Dunwich Township in southern Ontario, Canada, the only son of William Archibald and Catherine Kendall Galbraith. His forebears had left Scotland years before.

His father was a farmer and schoolteacher, the head of a farm-cooperative insurance company, an organizer of the township telephone company, and a town and county auditor. His mother, whom he described as beautiful and decidedly firm, died when he was 14.

Mr. Galbraith said he inherited his liberalism, his interest in politics and his wit from his father. When he was about 8, he once recalled, he would join his father at political rallies. At one event, he wrote in his 1964 memoir "The Scotch," his father mounted a large pile of manure to address the crowd.

"He apologized with ill-concealed sincerity for speaking from the Tory platform," Mr. Galbraith related. "The effect on this agrarian audience was electric. Afterward I congratulated him on the brilliance of the sally. He said, 'It was good but it didn't change any votes.' "

At age 18 he enrolled at Ontario Agricultural College, where he took practical farming courses like poultry husbandry and basic plumbing. But as the Depression dragged down Canadian farmers, the questions of how farm products were sold and at what prices became more urgent to him than how they were produced. He completed his undergraduate work at the University of Toronto and enrolled at the University of California, Berkeley, where he received a master's degree in 1933 and a doctorate in agricultural economics in 1934.

A major influence on him was the caustic social commentary he found in Veblen's "Theory of the Leisure Class." Mr. Galbraith called Veblen one of American history's most astute social scientists, but also acknowledged that he tended to be overcritical.

"I've thought to resist this tendency," Mr. Galbraith said, "but in other respects Veblen's influence on me has lasted long. One of my greatest pleasures in my writing has come from the thought that perhaps my work might annoy someone of comfortably pretentious position. Then comes the realization that such people rarely read."

While at Berkeley, he began contributing to The Journal of Farm Economics and other publications. His writings came to the attention of Harvard, where he became an instructor and tutor from 1934 to 1939.

In those years the theories of John Maynard Keynes were exciting economists everywhere because they promised solutions to the most urgent problems of the time: the Depression and unemployment. The government must intervene in moments of crisis, Keynes maintained, and unbalance the budget if necessary to get the nation's economic machinery running again.

Keynesianism gave economic validation to what President Roosevelt was doing, Mr. Galbraith thought, and he resolved in 1937 "to go to the temple" — Cambridge University — on a fellowship grant for a year of study with the disciples of Keynes.

In 1937 Mr. Galbraith married Catherine Merriam Atwater, the daughter of a prominent New York lawyer, whom he met when she was a graduate student at Radcliffe.

In addition to his wife and his son J. Alan, of Washington, a lawyer, he is survived by Peter, a former United States ambassador to Croatia and a senior fellow at the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation in Washington, and James, an economist at the University of Texas; a sister, Catherine Denholm of Toronto; and six grandchildren.

The War Years

Mr. Galbraith became an American citizen, and taught economics at Princeton in 1939. But after the fall of France in 1940, Mr. Galbraith joined the Roosevelt administration to help manage an economy being prepared for war. He rose to become the administrator of wage and price controls in the Office of Price Administration. Prices remained stable, unlike in earlier wars, but he grew controversial, drawing the constant fire of industry complaints. "I reached the point that all price fixers reach," he said, "My enemies outnumbered my friends."

He was forced to resign in 1943 and was rejected by the Army as too tall when he sought to enlist. He then held a variety of government and private jobs, including director of the United States Strategic Bombing Survey in 1945, director of the Office of Economic Security Policy in the State Department in 1946 and a member of the board of editors of Fortune magazine, from 1943 to 1948. It was at Fortune, he said, that he became addicted to writing.

In 1949 he returned to Harvard as a professor of economics; his lectures were delivered before standing-room-only audiences. And he began to write with intensity.

He completed two books in 1952, "American Capitalism: The Concept of Countervailing Power" and "A Theory of Price Control." In "American Capitalism," he set out to debunk myths about the free market economy and explore concentrations of economic power. He described the pressures that corporations and unions exerted on each other for increased profits and increased wages, and said these countervailing forces kept those giant groups in equilibrium and the nation's economy prosperous and stable.

In his 1981 memoirs, he said that though the basic idea was still sound, he had been "a bit carried away" by his notion of countervailing power. "I made it far more inevitable and rather more equalizing than, in practice, it ever is," he wrote.

He summarized the lessons of his days at the Office of Price Administration in "A Theory of Price Control," later calling it the best book he ever wrote. He said: "The only difficulty is that five people read it. Maybe 10. I made up my mind that I would never again place myself at the mercy of the technical economists who had the enormous power to ignore what I had written. I set out to involve a larger community."

