Christopher Zoukis's Blog, page 10
December 23, 2016
Scam Draws Huge Volume of Lawsuits by Former Inmates of New Jersey County Jail
The first inkling clerks in a federal courthouse in Camden, New Jersey had that something might be seriously amiss came in August, when they started getting an unusual number of requests for a packet of legal forms and information prepared for persons wanting to file a pro se civil lawsuits (filed by individuals without the assistance of an attorney).
Within a month, to cope with a strong, ongoing demand, the clerks had to send the packets — usually produced in-house — out to a printer. But the long lines of people waiting to get the packets caused so much congestion in the courthouse hallways that the court clerks began giving them to the guards in the courthouse lobby to pass out to those seeking them.
Then came the lawsuits. Some handwritten, first a trickle and then a flood, seeking money damages for having spent time in the city’s notoriously overcrowded Camden County Correctional Facility. Some complained of having been jailed with three other inmates in a cell designed to house two prisoners; other complained of having had no bed spaces and sleeping on cell floors in rat-infested cellblocks.
And the lawsuits keep coming – as many as 50 in a single day, in a court that averages about 200 civil lawsuits filed per month. Over the span of a few months, around 1,800 filings came in, forcing the court to bring in workers from other district courts to deal with the avalanche of filings. Many of the submissions were invalid, failing to meet either the filing requirements or to state a claim on which the court could grant relief— for example, by failing to meet the two-year deadline for filing garden-variety injury claims, or by alleging harms that could not amount to a constitutional violation.
County officials eventually discovered what generated the tsunami of pro se lawsuits on the county jail’s conditions. Apparently, several people had been working the city’s streets, spreading the news that there was a class-action settlement authorizing cash payouts to anyone who had ever spent time in the overcrowded jail, which had been built to accommodate slightly more than 1,200 inmates but had for long stretches housed 1,800 or more. One account said at least one scammer claimed to have received a cash pay-out of $1,000 per day at the court, and offered to sell potential claimants the legal forms they would need to claim their recovery. Potential claimants likely felt they had a legitimate chance at compensation. There was, in fact, a long-running class action, filed in 2005, by inmates claiming conditions in the Camden jail were so bad as to violate their constitutional rights. But that case neither sought money damages nor had been settled.
In late October, the district judge posted an announcement that there was no class-action settlement or ready payments for the county jail’s ex-inmates, and a similar notice was soon inserted in the pro se form packets. When even those steps failed to stem the tide of claimants, the courthouse got a new notice from the judge denouncing the false rumor for wasting the time of both plaintiffs and court workers.
Within a month, to cope with a strong, ongoing demand, the clerks had to send the packets — usually produced in-house — out to a printer. But the long lines of people waiting to get the packets caused so much congestion in the courthouse hallways that the court clerks began giving them to the guards in the courthouse lobby to pass out to those seeking them.
Then came the lawsuits. Some handwritten, first a trickle and then a flood, seeking money damages for having spent time in the city’s notoriously overcrowded Camden County Correctional Facility. Some complained of having been jailed with three other inmates in a cell designed to house two prisoners; other complained of having had no bed spaces and sleeping on cell floors in rat-infested cellblocks.
And the lawsuits keep coming – as many as 50 in a single day, in a court that averages about 200 civil lawsuits filed per month. Over the span of a few months, around 1,800 filings came in, forcing the court to bring in workers from other district courts to deal with the avalanche of filings. Many of the submissions were invalid, failing to meet either the filing requirements or to state a claim on which the court could grant relief— for example, by failing to meet the two-year deadline for filing garden-variety injury claims, or by alleging harms that could not amount to a constitutional violation.
County officials eventually discovered what generated the tsunami of pro se lawsuits on the county jail’s conditions. Apparently, several people had been working the city’s streets, spreading the news that there was a class-action settlement authorizing cash payouts to anyone who had ever spent time in the overcrowded jail, which had been built to accommodate slightly more than 1,200 inmates but had for long stretches housed 1,800 or more. One account said at least one scammer claimed to have received a cash pay-out of $1,000 per day at the court, and offered to sell potential claimants the legal forms they would need to claim their recovery. Potential claimants likely felt they had a legitimate chance at compensation. There was, in fact, a long-running class action, filed in 2005, by inmates claiming conditions in the Camden jail were so bad as to violate their constitutional rights. But that case neither sought money damages nor had been settled.
