Above Photo: Alberto Borgna from the Freedhome shop in Turin shows prison-made bags to customers | Rozanna Travis. All rights reserved Proudly ‘Made In Prison’ Prisoners in Italy pay for their own detention, and often leave prison in debt and without skills. A network of co-ops is trying to change this. Hand-made jewellery, bottles of locally produced wine and other artisanal products line the shelves of a small shop in the centre of Turin, northern Italy. Two fashionably dressed women are browsing the selection of handbags. ‘Made in Italy’ is a popular label that attracts both tourists and locals. But here […]
Inmates
10 posts
Sing Sing Correctional Facility in Ossining, N.Y. Mary Altaffer/AP hide caption toggle caption Mary Altaffer/AP Sing Sing Correctional Facility in Ossining, N.Y. Mary Altaffer/AP Back in early April as the COVID-19 pandemic ravaged New York, John J. Lennon was sure he would contract the coronavirus. As a prisoner at Sing Sing Correctional Facility in Ossining, N.Y., social distancing was impossible, he says. Making calls on prison phones, Lennon says, meant being “chest to shoulders” with nearly two dozen inmates. “It was a death-trap situation to use the phone,” he says. Not long after he made his prediction, Lennon started to feel […]
Gregory Marcinski is 43 and incarcerated at a federal prison in Otisville, New York. He has never met or touched his partner Eva, who lives nearly 4,000 miles away in Bavaria, Germany. But when Eva opens his letters and fingers the stationery she knows he’s held, too, the sensation feels “a bit like holding hands.” Marcinski has been in prison for almost 20 years, serving two concurrent life sentences in Kentucky and New York for the charge of kidnapping resulting in death. Eva first reached out to him over a prison pen pal website in 2017. The two fell in love […]
As Attorney General, Kamala Harris claims that she helped push for taxpayer-funded gender reassignment surgeries for California inmates. In 2015, Harris defended the California corrections department in a case regarding gender reassignment surgeries for inmates as ‘necessary’. The outcome of the case allowed for convicted murderer Shiloh Quine to receive gender reassignment surgery. Harris stated, “I worked behind the scenes to not only make sure that that transgender woman got the services she was deserving. So it wasn’t only about that case. I made sure that they changed the policy in the State of California so that every transgender inmate in […]
As COVID-19 Stalks Florida’s Inmates, So Does Another Plague By Shirso Dasgupta and Samantha J. Gross, McClatchy DC. July 21, 2020 As COVID-19 Stalks Florida’s Inmates, So Does Another Plague2020-07-212020-07-21https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/07/sweat.jpg200px200px Above photo: At Tomoka Correctional Institution (pictured) near Daytona and other facilities, inmate would seek work outside the compound to escape from the brutal heat. The coronavirus has limited those opportunities. ‘Sleeping in a ball of sweat.’ “They are dying in the heat,” said the distraught mother of an inmate at Dade Correctional Institution south of Miami. “What have we done to deserve this. … How is it possible, knowing how hot […]
San Quentin Inmates On Hunger Strike By Dominique Mosbergen, HuffPost. July 5, 2020 San Quentin Inmates On Hunger Strike2020-07-052020-07-05https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/07/quentin-inmate.jpg200px200px Above photo: Fro NBC. Amid Alarming COVID-19 Surge. More than 1,100 coronavirus cases and one death have been reported at the California prison. Infected inmates said they’re protesting inhumane conditions. Several men incarcerated in California’s San Quentin State Prison who have tested positive for COVID-19 have gone on a hunger strike to protest what they call “dismal” living conditions, KNTV in San Jose reported Wednesday. More than 1,100 active coronavirus cases have been reported at San Quentin, California’s oldest prison and home to the state’s […]
French prison residents and law enforcement agents have been exposed to COVID-19 from the outset of the pandemic due to irresponsible actions of the French authorities, argue trade unionists Samuel Gauthier and Noam Anouar. On 9 June 2020, Chief Prosecutor of Paris Remy Heitz launched an investigation into the French state’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak, considering possible charges including involuntary homicide, endangering life and failure to assist those in danger which based on roughly 80 complaints filed against the government since March. To date, France accounts for over 194,300 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 29,550 deaths. For comparison’s sake France’s immediate […]
US Attorney General William Barr US Attorney General Bill Barr on Monday directed the Federal Bureau of Prisons to schedule executions for four federal death-row inmates convicted of murdering children. In two of the cases, the inmates raped the children they murdered. In July of 2019, AG Barr directed the Federal Bureau of Prisons to revise the Federal Execution Protocol to provide for the use of a single-drug, pentobarbital — similar to protocols used in hundreds of state executions and repeatedly upheld by federal courts, including the Supreme Court, as consistent with the Eighth Amendment, the DOJ announced. Last year the US […]
Baton Rouge Inmates Sue For Release Due To COVID-19, Potential ‘Death Sentence’ Lea Skene, The Advocate. May 28, 2020 Baton Rouge Inmates Sue For Release Due To COVID-19, Potential ‘Death Sentence’2020-05-282020-05-28https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/05/inside-a-louisian-state-penitentiary-from-pinterest-e1590688770232.jpg200px200px Above photo: Inside a Louisiana State Penitentiary from Pinterest. A group of inmates in Baton Rouge’s jail filed a lawsuit in federal court Wednesday seeking their release to home confinement because the coronavirus is spreading through the lockup. Clifton Belton, who relies on a wheelchair to get around because of fluid in his lungs and partial foot amputation, is among several plaintiffs who argue their continued incarceration places them at high risk for serious […]
Inmates in the Los Angeles County prison system are deliberately trying to contract the coronavirus so that they will be released, according to Sheriff Alex Villanueva. During a press conference on Monday, Sheriff Villanueva said that some inmates believed that if more inmates caught the virus, it would force the county to begin releasing more inmates. “There was some mistaken belief among the inmate population that if they tested positive, there was a way to force our hand and somehow release more inmates out of our jail environment, and that’s not gonna happen,” he said. The prison system has seen a […]