Four sex offenders have tracking bracelets removed

A North Carolina judge has ruled that four sex convicted sex offenders could not be subjected to lifetime monitoring—their ankle bracelets and waist transmitters have been removed. The constitutional issues of lifetime monitoring are unresolved. (Charlotte Observor)

Get back to your cell.

FIRST-PERSON….I had to go to jail because in 1998 I got a DWI, and then last April I got pulled over after a couple of beers. When you have a prior these days, they’re much more harsh about drinking and driving. The penalty could have been one year in jail if I had gone to [...]

Ex-inmate says prison exec shouldn’t become a judge

Alex Friedmann spent six years in a Tennessee prison run by the world’s largest private prison company, Corrections Corporation of America. During his sentence Friedmann sued CCA, alleging the company retaliated against him for critical comments made to the press. Now an editor at Prison Legal News, Friedmann has found that Gus Puryear, general counsel [...]

Inmates want info on their executioners

Five death-row inmates in Missouri have asked the state to provide more information on the criminal backgrounds of individual executioners after learning that one was on probation for stalking. (St. Louis Post-Dispatch)

Mother asks for clemency for terrorist son

IN THE NEWS….Jose Padilla trained with al-Qaeda and was convicted of conspiring to commit murder. His headline case drew national attention to the controversial treatment by the Bush administration of military prisoners and “enemy combatants.” Padilla’s single mother, Estela Ortega-Lebron, spoke last year about the toll taken by the three years her son was held [...]

She had to bare her head

IN THE NEWS….The ACLU joined Jameelah Medina’s lawsuit claiming that her freedom of religion was violated when she was forced to bare her head for hours at a county jail….( ACLU)

Father sued for back child support during years of wrongful imprisonment

IN THE NEWS….Dwayne Allen Dail spent 18 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. New DNA evidence set him free, and now he faces a civil lawsuit from his son’s mother for years of back child support.
Dail is entitled to $360,000 in compensation from the state for the wrongful imprisonment. Who should [...]

I’m waiting for someone to say “I’m sorry”….

IN THE NEWS….Hear from more than 137 prisoners exonerated by DNA evidence and released into private life. Compelling coverage at the New York Times…..

They put a gun to my head….

FIRST-PERSON….I was visiting a friend about 2:00 in the morning. I parked my car and three men approached me. They said something I didn’t understand. I thought they were asking me to buy drugs. Then they said something louder to me, we want your wallet. I turned around and they were right behind me, [...]

An innocent man was released.

FIRST-PERSON….Several years ago I attended a gathering to oppose the penalty of death. The speaker was a man in his late thirties. In his youth he worked, lived his life. Then he was arrested for a heinous crime. The “evidence” was a physical characteristic. He was convicted and [...]