In late October, the district judge posted an announcement that there was no class-action settlement or ready payments for the county jail’s ex-inmates, and a similar notice was soon inserted in the pro se form packets. When even those steps failed to stem the tide of claimants, the courthouse got a new notice from the judge denouncing the false rumor for wasting the time of both plaintiffs and court workers.
What Will Happen to the Clemency Movement in the Trump Administration?
Rather than slackening off as the Obama administration nears its final days, the clemency initiative announced in April 2014 for federal prisoners is picking up speed. From the Oct. 1 start of the current fiscal year until two days before Election Day, the president had issued 272 sentence commutations — nearly one-third of its total up to that time.
On election eve, the sentences of 72 inmates were commuted, followed by 79 more Nov. 22, bringing the total for the Obama administration to 1,023, exceeding the combined total for commutations issued by all 11 presidents from Harry Truman through George W. Bush. Of Obama’s clemency grants, thus far 342 have gone to inmates serving life sentences, and most recipients were serving lengthy sentences for nonviolent, primarily drug-related, offenses.
But what will happen to the commutation movement after Trump’s inauguration?
During the presidential campaign, Donald Trump generally sounded a get-tougher line on criminal law, but had relatively little to say on Obama’s clemency program. What he did say, however, sparked fears among advocates of decriminalizing or reducing penalties for drug offenses, or adopting new approaches to incarceration. For example, at a town hall event in New Hampshire two days before that state’s primary election, Trump said the approximately 6,000 inmates released after the Obama administration revised some drug sentencing criteria in 2015 would soon “be back selling drugs.” More recently, at an August event in Florida, the GOP candidate described some of those released under the clemency program as “bad dudes,” before sarcastically telling his audience to “sleep tight, folks.”
Another troubling sign to advocates of criminal justice revisions – such as those in a now-apparently stalled bill introduced in Congress last year with substantial bipartisan support – was the president-elect’s announcement he would nominate Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions (R) as his Attorney General. Sessions has been a consistent proponent of strict drug penalties and an opponent of reducing mandatory minimum sentences.
Once in office, Trump cannot reverse clemency grants issued by Obama, but can, if he chooses, quickly reverse executive orders issued by his predecessor. In fact in several areas — such as executive orders for more lenient treatment of young persons not legally in this country, and their parents — Trump has explicitly promised he would do so. Some of the executive orders are already being halted by court orders. Obama administration executive actions taken through regulations, however, will likely have to go through a similar rulemaking process in order to be undone.
As for the clemency program, Obama’s White House counsel has said the president, even though a lame duck, will keep on granting clemencies in his final days in office. The Department of Justice official who announced the clemency program adds that the president is aware how deeply a clemency grant can improve the lives of not just inmates, but their families as well.
That is not enough, however, for some clemency advocates, who are publicly urging Obama to issue blanket clemency for whole classes of federal inmates – prominently, those who were already serving long sentences for crack cocaine offenses before 2010 — when Congress passed and Obama signed the Fair Sentencing Act, which brought penalties for crack more in line with those for powder cocaine, but was not retroactive.
On election eve, the sentences of 72 inmates were commuted, followed by 79 more Nov. 22, bringing the total for the Obama administration to 1,023, exceeding the combined total for commutations issued by all 11 presidents from Harry Truman through George W. Bush. Of Obama’s clemency grants, thus far 342 have gone to inmates serving life sentences, and most recipients were serving lengthy sentences for nonviolent, primarily drug-related, offenses.
But what will happen to the commutation movement after Trump’s inauguration?
During the presidential campaign, Donald Trump generally sounded a get-tougher line on criminal law, but had relatively little to say on Obama’s clemency program. What he did say, however, sparked fears among advocates of decriminalizing or reducing penalties for drug offenses, or adopting new approaches to incarceration. For example, at a town hall event in New Hampshire two days before that state’s primary election, Trump said the approximately 6,000 inmates released after the Obama administration revised some drug sentencing criteria in 2015 would soon “be back selling drugs.” More recently, at an August event in Florida, the GOP candidate described some of those released under the clemency program as “bad dudes,” before sarcastically telling his audience to “sleep tight, folks.”
