San Quentin News

Written By Incarcerated - Advancing Social Justice

ACLU aims to free 50,000 from prisons

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A nationwide campaign by the ACLU that urges state governors to broaden their executive clemency powers to release 50,000 prisoners over the next five years is now underway, according to the Coalition of Prisoners’ Rights newsletter.

“‘Clemency’ can come in the form of a pardon, which legally undoes a criminal conviction, or in the form of a commutation, which reduces or ends someone’s incarceration. Chief executives, that is governors, have the power to ‘correct systemic injustices and end imprisonment that is considered unjust or no longer necessary,’” the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) stated.

The goal is to have state governors nationwide expand their existing clemency powers to diminish decades of punitive criminal justice
policies that targeted Black and Brown people.

To accomplish this, the ACLU suggests governors focus reform efforts on four specific areas designed to promote categorical commutations for large groups of individuals who meet these criteria: 1. If they were convicted under current laws, they would receive a shorter sentence than the one they got. 2. If they were convicted of drug distribution and possession offenses, regardless of the underlying substance. 3. They were incarcerated for technical probation or parole violations. 4. Older incarcerated people.

Popular support for these targeted categories ranges from 66 percent (for those who have drug convictions) to 84 percent (for those who would have received current shorter sentences) among the general population. Factoring in the fact that there are 1.3 million people incarcerated in state prisons, a more forward approach toward correcting prior injustices and liberating people who have spent years, even decades, behind bars, is a
critical step to take in healing racial disparities, the article noted.

State prisons currently house 165,000 people over the age of 55 (increasing
yearly), 191,000 for drug-related crimes, and 280,000 for probation and parole violations. Acknowledging and moving toward the release of 50,000 incarcerated people in the next five years, through governors’ grants of clemency, will redeem the rights of these prisoners and create their only chance for a timely release and a pathway to healing, notes the ACLU.

States collectively spend $43 billion a year on a prison system where Blacks and Latinos make up 57 percent of the prison population but are only 29 percent of the US population.

“Hundreds of thousands of people are trapped by extraordinarily long and punitive sentences that were never warranted in the first place,” the ACLU stated.

CÔNG LÝ CHÊNH LỆCH DO THIẾU TÀI CHÁNH

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Ứng cử viên tổng thống Kamala Harris vừa đề trình một đạo luật để giải quyết những lợi thế không công bằng mà công tố viên có trên luật sư công cộng.

Tháng Năm vừa qua, cựu bộ trưởng tư pháp của Cali đã đề xuống một đạo luật “Equal Defense Act” để đảm bảo quyền được bảo vệ trước pháp lý. Đạo luật này sẽ phân phối $250 triệu tiền trợ cấp của liên bang để khuyến khích mức lượng công bằng giữa luật sư công và công tố viên, và giảm bớt số lượng hồ sơ của luật sư công.

Theo dự án cải cách hình luật của ACLU, tối cao pháp viện đã xác định 50 năm trước rằng, “trong hệ thống pháp lý, người bị mang ra tòa mà không có tiền mướn luật sư thì không thể đảm bảo được sự xét xử công bằng trừ trường hợp người đó được cung cấp một luật sư.” Hai mươi năm sau lại xác định thêm rằng không phải luật sư nào cũng được, những người đó phải được biện hộ hữu hiệu.

Kanya Bennett và Ezekiel Edwards, cả hai của ACLU, trích dẫn cơ quan luật sư công ở Fresno là một ví dụ rõ ràng về vấn đề hồ sơ chồng chất do thiếu tiền trợ cấp gây ra.

Họ nói rằng theo luật liên bang, số lượng hồ sơ cho luật sư công không quá 400 hồ sơ đại hình và 150 hồ sơ tiểu hình. Hiện tại Fresno đang xử lý ít nhất là 418 đại hình và 1,375 tiểu hình mỗi năm, theo thống kê của ACLU soạn thảo.

Vớisốlượnghồsơđóvà 198 ngày tòa làm việc, mỗi luật sư công phải đóng 9 hồ sơ trong 6.5 giờ mỗi ngày.

Tại thành phố Orleans Parish ở tiểu bang Louisi- ana, ngân quỷ thiếu hụt đã ép buộc luật sư công bỏ những bị cáo nghèo lên danh sách để đợi luật sư khác đại diện.

