United States of America
Seen in the press
Read our selection of press reports about this country. This is a short description of prison conditions on a national scale.
United States: drug tests in California prisons yielded false positives, affecting thousands of people
Thousands of drug tests used by a major US diagnostic company in California prisons last year are suspected to have generated false positive results, an enormous error that has jeopardized the parole requests of some incarcerated people.United States: California turns down another chance to end forced prison labor
In November, Californians voted to keep using forced labor in the state’s prison system. Just more than 53% of voters voted against Proposition 6, while a little less than 47% supported the end of indentured servitude in the Golden State.United States: the harsh reality of being a prison journalist
Censorship, threats, and stints in solitary are among the acts of retaliation prison reporters face. Busby was sentenced to seventy-five years in 1999. Since then, he’s worked as a writer and journalist, including a stint as a staff reporter for the Texas prison newspaper The Echo.United States: lethal injection, electrocution and now firing squads. A look at US execution methods
South Carolina is preparing to execute a man by firing squad, a capital punishment method that hasn’t been used in the U.S. in nearly 15 years. Since the Supreme Court lifted its ban on capital punishment in 1976, states have used five different execution methods.United States: another layer of isolation could be coming for Dane County Jail “residents”
The ACLU of Wisconsin sent out its annual holiday card in December. But no one on the organization’s mailing list actually received the physical card. Instead, recipients opened up an envelope to find a sad piece of copier paper, printed on either side with black-and-white scans.United States: 2 cities tried basic income for formerly incarcerated people. Participants felt more food secure but struggled to pay for housing.
Gainesville, Florida, and Durham, North Carolina, recently tried using cash aid to help alleviate financial instability among formerly incarcerated residents, a demographic that is especially vulnerable to homelessness and food insecurity.United States: State proposes closing Bellingham Reentry Center, home for those finishing prison time
The Bellingham Reentry Center has been serving as a transition house for incarcerated people finishing up the last bit of their prison sentence since 1976, and since 1981 at its Garden Street address. The facility is the only reentry center north of Seattle.United States: shave, haircut, second chance. How a Denver barbershop is opening doors for people leaving prison
The man shaping McCotter’s style with comb and scissors is Mike Montoya, a skilled apprentice who is on the cusp of earning his barber’s license. Since his release, he’s been working this job with the stability and flexibility to pursue a productive future.United States: lawyers for incarcerated people ask judge to take over health care services in Arizona prisons
Lawyers for 25,000 people incarcerated in Arizona have asked a judge to take over health care operations in state-run prisons and appoint an official to run them, saying the state is not capable of fixing deep failures in care even though it has been required to do so over the last decade.United States: incarcerated trans person felt like a ‘zoo animal’ after she was forced into men’s prison under Trump order
An incarcerated trans woman who underwent top and bottom surgeries was forced into a men’s facility, according to the latest lawsuit from trans people in prison targeting Trump’s executive order.United States: lawmakers push to recognize right to visit for people in prison in Colorado
Colorado lawmakers are trying to make it a right — rather than a privilege — for people in the state’s prisons to receive visitation while incarcerated. Now, they can have their visitation privilege revoked if they violate the Department of Corrections‘ rules.United States: health care is key for youths getting out of prison. A new law helps them get it
Valentino was given his birth certificate, his Social Security card, a T-shirt, and khaki pants when he was released from a Texas prison in 2019 at the age of 21. But he didn’t have health insurance, mental health medications, or access to a doctor, he said.United States: 'everything is changing every minute', new prison rules for trans women on hold
A Bureau of Prisons policy that called on transgender women in federal prisons to hand over any female-identifying clothing and other commissary items, like women’s razors and hair care, is on hold at at least one federal prison in Texas.United States: three transgender women sue Trump administration over ‘life or death’ prison transfer plan
Three incarcerated transgender women sued the Trump administration, alleging that the president’s executive order directing government officials to move them to men’s prisons and cut off their access to health care violates the U.S. Constitution and federal law.United States: many more older people are leaving prison and face unmet needs for housing and health care
Following decades of mass incarceration,the proportion of older people in prison has increased since the early 1990s. Nearly a quarter of people behind bars in federal and state prisons are over age 50. That’s five times the proportion of the prison population in 1991.United States: legislation would tighten oversight in wake of Marcy prison death
State Sen. Julia C. Salazar has proposed a series of bills that seek to make it easier to discipline or fire correction officers who are found to have engaged in misconduct, including using excessive force, as well as to provide greater independent oversight of state prisons.United States: incarcerated firefighters battle L.A. blazes while California upholds prison slavery
Last fall, California voters rejected Proposition 6, which would have brought an end to modern-day slavery in the state’s prisons. Not even three months later, more than 1,000 incarcerated Californians stood on the front lines of the fires blazing through LA, risking their lives for minuscule pay.United States: Alabama incarcerated person asks court to block nitrogen gas execution
Attorneys for an Alabama incarcerated person scheduled to be the fourth person put to death with nitrogen gas asked a federal judge to block the execution, arguing that the first three incarcerated people showed signs of suffering from suffocation as the gas flowed.