Another troubling sign to advocates of criminal justice revisions – such as those in a now-apparently stalled bill introduced in Congress last year with substantial bipartisan support – was the president-elect’s announcement he would nominate Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions (R) as his Attorney General. Sessions has been a consistent proponent of strict drug penalties and an opponent of reducing mandatory minimum sentences.
Once in office, Trump cannot reverse clemency grants issued by Obama, but can, if he chooses, quickly reverse executive orders issued by his predecessor. In fact in several areas — such as executive orders for more lenient treatment of young persons not legally in this country, and their parents — Trump has explicitly promised he would do so. Some of the executive orders are already being halted by court orders. Obama administration executive actions taken through regulations, however, will likely have to go through a similar rulemaking process in order to be undone.
As for the clemency program, Obama’s White House counsel has said the president, even though a lame duck, will keep on granting clemencies in his final days in office. The Department of Justice official who announced the clemency program adds that the president is aware how deeply a clemency grant can improve the lives of not just inmates, but their families as well.
That is not enough, however, for some clemency advocates, who are publicly urging Obama to issue blanket clemency for whole classes of federal inmates – prominently, those who were already serving long sentences for crack cocaine offenses before 2010 — when Congress passed and Obama signed the Fair Sentencing Act, which brought penalties for crack more in line with those for powder cocaine, but was not retroactive.
November 30, 2016
States Adopt Ballot Measures Revising Laws on Sentencing
With scant weeks remaining before Congress calls it quits, it seems certain there won’t be final action on criminal justice reform measures that started out strongly, but soon got bogged down in the quagmire that is modern-day Capitol Hill.
Proposals introduced early in 2015 to ease mandatory minimum sentencing laws and promote alternatives to incarceration seem fated to expire in the final days of the 114th Congress despite substantial bipartisan support, both in Congress and outside, including not just the Obama administration but many Republican conservatives, and by groups ranging from the American Conservative Union to the American Civil Liberties Union.
But while the drive for federal legislation appears stalled, at least temporarily, voters this November adopted a number of state ballot proposals to revise criminal laws and sentencing practices. California is a leading example. Nearly 64 percent of voters there handily approved Proposition 57, also known as the “Justice and Rehabilitation Act,” a measure backed by Gov. Jerry Brown (D), over the opposition of many of the state’s district attorneys and sheriffs, who argued it was too lenient and too broadly defined some sex offenses as nonviolent.
The ballot initiative undid part of a tougher sentencing provision Brown had signed into law 40 years earlier. Brown defended the proposed changes as needed to meet court-ordered reductions in state prison overcrowding. The most significant and controversial part of the ballot measure proposed to remove some crimes from the “determinate” sentencing law Brown had long ago championed.
As approved by the state’s voters, inmates convicted of nonviolent crimes who have completed their full sentences for their primary offense — without reference to any other provision of state law providing sentence enhancements, alternatives or consecutive sentences — and who had also passed a review on public safety concerns would be eligible for parole. State officials estimated this would make at least 7,000 inmates immediately eligible for release on parole.
The measure also directed state prison officials to devise a new system for shortening sentences for contained inmates’ good conduct while incarcerated, and reversed provisions in a law passed in 2000 which sent more juvenile defendants to adult courts. As passed, the initiative left it to state court judges, rather than to prosecutors, to determine whether offenders as young as 14 will be tried as juveniles or adults.
To get onto the state’s crowded ballot, backers had to not only round up valid signatures from nearly 600,000 voters, but to beat back a lawsuit filed by the California District Attorneys Association challenging the decision by state Attorney-General (now Senator-elect) Kamala Harris to allow the original, narrower petition of juvenile justice provisions to be broadened by adding the other provisions.
Ballot initiatives on criminal justice reform were not just limited to the Golden State. In Oklahoma, voters also approved, by comfortable margins, ballot initiatives revamping the criminal justice system. One proposal (Question 780) downgraded some drug possession and property offenses from felonies to misdemeanors, and placed less emphasis on mandatory minimum sentences and greater emphasis on inmates’ progress in drug treatment and other rehabilitation programs. Another (Question 781) increases the flexibility for counties to channel incarceration costs avoided due to the changes made under Question 780 into drug treatment and community rehabilitation programs.