He wrote two more major books in the 1950's dealing with economics, both aimed at a large general audience. Both were best sellers.

In "The Great Crash 1929," he recalled the mistakes of an earlier day and suggested that some were being repeated as the book appeared, in 1955. Mr. Galbraith testified at a Senate hearing and said that another crash was inevitable. The stock market dropped sharply that day, and he was widely blamed.

"The Affluent Society" appeared in 1958, making Mr. Galbraith known around the world. In it, he depicted a consumer culture gone wild, rich in goods but poor in the social services that make for community. He argued that America had become so obsessed with overproducing consumer goods that it had increased the perils of both inflation and recession by creating an artificial demand for frivolous or useless products, by encouraging overextension of consumer credit and by emphasizing the private sector at the expense of the public sector.

Anticipating the environmental movement by nearly a decade, he asked, "Is the added production or the added efficiency in production worth its effect on ambient air, water and space — the countryside?"" Mr. Galbraith called for a change in values that would shun the seductions of advertising and champion clean air, good housing and aid for the arts.

Later, in "The New Industrial State" (1967), he tried to trace the shift of power from the landed aristocracy through the great industrialists to the technical and managerial experts of modern corporations. He called for a new class of intellectuals and professionals to determine policy. While critics, as usual, praised his ability to write compellingly, they also continued to complain that he oversimplified economic matters and either ignored or failed to keep up with corporate changes.

One of his early readers was Adlai Stevenson, the governor of Illinois, who twice ran unsuccessfully for president against Dwight D. Eisenhower. Mr. Galbraith often wrote to Mr. Stevenson, introducing him to Keynesian taxation and unemployment policies. In 1953, Mr. Galbraith and Thomas K. Finletter, the former secretary of the Air Force and later ambassador to NATO, formed a sort of brain trust for Mr. Stevenson that included Ambassador W. Averell Harriman, the historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. and the foreign policy specialist George W. Ball.

Although Mr. Galbraith did not at first regard Kennedy, a former student of his at Harvard, as a serious member of Congress, he began to change his view when Kennedy was elected to the Senate in 1952 and began calling him for advice. The senator's conversations became increasingly wide-ranging and well informed, Mr. Galbraith said, and his respect and affection grew.

After Mr. Kennedy won the presidency in 1960, he appointed Mr. Galbraith as United States ambassador to India. There were those, Mr. Galbraith among them, who believed that the president had done this to get a potential loose cannon out of Washington.

He said in his memoirs: "Kennedy, I always believed, was pleased to have me in his administration, but at a suitable distance such as in India." Mr. Galbraith was fascinated with India; he had spent a year there in 1956 advising its government and was eager to return.

He spent 27 months as ambassador, clashed with the State Department and was more favorably regarded as a diplomat by those outside the government. He fought for increased American military and economic aid for India and acted as a sort of informal adviser to the Indian government on economic policy. Known by his staff as the Great Mogul, he achieved an excellent rapport with Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and other senior officials in the Indian government.

When India became embroiled in a border war with China in the Himalayas in 1962, Ambassador Galbraith effectively took charge of both the American military and diplomatic response during what was a brief but potentially explosive crisis. He saw to it that India received restrained American help and took it on himself to announce that the United States recognized India's disputed northern borders.

The reason he had so much control over the American response, he said, was that the border fighting occurred during the far more consequential Cuban missile crisis, and no one at the highest levels at the White House, State Department or Pentagon was readily responding to his cables.

In 1968, Mr. Galbraith published "Indian Painting: The Scenes, Themes and Legends," which he wrote with Mohinder Singh Randhawa. An avid champion of Indian art, he donated much of his collection to the Harvard University Art Museums.

Falling Out With Johnson

After Kennedy was assassinated, Mr. Galbraith served as an adviser to President Johnson, meeting with him often at the White House or on trips to the president's ranch in Texas to talk about what could be accomplished with the Great Society programs. Mr. Galbraith said that Johnson had summoned him to write the final draft of his speech outlining the purposes of the Great Society, and that when the writing was done, said, "I'm not going to change a word. That's great."

The relationship between the two men soon broke apart over their differences over the war in Vietnam. Nevertheless, when Adlai Stevenson died in 1965, the ambassadorship to the United Nations became vacant, and word reached Mr. Galbraith that the president was considering him as Mr. Stevenson's successor.

Not wanting to be placed in the position of having to defend administration positions he was strongly against, Mr. Galbraith suggested Justice Arthur J. Goldberg of the Supreme Court. The president named Mr. Goldberg, and Mr. Galbraith later blamed himself for a mistake that "cost the court a good and liberal jurist." Others said he took too much credit for what happened.