Hiện tại trong nước đang chi tiêu $250 tỉ cho công lý tội phạm nhưng chỉ phân cấp $5 tỉ, hoặc 2.5%, để bênh vực bị cáo.

Đạo luật của thượng nghị sĩ Harris chỉ tăng lên 0.125% của tổng số ngân quỷ.

Access to Justice Office, thành lập bởi bộ tư pháp vào năm 2010, là một chương trình nêu lên những vi phạm

của “quyền được luật sư” đã được đảm bảo trong hiến pháp. Phương châm của cơ quan này là “giúp hệ thống công lý đem lại những kết quả công bằng cho mọi người, bất luận sang giàu hay địa vị.”

Chương trình này được tài trợ đến 2021, nhưng bị chính quyền của tổng thống Trump đóng cửa.

Pew Research và chánh án khu vực New York, Jed Raykoff, ước tính từ 2% đến8%tùnhânbịkếtánsai lầm. Trên toàn nước Mỹ, con số này được ước tính quá 600,000.

ACLU đi đến kết luận này: “Nước Mỹ bỏ tù hơn 2 triệu người. Nếu những người có thu nhập thấp bị dính dáng vào hệ thống pháp lý mà không có sự bênh vực nhiệt tâm, họ sẽ tiếp tục bị bỏ tù nhiều hơn và quyền pháp lý cũng bị tước đoạt. Nếu không có một hệ thống luật sư công hoạt động bình thường, chúng ta không thể giảm bớt con số khổng lồ của những người đang bị giam cầm chờ ra tòa, những kết án sai lầm, hoặc những lạm dụng trong quyền truy tố.

— Dịch giả: Dũng Trần

Congress looks at equalizing courtroom dynamics

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Bill introduced to bring defense budgets more in alignment with prosecutors

A bill was introduced at the national level by presidential hopeful Senator Kamala Harris that addresses the unfair advantage prosecutors have over public defend- ers in criminal cases.

In May, California’s ex-attorney general introduced a bill called The Ensuring Quality Access to Legal Defense Act (EQUAL Defense Act) to ensure quality access to legal defense. The bill would allocate $250 million in federal aid to encourage pay parity between public defenders and prosecutors and to lower the unmanageable case loads of public defenders.

According to the ACLU’s Criminal Law Reform Project, the U.S. Supreme Court established over 50 years ago that, “in our adversary system of criminal justice, any person [haled] into court, who is too poor to hire a lawyer, cannot be assured of a fair trial unless counsel is provided for [them].” Twenty years after that, the court said that not just any counsel would do, but that counsel must be “effective.”

Kanya Bennett and Ezekiel Edwards, both of the ACLU, cited California’s Fresno Public Defender’s Office as a glaring example of case overload caused by the lack of al- located dollars.

They noted the national mandates set for defense attorneys are for case loads not to exceed 150 felony cases and 400 misdemeanor cases. Currently Fresno public defenders are handling a minimum of 418 felony cases and 1,375 misdemeanor cases per year, according to statistics compiled by the ACLU.

With a 365 day calendar reduced to an estimated 198 working court days in this state, forecasts for each pub- lic defender in Fresno estimate they must close 9.05 cases per 6.5 hour day.

In Orleans Parish, Louisiana, budget shortfalls have forced defenders to put indigent defendants on waiting lists for representation.

Bennett and Edwards reported the constitutional crisis revealed in Fresno and Orleans Parish can be seen across the country because of inadequate funds budgeted for defending indigent individuals.

Currently the nation is spending approximately $200 billion on criminal justice yet only allocates $5 billion, or 2.5%, to defending the accused.

Sen. Harris’ proposed bill would only increase the defense budget by .125 percent of the total judiciary budget.

One program that addressed violations of the “right to counsel” guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment was the Dept. of Justice’s creation of the Access to Justice Office in 2010. The office’s mission statement included the goal to “help the justice system efficiently deliver outcomes that are fair and accessible to all, irrespective of wealth and status.”

That program was funded through 2021, but the Access to Justice Office was summarily closed by the current Trump Administration, ac- cording to the ACLU.