Proposals introduced early in 2015 to ease mandatory minimum sentencing laws and promote alternatives to incarceration seem fated to expire in the final days of the 114th Congress despite substantial bipartisan support, both in Congress and outside, including not just the Obama administration but many Republican conservatives, and by groups ranging from the American Conservative Union to the American Civil Liberties Union.
But while the drive for federal legislation appears stalled, at least temporarily, voters this November adopted a number of state ballot proposals to revise criminal laws and sentencing practices. California is a leading example. Nearly 64 percent of voters there handily approved Proposition 57, also known as the “Justice and Rehabilitation Act,” a measure backed by Gov. Jerry Brown (D), over the opposition of many of the state’s district attorneys and sheriffs, who argued it was too lenient and too broadly defined some sex offenses as nonviolent.
The ballot initiative undid part of a tougher sentencing provision Brown had signed into law 40 years earlier. Brown defended the proposed changes as needed to meet court-ordered reductions in state prison overcrowding. The most significant and controversial part of the ballot measure proposed to remove some crimes from the “determinate” sentencing law Brown had long ago championed.
As approved by the state’s voters, inmates convicted of nonviolent crimes who have completed their full sentences for their primary offense — without reference to any other provision of state law providing sentence enhancements, alternatives or consecutive sentences — and who had also passed a review on public safety concerns would be eligible for parole. State officials estimated this would make at least 7,000 inmates immediately eligible for release on parole.
The measure also directed state prison officials to devise a new system for shortening sentences for contained inmates’ good conduct while incarcerated, and reversed provisions in a law passed in 2000 which sent more juvenile defendants to adult courts. As passed, the initiative left it to state court judges, rather than to prosecutors, to determine whether offenders as young as 14 will be tried as juveniles or adults.
To get onto the state’s crowded ballot, backers had to not only round up valid signatures from nearly 600,000 voters, but to beat back a lawsuit filed by the California District Attorneys Association challenging the decision by state Attorney-General (now Senator-elect) Kamala Harris to allow the original, narrower petition of juvenile justice provisions to be broadened by adding the other provisions.
Ballot initiatives on criminal justice reform were not just limited to the Golden State. In Oklahoma, voters also approved, by comfortable margins, ballot initiatives revamping the criminal justice system. One proposal (Question 780) downgraded some drug possession and property offenses from felonies to misdemeanors, and placed less emphasis on mandatory minimum sentences and greater emphasis on inmates’ progress in drug treatment and other rehabilitation programs. Another (Question 781) increases the flexibility for counties to channel incarceration costs avoided due to the changes made under Question 780 into drug treatment and community rehabilitation programs.
California Voters Vote to Keep, Speed Up State’s Death Penalty
This year’s election gave California voters 17 ballot propositions to consider. Two initiatives took starkly different approaches to the state’s death penalty, offering voters what was widely described as an “end or mend” choice.
Proposition 62 sought to abolish the death penalty in California state courts, making life without parole the most severe sentence they could impose. In contrast, Proposition 66 called for retaining the death penalty while limiting and speeding up appeals of convictions in capital cases.
The Golden State has a fairly long and complex history with capital punishment. In 1972, a court ruling halted executions, only to see voters approve a ballot initiative reinstating the death penalty and more specifically defining the special circumstances in which it can be used. A 2006 decision by a federal judge in San Jose found fault with the way the state was carrying out lethal injections. After a botched lethal-injection execution in Oklahoma caused a Death Row convict obvious, intense pain, the judge ordered what was supposed to be a temporary moratorium on executions, and required that future executions have a doctor or other qualified health practitioner be in attendance to ensure the condemned prisoner had been adequately sedated.
Medical societies argued their ethics prevented members from participating in executions, and the ensuing impasse and other difficulties — such as difficulty obtaining the drugs used in lethal injections —blocked all executions in the state for the next 10 years. As a result, there are now about 750 residents on San Quentin’s Death Row.
