North America
North America
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Health
Mental health
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United States
British prisons and jails must provide for vegan inmates by law; as of January this year, veganism is an explicitly protected belief under the Equality Act 2010, the same as religious beliefs.
This protection is not absolute, nor does veganism have legal protection everywhere in the world. In the U…
United States: California law is step forward but fails to guarantee safety for trans prisoners
News
North America
Women
Access to legal rights
Justice
Health
Mental health
Material conditions
Violence
United States
Syiaah Skylit has been imprisoned in California since 2015. Despite multiple requests to be placed in a women’s prison, Skylit, a Black trans woman, has always been incarcerated in the state’s men’s prisons. There, she has faced attacks by incarcerated men as well as sexual abuse and retaliation by…
North America
Access to legal rights
Mental health
United States
State officials often fail to identify prisoners with developmental disorders, a group that faces overwhelming challenges behind bars, from bright lights to noises to social dynamics.
Coronavirus
North America
Health
United States
Some states stop charging copays to encourage COVID-19 care.
Smell — 11/12
Inside Outside
North America
South America
Women
Asia
Europe
Long-term prisoners
Each month, the photographer Bertrand Gaudillère creates an image or chooses one from his archives. Prison Insider sends it to a dozen participants, prisoners around the world.They are in Argentina, in the United States of America, in France, in Switzerland, in Guatemala, in Ukraine, in Colombia, i…
North America
Minors
Access to legal rights
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Mental health
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United States
Detainees in Texas’ juvenile prisons suffer from frequent physical and sexual abuse, inadequate mental healthcare and high rates of staff turnover, two youth advocacy groups wrote in a federal complaint Wednesday.
The rights of the hundreds of youths detained in five secure facilities around the st…
North America
Long-term prisoners
Mental health
United States
Kyle H. has been incarcerated since 2001 and is serving a life sentence. He is held at River North Correctional Center in the state of Virginia. He bravely tells how an ordinary day goes by, when voices cannot stop, and when he becomes a stranger to himself.
Coronavirus
North America
Women
Access to legal rights
Health
Material conditions
United States
“I am forced to make a choice on what’s more important, my freedom or my health,” Ortega said.
Coronavirus
North America
Access to legal rights
Health
Work
United States
California’s prison system has taken drastic measures to combat the coronavirus, halting rehab programs, religious services and educational classes. But correctional authorities kept one type of operation running through much of the last six months: prison factories.
Estados Unidos: la paradoja de la pena de muerte
News
North America
Long-term prisoners
Access to legal rights
Justice
Death penalty
United States
This article is not available in English. This article is available in the following versions: Spanish
Coronavirus
North America
Access to legal rights
Health
Material conditions
Rehabilitation
Work
United States
States like California, New York, and Arizona have relied on prisoners to continue working, with little pay and in precarious conditions, during the coronavirus pandemic.
North America
Minors
Access to legal rights
Justice
Mental health
Material conditions
Violence
United States
The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) issued notice on February 5, 2020 that it has found the “totality of the conditions, practices, and incidents” it discovered at Broad River Road Complex (BRRC), South Carolina’s long-term juvenile commitment facility, violated the juveniles’ Fourteenth Amendment…
Taste — 10/12
Inside Outside
North America
South America
Women
Asia
Europe
Long-term prisoners
Each month, the photographer Bertrand Gaudillère creates an image or chooses one from his archives. Prison Insider sends it to a dozen participants, prisoners around the world.They are in Argentina, in the United States of America, in France, in Switzerland, in Guatemala, in Ukraine, in Colombia, i…
North America
Facilities
United States
A California assemblymember said nearly $200 million in operating costs will be saved after the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation’s (CDCR) announcement on Friday of the closure of a state prison in Tracy.
The Deuel Vocational Institution in Tracy was chosen for closure based o…
North America
Europe
Material conditions
Facilities
Alternatives
Prison privatization
Coronavirus
North America
Health
United States
After nearly flattening for about three months, positive coronavirus tests in Wisconsin prisons are back on the rise at rates worse than ever.
More than 600 inmates in state-run prisons tested positive for coronavirus in the past month, bringing the total to 953 since the beginning of the pandemic.…
Estados Unidos: informes profundamente alarmantes sobre esterilización forzosa de mujeres detenidas por el ICE
News
North America
Women
Foreign prisoners
Access to legal rights
Torture
Violence
United States
This article is not available in English. This article is available in the following versions: Spanish
United States: the expensive burden of parole, probation unjustly places people in a second prison
News
North America
Justice
United States
When President Donald Trump commuted Alice Marie Johnson’s life sentence in 2018, many observers assumed that the grandmother was fully free. What they didn’t realize at the time was that Johnson, who was convicted of a first-time, nonviolent drug offense, still wore the “invisible shackle” of prob…
North America
Justice
United States
Kentucky State law allows county jails to charge prisoners a daily fee during their stay while fighting their case. But what happens when the person is found not guilty of the charges and gets released? According to a February 14, 2020 ruling by the Kentucky Court of Appeals, even if the state thro…
Prisons and jails are rolling back free phone and video calls. They should be extending them instead
News
Coronavirus
North America
Social ties
United States
Amidst a pandemic and recession, policymakers should be fighting for extended — if not permanent — financial relief for incarcerated people and their families.
Mapping the 'Blind Spots'
Interview
Africa
North America
Women
Asia
Death penalty
What are maps for? How are they produced?
Coronavirus
North America
Access to legal rights
United States
Randall Jordan-Aparo, Darren Rainey and Latandra Ellington are not household names. But like Michael Brown, George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, they were killed by law enforcement officers.
Coronavirus
North America
Justice
United States
State and federal head counts have dropped 8%, largely because prisons are not accepting new inmates and many courts are closed.