Pew Research and New York District Judge Jed Raykoff estimate that 2 to 8% of imprisoned persons are wrongfully convicted. In America this total is estimated to surpass 600,000.

The ACLU’s Criminal Law Reform Project reached this conclusion about “The urgent need to insure robust public defense systems… America warehouses over two million people behind bars. If low-income people caught in the carceral system do not have zealous advocates, they will continue to be over criminalized, over incarcerated, and deprived of their rights, without functioning public defender systems, we cannot meaningfully reduce the staggering number of people held in pretrial detention, wrongful convictions, or abusive prosecutorial practices.”

Yet to fiscally adept Americans, it’s obvious that even if Senator Harris’ Equal Defense Act passes, an increase of .00125 per- cent will not be enough to stave off most wrongful prosecutions.

Female incarceration in the U. S. is causing an impact on society

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By Elton Kelley Journalism Guild Writer

America is leading the world in incarcerating women, and this is disrupting many families across the country, the American Civil Liberties Union reports

The United States has nearly four percent of the world’s female population. But about a third of the female prisoners in the world are in the U.S., ACLU statistics show.

“When you think about the image you have of our mass incarceration crisis, it probably is not a mother who comes to mind,” the ACLU said in its May 12 web posting.

Incarcerating moms and disrupting their families is the fastest growing incarceration demographic in the country, the report says. Blacks are twice as likely to be incarcerated as Whites, the posting states.

Pretrial detainees who have not been tried or convicted of any crime make up 60 percent of women held in local jails, the story notes. Most are women who are held pending charges and cannot post bail, reported the ACLU.

“When you think about the image you have of our mass incarceration crisis, it probably is not a mother who comes to mind,”

The posting highlights the case of Faith Bartley, who spent three months in jail for misdemeanors because she couldn’t pay the $260 bail. She lost her home and employment.

Fifty-six percent of all women serving terms are doing so for drug or property offenses, ACLU numbers revealed.

For example, Lauren Johnson got picked up for having trace amounts of drugs in Texas, where that is a felony. She was removed from her home, where she cared for her three kids and nearby grandmother.

Johnson told the ACLU the mass incarceration crisis will continue to impact women un- til they’re “able to access treatment and services” outside of the criminal justice system.

Former Pennsylvania prisoner Dana Lomax-Williams said she was strip-searched, sexually violated by male guards, and sent to solitary for being noncompliant.

The ACLU reported Pennsylvania changed its laws, now mandating that females not be searched by males.

Arizona crisis for low-level drug offenders

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Arizona is wasting millions of dollars by imprisoning low-level drug offenders and failing to treat drug addicts, a recent report concludes.

“Arizona imprisonment crisis removes thousands of people from the economy and costs tax- payers more than $1 billion each year (for the state Department of Corrections budget)-preventing the state from investing in other critical priorities like education, social services for families, and child safety,” said the report by FWD.us.

FWD.us is a bipartisan political group founded by Silicon Valley leaders, according to the Arizona Republic.

The FWD.us report relies on an analysis of about 500,000 records that span 30 years, reported the Republic.

Arizona could enact reforms to reduce prison population, thus reducing taxpayer expense for prisons, contended FWD.us researcher Felicity Rose. Instead, she said enactment of Proposition 301 in 2006 gave judges the ability to sentence first-time drug offenders of methamphetamine possession to prison. Previously they received only counseling and treatment, the newspaper noted.

FWD.us, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the Pew Charitable Trust take the position that laws and policies of Arizona which allow that state to incarcerate for first-time drug possession is giving Arizona the “fourth- highest imprisonment rate in the nation,” the story said.

Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery opposed the reforms .

“If we were to lessen punishment for drug trafficking, what’s the message that we would be sending? We would just see more of that particular type of crime.” Montgomery said.

Arizona keeps people in prison 25 to 100 percent longer than national average, FWD.us said. It cited prison rates and crime have been reduced in 32 other states with programs, not prison.