In 1973 he published "Economics and the Public Purpose," in which he sought to extend the planning system already used by the industrial core of the economy to the market economy, to small-business owners and to entrepreneurs. Mr. Galbraith called for a "new socialism," with more steeply progressive taxes; public support of the arts; public ownership of housing, medical and transportation facilities; and the conversion of some corporations and military contractors into public corporations.

He continued to pour out magazine articles, book reviews, op-ed essays and letters to editors; he lectured everywhere, sometimes debating William F. Buckley Jr., his friend and Gstaad skiing partner.

In 1977 he wrote and narrated "The Age of Uncertainty," a 13-part television series surveying 200 years of economic theory and practice. In 1990 he wrote "A Tenured Professor," about a Harvard professor who devised a computer-assisted system for playing the stock market and used his billions in profits on programs for education and peace — only to be investigated by Congress for un-American activities and forced to shut down his operations.

In 1996, as Mr. Galbraith approached his 90th year, he wrote "The Good Society." He contended that Republicans out to roll back the welfare state made a fundamental error in thinking that politicians and their actions drive history. Liberals did not create big government; history did, he argued.

Mr. Galbraith, who received the Medal of Freedom from President Bill Clinton in 2000, continued to make his views known. Some were surprising, like his speech in 1999 praising Johnson's presidency, which he had helped to bring down by working with the 1968 McCarthy campaign.

In 2004, Mr. Galbraith, who was then 95, published "The Economics of Innocent Fraud," a short book that questioned much of standard economic wisdom.

He remained optimistic about the ability of government to improve the lot of the less fortunate. "Let there be a coalition of the concerned," he urged. "The affluent would still be affluent, the comfortable still comfortable, but the poor would be part of the political system."

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Posted by lois at 05:30 PM | Comments (0)

Treatment No Panacea for Nation's Drug Problems, Researchers Say

Treatment No Panacea for Nation's Drug Problems, Researchers Say
April 28, 2006

http://www.jointogether.org/news/headlines/features/2006/treatment-no-panacea-for.html
By Bob Curley

"We can't arrest our way out of our drug problems" has become a familiar mantra in recent years among advocates for more spending on addiction treatment and prevention, including some progressive law-enforcement officials. In a new report, however, noted drug-policy researcher Peter Reuter and colleague Harold Pollack offer a sobering counterpoint: the U.S. can't just treat its way to a drug-free society, either.

"Even with a well-funded treatment sector, a nation will still face chronic problems of disease, addiction, crime and disorder associated with illicit drugs," wrote Reuter and Pollack in the March 2006 issue of the journal Addiction.

"There does seem to be a population prevalence of the disease [of addiction], similar to population prevalence of other diseases. Treatment alone does not make that prevalence disappear," agreed David Rosenbloom, director of Join Together. "Since we have never had a comprehensive treatment strategy in the country, we don't know what the population prevalence really is."

Reuter, director of the program on economics of crime and justice policy at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy, and Pollack, an associated professor at the University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration, are quick to note that "the argument for treatment expansion is strong." Reuter told Join Together that although the risk exists that someone outside the addiction field might conclude from the paper that treatment doesn't work, "a little skepticism for the faithful is just fine."

Broad But Limited Effect

Not only can addiction treatment reduce individual drug use, crime, and incarceration costs, Reuter and Pollack say, but there is evidence that treating dealers who also are addicts may also reduce drug supply. "If broad treatment provision appreciably shrinks the pool of users willing to work in the drug trade, it is possible that treatment can have substantial supply-side side-effects, without the larger personal and social costs that come with incarcerating nonviolent drug offenders," write Reuter and Pollack.

However, research from several countries that -- unlike the U.S. -- have offered treatment more-or-less on demand has shown that treatment alone cannot solve the problems of addiction to drugs like heroin or cocaine. "No democratic nation with a major opiate problem has managed to cut the number of regular users sharply within a decade, even when a large proportion of the eligible individuals are served by treatment services," the paper notes.

In the 1990s, for instance, the Netherlands provided treatment to about 50 percent of its heroin-dependent population, but failed to put a dent in the number of heroin users, a 2001 study found. Reuter and Pollack note that the stubbornly high number of Dutch heroin users could not be explained by new users taking the place of those who quit using the drug. Rather, they said, many treatment clients simply continued to use heroin, albeit often at a reduced rate.

"Treatment is generally acknowledged to be useful, frail, and incomplete," the authors wrote. "Viewed at the population level, treatment is cost-effective and perhaps cost-saving. Viewed at the client level, treatment reduces but rarely fully halts problem alcohol use or the use of illicit drugs."

