Pennsylvania — The advocacy
group Straight Ahead! is
supporting two new bills. The
first would allow the possibility
of parole for over 5,000 currently
serving sentences of life
without the possibility of parole.
The second bill offers the same
benefits to an aging incarcerated
population instead of focusing
on a fixed number of years.
Pennsylvania — T he H uman
Rights Coalition’s Solidarity
Not Solitary is supporting
two bills that would limit the
duration of solitary confinement
and prohibit the use of
isolation for certain vulnerable
populations. The bills also provide
alternatives to solitary as
discipline for most infractions,
and a step-down program to
prevent abrupt transitions from
solitary confinement back into
general incarcerated populations
or outside communities.
California — The Sacramento
Bee reports that the
union representing California’s
correctional officers will
oppose mandated COVID-19
vaccinations for its members.
A federal overseer requested a
judge to require vaccination of
everyone entering the state’s
prisons. Meanwhile, the state’s
Department of Public Health is
preparing vaccine guidelines
for prison health care facilities.
The union intends to ask the
state to halt the Department’s
order in anticipation that its
terms will violate the union’s
contract. As of the date of the
Bee article, about 5 2% of the
state’s prison employees were
fully vaccinated. At six prisons,
the vaccination rate for
state prison employees was less
than 40%
North Carolina — To reduce
overcrowding in prisons,
a state program has paid county
jails to house certain classes
of offenders even though the
jails are already above 100
percent capacity, The Associated
Press reports. County
jails have long-held those
serving less than 90 days on
misdemeanor convictions. The
program provides funding to
house misdemeanor offenders
regardless of the length of their
sentence. Luke Woollard, an
attorney for Disability Rights
North Carolina said, “The conditions
we found are extremely
dangerous for all people in
these overcrowded jails …”
Ohio — Prison officials plan
to scan incoming mail and deliver
digital, rather than paper,
copies to prisoners in an effort
to stop the inflow of physical
mail soaked with drugs. Legal
mail will be exempted, reports
the AP. Service contractor
Global-Tel Link said “digital
mail becomes another source
of actionable intelligence for
investigators.” Incarcerated
person Peter Kenney prefers
a handwritten letter, which he
calls “priceless,” to a digital
copy. “It takes all the sentiment
out of it,” he said.
Alabama — As lethal injection
drugs become harder to
get, some states are searching
for alternative methods to kill
the condemned. Prison officials
in Alabama developed a
system to carry out executions
with nitrogen gas, reports the
AP. The deaths would result
from breathing a nitrogen only,
oxygen-free gas, which has not
been tested. Critics likened it to
human experimentation. Oklahoma
and Mississippi have also
authorized the untested nitrogen
execution method.
Virginia — The state’s governor
posthumously pardoned
a group of Black men executed
in 1951 for the rape of a White
woman, reports the Washington
Post. The men were known as
the Martinsville Seven. They
were convicted by all-White juries
in trials that spanned only
eight days. The governor issued
“simple pardons,” which do not
address guilt or innocence but
acknowledge a lack of due process
and racial inequity in the
cases. Forty-five men, all Black,
were executed for rape in Virginia
between 1908 and 1951.