Wisconsin ends harsh treatment of youth

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Wisconsin prison officials have reached a legal settlement aimed at bringing sweeping criminal justice reform to its youth prisons.
The settlement provides for “broad changes at the state’s troubled youth prison, (which) include banning guards from using pepper spray, ending solitary confinement for rule-breakers and limiting mechanical restraints and strip searches,” The Associated Press reported in June.
Pending approval from a federal judge, the settlement would include $1 million for ACLU’s attorney fees. ACLU represented the plaintiffs against the state.
“We hope this settlement (will) signal a larger shift in Wisconsin’s juvenile justice system toward an approach that recognizes the unique needs and vulnerabilities of youth and respects their constitutional rights,” said Timothy Muth,  ACLU attorney.
The U.S. Department of Justice has been investigating allegations of widespread abuse of Wisconsin prisons since 2015, according to the AP.
“In March, Wisconsin Department of Corrections reached an $18.9 million settlement with a former juvenile inmate who suffered brain damage after she tried to hang herself in her cell,” AP reported.

The girl alleged that staff ignored signs that she was contemplating suicide and didn’t respond to her cell call light when she activated it before she attempted suicide, AP reported.

Wisconsin’s Department of Justice Secretary Ed Wall resigned in February 2016 after the FBI took over the investigation into allegations of abuse at its prisons. The probe is still ongoing, according to AP.

PPI’s “Correctional Control: Incarceration and Supervision by State” is the first report to aggregate data on all types of correctional control nationwide.

CA senators bill baring juveniles from adult courts

Formerly incarcerated author, Donna Hylton

Unarmed killing sparks deadly force law conversation

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‘Under current law, an officer can assume they are armed, and kill them if they flinch’

The questionable killing of Stephon Clark, an unarmed Black man in Sacramento, by a barrage of police bullets may be the catalyst to raising the legal threshold on when police can use deadly force.
The police responded to a car break-in. They chased Clark into his dark backyard. An officer shouted “gun” and they fired 20 shots at the 22-year-old, hitting him eight times, mostly in the back, according to a NPR piece by Martin Kaste.
Clark was armed with a cellphone.
Law
Currently, police in California may use deadly force when it’s objectively reasonable. The law allows using “all necessary means to effect the arrest,” according to a New Republic article by Matt Ford.
“That threshold almost always benefits the police, since judges and juries tend to be extremely deferential when assessing whether an officer was acting reasonably in the heat of the moment,” Ford wrote.
The ACLU and Assemblywoman Shirley Weber co-wrote the proposed legislation to raise the legal threshold for the use of force. The bill that has been introduced in Sacramento would only allow officers to use deadly force to prevent imminent physical injury.
Deadly force
“Under the current standard, if there’s a threat, an officer can use deadly force even if there were alternatives to using deadly force,” Lizzie Buchen, a legislative advocate at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of California, told Ford “This would shift [the legal standard] so that if an officer’s feeling a threat, and there are alternatives to deadly use of force, then they need to use those first.”
Craig Lally, a union president for Los Angeles police officers, said that the bill “will either get cops killed or allow criminals to terrorize our streets unchecked,” according to the Ford article.
Buchen feels differently. “I understand law enforcement officers put their lives at risk. They have to make split-second decisions,”but the law needs to take more into account the fact that when civilians are approached by police with guns drawn, they also have to make quick decisions.
“They might be scared, they might panic. And under current law, an officer can assume they are armed, and kill them if they flinch or move in any way that can be construed as dangerous or reaching for a weapon. It’s really disturbing.”
Legislation
The proposed legislation would also consider whether police officers put themselves in unjustified danger before using deadly force.
“Under current law, if an officer jumps in front of a moving vehicle, they can legally kill the driver because now they’re suddenly in harm’s way,” Buchen explained. “What this law would say is that officer needs to be held accountable for creating the necessity of killing the driver.”
If the law passes, it will be the first of its kind.
“This would certainly be unique,” Buchen said. “There’s no other state that has a state law with this kind of protection for civilians.”

San Quentin News & Wall City Merchandise

Right to Police Transparency


https://sanquentinnews.com/criminal-justice-system-shifts-towards-technology/

Police continue to shoot about 1,000 people a year

Virginia disputes ACLU charges of harsh solitary

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The solitary confinement program in Virginia’s prisons is chastised in a new ACLU report for its inhumane conditions, according to the Washington Post.

Disciplinary segregation, special housing and administrative segregation are also considered to be solitary confinement by the ACLU.