Prevention, Enforcement Outcome Data Lacking

For all of its limitations, however, treatment has a stronger research base and proven track record of effectiveness than other anti-drug strategies, namely prevention and law enforcement and interdiction.

"For primary prevention, the research base is scientifically impressive but programmatically barren," write Reuter and Pollack. "Surprisingly little is known about the effectiveness of prevention programs as implemented ... Research has been dominated by school-based programs, which are studied more readily than those in less-controlled settings. The gap between best-practice and typical interventions is large; many school-based prevention interventions are poorly implemented."

The research landscape on supply reduction is even more bleak, with the authors citing a "near-total absence of impact or outcome evaluation and a near-total absence of public or policymaker demands that such evaluations be performed."

"There is, at present, no empirical basis for estimating how much any of these enforcement efforts contribute to reductions in drug use and related problems, let alone a basis to evaluate the broad costs and benefits of competing enforcement approaches for society," Reuter and Pollack write. "... Prevention and treatment have been studied much more carefully, in part because policymakers and clinicians have demanded that these evaluations be performed to justify program funding."

Call for Harm Reduction, Support for Coerced Treatment

The authors' recommendations for improving the U.S. approach to the drug problem is an interesting mixed bag: an endorsement of coerced treatment via drug courts on the one hand, and a call for pragmatic harm-reduction strategies on the other.

Reuter and Pollack note that interdiction does help keep drugs like heroin and cocaine more expensive; they point out that while Federal Express could ship a kilo of cocaine from Bogota to Miami for about $100, it currently costs smugglers about $15,000 to avoid law enforcement and deliver the same amount of drugs.

Street-level law enforcement, they add, can make dealers more discreet, hinder new users from getting drugs, and (potentially) sweeping addicts into treatment programs. When Swiss officials cracked down on an open heroin scene in Zurich in the 1990s, for example, demand for methadone maintenance programs rose. The authors stressed the need for better coordination between law enforcement and the treatment system to reduce drug use among criminal offenders.

"Treatment may be frail, but it is likely to work more effectively if providers have many opportunities to treat the same person," write Reuter and Pollack. "Existing evidence suggests that treatment episodes motivated by criminal-justice pressure are no less successful than those with other motivations."

If primary prevention is not fully capable of deterring drug use, and relapse is an acknowledged part of addiction treatment and recovery, more attention needs to be paid to secondary and tertiary prevention aimed at users both in and out of treatment, argue Reuter and Pollack. "For this reason, harm reduction -- by which we mean interventions to help people to more safely consume drugs if and when they continue to use -- becomes an integral part of any prevention program," they write, even while acknowledging that "abstinence is the right ultimate goal."

Reuter told Join Together that harm reduction is best construed as a framework for examining the harms caused by drug policy itself, not as a definition of individual interventions. In this sense, he said, even drug courts can be considered a form of harm reduction. "Drug courts are willing to take a risk that people who are drug-court clients may use more drugs, but the overall harm to individuals and society will be reduced," he said.

A "drug-free America" is an impossible goal, Reuter and Pollack conclude, and the U.S. should feel no shame in failing to eliminate its drug problems. However, they said, the nation's failure to contain the social harms related to drug use -- such as more than 193,000 AIDS cases among injection drug users, many of which could have prevented via clean-needle programs -- "deserves greater condemnation."

"The problem is not that the United States has failed to achieve the impossible, but that it has failed to achieve things that could readily be achieved," write Reuter and Pollack. "... Harm reduction remains essential because, despite our best use-reduction efforts, drug misuse will remain prevalent and socially costly."

Reuter said that despite the advent of drug courts and innovations like Proposition 36 in California, he remains pessimistic that U.S. political leaders are ready for fundamental drug-policy reform. Few politicians think well of the drug war, he said, but "because there's so little interest, nobody sees the benefits of taking the risk of making significant changes."

Posted by lois at 05:16 PM | Comments (0)

New Report: BJS: Justice Expenditure & Employment in Corrections, Police, Courts 1982-2003

This is a new report looking at spending & employment for police, courts, departments of corrections from 1982 to 2003. It is filled with very interesting information.

Justice Expenditure and Employment in the United States, 2003

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/jeeus03.htm

Highlights include the following:

* The total number of justice employees grew 86% between 1982 and 2003
with the Federal Government having the largest percentage increase - 168%.
* Total per capita expenditure for each justice function increased more
than 300% between 1982 and 2003, with corrections having the largest per capita increase - 436%.
* The total direct justice expenditure for all levels of governments grew
from $3.6 billion in 1982 to $185 billion in 2003, a 418% increase.

Posted by lois at 04:42 PM | Comments (0)