After considering for years whether to revise its criminal procedure rules to broaden defendants’ access to information that will be used to prosecute them, the Virginia Supreme Court has decided to expand defendants’ pre-trial access to prosecutors’ evidence. An order issued September 5 by the top state court will require state prosecutors (known locally as
A retired Army colonel denied a promotion due to a rape accusation has been awarded $8.4 million in a defamation lawsuit filed against his accuser. Col. David “Wil” Riggins, a highly-decorated veteran of both Iraq and Afghanistan, was up for promotion to brigadier general in July 2013 when he was accused of raping a fellow
In a unanimous and lengthy opinion, the Vermont Supreme Court dismissed a charge of unauthorized practice of law brought against a jailhouse lawyer. Martin Serendipity Morales, a prisoner who identifies as female, was being held at the Marble Valley Regional Correctional Center when she was charged with a felony by Bennington County prosecutors. Her crime?
Fourteen years ago, the nonprofit monthly magazine Prison Legal News filed a Freedom of Information Act request asking the Federal Bureau of Prisons for documentation of how much money the BOP had paid out over an approximately seven-and-a-half-year period (from 1996 through the end of July 2003) in judgments and settlements of lawsuits and claims
The Habeas Citebook: Ineffective Assistance of CounselBy Brandon Sample and Alissa HullPrison Legal News Publishing, 2016275 pages, $49.95Buy from Prison Legal News Reviewed By Christopher Zoukis The much anticipated second edition of The Habeas Citebook: Ineffective Assistance of Counsel, by Brandon Sample and Alissa Hull, is the fifth book to be published by Prison Legal
Prison Legal News has launched an important lawsuit against Arizona’s Department of Corrections over the withholding of their publication from prisoners. The editions in question discuss documented cases of rape and sexual violence perpetrated by prison staff against inmates—one of which took place in an Arizona prison and was heard in federal court. Many inmates
Prison Legal News is engaging in an investigation concerning deceptive practices by prison phone companies. We at the Prison Law Blog encourage you to submit documentation to Prison Legal News if you have been a victim of such practices. The Prison Legal News notice is as follows: HRDC and PLN are gathering information about the
Prison Legal News is seeking information from prisoners and their families concerning deceptive practices which are designed to siphon funds away from inmates’ trust and commissary accounts. We at the Prison Law Blog encourage you to assist Prison Legal News in their investigation. Their notice is as follows: Prison Legal News is collecting information about
Last month, a small, black-and-white newsprint magazine quietly made a case in a Florida courtroom to protect the fundamental rights that nearly every citizen in the industrialized world holds dear. Yet the odds are, you didn’t hear a word about it. Prison Legal News has reported on the legal landscape of prisoners’ rights in America’s
By Prison Legal News Prison Legal News continues its efforts to defend its First Amendment right to communicate with prisoners in the Nevada Department of Corrections (NDOC). In 1999 the NDOC banned all copies of PLN, claiming the publication constituted “inmate correspondence.” PLN filed suit and was granted a preliminary injunction requiring the delivery of
We have profiled every prison within the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
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