“It simply doesn’t matter what you call it. The impact of the practice on people is exactly the same,” said Claire Gastanaga, ACLU executive director.

During solitary confinement, prisoners are housed in small cells for 22 to 24 hours a day with reduced or no natural light and little human contract. They have restrictions on reading material, visits, TV and radio as well, according to the report.

Putting inmates in isolationary confinement is “allowing people to be treated worse than zoo animals,” said David Smith, a former inmate.

Smith said he was confined in a windowless 12-foot by 6-foot cell for more than 16 months in the Norfolk City Jail. He was allowed to exercise every two weeks in the prison’s in-door gym, said the article.

“It’s a place of fear and isolation,” said Smith.

Virginia’s Department of Corrections disputed ACLU’s findings. Lisa Kinney, the department’s spokesperson, said the state has a long-term restrictive housing program without the use of solitary confinement.

Kinney also said the inmates have reading materials, out-of-cell recreation and classes.

“The Virginia Department of Corrections serves as a national model for the limited use of restrictive housing,” she said.

In Virginia, Kinney added, seriously mentally ill inmates cannot spend more than 30 days in restrictive housing. It is rare for offenders to be released from long-term restrictive housing back into the community, she said.

In 2011, the Virginia Department of Corrections implemented a “step down” program, meaning that inmates can get out of solitary confinement through good behavior. This was a part of reforms at Red Onion and Wallens Ridge State Prisons, meant to reduce the number of people held in “administrative segregation.”

Additionally, a DOJ recommendation for a program that diverts those with serious mental illness from restrictive housing was implemented in 2016.

www.stopsolitaryforkids.org
http://sanquentinnews.com/nys-solitary-confinement-of-youth-persists-under-different-name/
https://sanquentinnews.com/virtual-reality-and-the-solitary-prison-experience/

$200 For Parolees Doesn’t Make It


https://sanquentinnews.com/alabama-fails-fix-housing-mentally-ill-inmates-solitary/
 

Prison death a mystery after year-long investigation

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One year and a transparent investigation later, the death of inmate James Leonard Acuna remains undetermined.

Acuna’s decomposing body had been found in a cell he shared with another inmate at Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility, at least two days after he passed, reported Patch.

“The fact [Acuna] made bad choices and was paying his debt to society doesn’t mean he should have been neglected,” said Sara Leslie, a volunteer for California Prison Focus, an inmates’ rights nonprofit. “We as a society should care because we are a civilized country and it’s expected that we treat all people in a humane manner.”

“SNY [Sensitive Needs Yard] …comprises roughly half the California prison system,” according to Lody Lewn in the Prison University Project Spring 2018 Newsletter Volume 13, No.1

Because Acuna’s body was so decomposed, forensic experts aren’t sure how he died and they listed the cause of death as “undetermined.”

While it’s possible Acuna died of natural causes, an autopsy concluded “homicidal violence cannot be completely excluded,” as the body showed “signs of minor blunt force injury of head and extremities,” Patch reported.

The San Diego County Sheriff’s Department refused to release its report of the investigation, after a request from Patch, making it impossible to determine how extensive the homicide investigators’ probing was.

Patch also reported that, according to a San Diego County Medical Examiner’s report, Acuna’s cellmate told a mental healthcare professional at the prison that he had “murdered his former cellmate to get a cell to himself” while he was in Kern County.

Bardis Vakili, a prisoner rights advocate and senior attorney with the ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Valley, criticized California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) employees for not finding the body sooner.

“In 1935 the Supreme Court declared that a prosecutors job is more than merely winning every case by racking up convictions; it also included seeing that justice is done.” “Pressing Pause on Marijuana Convictions” NYT Opinion July 30, 2018

“Whenever the government takes someone into custody, it bears the responsibility for that individual’s safety,” Vakili said. “However harsh the conditions in prison may be, for a dead body to go unnoticed in a cell for so long that the cause of death can no longer be determined requires a shocking level of carelessness.”

Justicia rota

Justicia rota

CDCR regulations require the physical head-counting of inmates four times a day. Inmates like Acuna, who occupied a cell, must stand at the cell door until counted, said the article.

Dan Vasquez, a thirty-year veteran of CDCR and former warden at two prisons, one being San Quentin, said he found Acuna’s death troubling from a procedural standpoint.

“It was a rule drilled into my head,” Vasquez said, “You had to make sure you saw living, breathing flesh—that’s when you knew the inmate was OK.”

A spokesperson for CDCR told  that appropriate action was taken against some employees. However, she would not disclose the number of employees, their positions, or what specific disciplinary action was being considered, citing employees’ “due process” rights.

Acuna was diagnosed with hepatitis C and suffered from cirrhosis of the liver, souces who asked to remain anonymous told Patch. But Dr. David Bernstein, an internal medicine and gastroenterology specialist and hepatitis B and C researcher, reviewed the autopsy report and doesn’t believe Acuna died from the condition. He said cirrhosis can kill, but there will be bleeding and other symptoms, none of which Acuna’s autopsy indicated.

Another pressing question is why healthcare professionals who should have had daily face-to-face contact with Acuna and should have provided him with medication in person didn’t discover him dead in bed. It is uncertain whether Acuna was supposed to be receiving medication through his cell door or from the “pill window,” noted the article.

While Acuna’s post-mortem toxicology test reported traces of antidepressants Venlafaxine, Amitriptyline, and Nortriptyline—a drug prescribed for headaches and sleep issues—there was no indication of any medication prescribed to treat hepatitis C, reported Patch.

https://sanquentinnews.com/prosecutors-have-great-power-over-criminal-cases/

CBS’ Ted Koppel visits Ear Hustle

San Quentin’s big transition as non-designated facility

Overview of inmate deaths in 2017 in CDCR

Voting rights for people with criminal convictions

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Who in California currently has the right to vote?

Eligible voters are citizens of the United States, 18 years of age or older as of Election Day.

But, what if you’ve been arrested or have a conviction?

“Many Californians mistakenly believe a criminal conviction keeps them from voting. Politicians bet on that fact to win elections,” according to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

So, let’s set the record straight. You are eligible to vote if you:

Are awaiting trial or are on trial for any crime;

Are in jail for a misdemeanor;

Are serving a county jail sentence under Realignment (AB 109);

Are on probation, even if you are in jail as a condition of your probation;

Are awaiting a judge’s decision on a probation violation;

Are completing your mandatory supervision or post-release community supervision;

Have completed parole;

Are a person with a juvenile wardship adjudication.

In 2016, Gov. Jerry Brown signed AB 2466, known as “The Voting Rights Clarification.”

The bill granted “more than 50,000 people under mandatory and post-release community supervision” the right to vote, according to the ACLU.

Under the new law, anyone convicted of a felony, who is not currently in state or federal prison or on parole, is allowed to vote.

The only time you cannot vote while in county jail is if you are awaiting transfer to state or federal prison; in jail for a parole violation or serving a state prison sentence under contract with a county jail; or you are currently found mentally incompetent to vote by a court.

In order to vote from jail, a voter registration form must be requested, completed, filled out, and an application to vote-by-mail must be requested from jail staff or from a county clerk. Once submitted, your county election official will process and mail you a Voter Notification Card, and you will receive a vote-by-mail ballot in the mail prior to the next election.

You may register to vote if you are 18 or over and if you are a juvenile court commitment (not an adult court conviction), to the Division of Juvenile Justice (DJJ). Counselors could answer any questions.

The ability to vote is restored once a sentence is completed.

Online voter registration is at http://registertovote.ca.gov/ or print the voter registration form and send it in by mail. You can also register at the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) when you are signing up for a driver’s license or ID card. According to the DMV, “the deadline to register [to vote] is by 11:59:59 on the 15th day before the Election Day.”

The next election in California will be held on Nov. 6.

“Drug-overdose deaths drove a decline in U.S. life expectancy in 2016 for the second year in a row…”  THE WALL STREET JOURNAL Dec. 21, 2017

If you are eligible and haven’t already registered to vote please do! Encourage family members and friends to register and vote too. There are a number of criminal justice reform bills on the ballot that directly affect you and your family.

Ella Baker Center for Human Rights can be reached at 1970 Broadway, Suite 1125, Oakland, CA 94612.

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Question Is Answered: CA Inmates Can’t Vote

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