Opponents of capital punishment argued Proposition 62 could, within a few years, reduce state spending by about $150 million annually, by eliminating now-automatic direct appeals to the state Supreme Court of death sentences, and reducing many other death sentence appeals to state and federal courts, which can delay death sentences by years or even decades. Four years ago, by a 52 to 48 percent margin, California voters rejected a similar initiative to abolish the death penalty.
Proposition 62 actually received a lower percentage of positive votes (46.1 percent) than the 48 percent for the 2012 repeal effort, while opponents — drawing almost 54 percent of the vote, compared with 52 percent in 2012 — did better. This year’s repeal initiative garnered often-slim majorities in just 15 of the state’s 52 counties. It drew 60 percent or more favorable votes in just four counties (San Francisco, Marin, Alameda and Santa Cruz), but amassed negative votes of 70 percent or more in about a dozen other counties.
Competing initiative Proposition 66, on the other hand, explicitly retains the death sentence and limits appeals by revising post-sentencing procedures. Approved by about 51 percent of voters, it embodies the Death Penalty Savings and Reform Act, which directs California courts to adopt rules to expedite legal appeals in death sentence cases, sets new time limits for appeals and would draft lawyers to handle those limited appeals.
But a lawsuit filed by a former state attorney general against state officials the day after the election seeks to keep Proposition 66 from taking effect, arguing it conflicts with the state constitution by interfering with inmates’ rights to bring — and state courts’ powers to hear — appeals of death sentences. A decision on whether that challenge will be heard could come soon.
Proposition 62 sought to abolish the death penalty in California state courts, making life without parole the most severe sentence they could impose. In contrast, Proposition 66 called for retaining the death penalty while limiting and speeding up appeals of convictions in capital cases.
The Golden State has a fairly long and complex history with capital punishment. In 1972, a court ruling halted executions, only to see voters approve a ballot initiative reinstating the death penalty and more specifically defining the special circumstances in which it can be used. A 2006 decision by a federal judge in San Jose found fault with the way the state was carrying out lethal injections. After a botched lethal-injection execution in Oklahoma caused a Death Row convict obvious, intense pain, the judge ordered what was supposed to be a temporary moratorium on executions, and required that future executions have a doctor or other qualified health practitioner be in attendance to ensure the condemned prisoner had been adequately sedated.
Medical societies argued their ethics prevented members from participating in executions, and the ensuing impasse and other difficulties — such as difficulty obtaining the drugs used in lethal injections —blocked all executions in the state for the next 10 years. As a result, there are now about 750 residents on San Quentin’s Death Row.
Opponents of capital punishment argued Proposition 62 could, within a few years, reduce state spending by about $150 million annually, by eliminating now-automatic direct appeals to the state Supreme Court of death sentences, and reducing many other death sentence appeals to state and federal courts, which can delay death sentences by years or even decades. Four years ago, by a 52 to 48 percent margin, California voters rejected a similar initiative to abolish the death penalty.
Proposition 62 actually received a lower percentage of positive votes (46.1 percent) than the 48 percent for the 2012 repeal effort, while opponents — drawing almost 54 percent of the vote, compared with 52 percent in 2012 — did better. This year’s repeal initiative garnered often-slim majorities in just 15 of the state’s 52 counties. It drew 60 percent or more favorable votes in just four counties (San Francisco, Marin, Alameda and Santa Cruz), but amassed negative votes of 70 percent or more in about a dozen other counties.
Competing initiative Proposition 66, on the other hand, explicitly retains the death sentence and limits appeals by revising post-sentencing procedures. Approved by about 51 percent of voters, it embodies the Death Penalty Savings and Reform Act, which directs California courts to adopt rules to expedite legal appeals in death sentence cases, sets new time limits for appeals and would draft lawyers to handle those limited appeals.
But a lawsuit filed by a former state attorney general against state officials the day after the election seeks to keep Proposition 66 from taking effect, arguing it conflicts with the state constitution by interfering with inmates’ rights to bring — and state courts’ powers to hear — appeals of death sentences. A decision on whether that challenge will be heard could come soon.
Presidential Race Saw Sharp Differences on Criminal Justice Issues
Along with bitter personal attacks and accusations of criminality, this year’s presidential campaign highlighted sharp differences in perspective and policy preferences between major party candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Before we begin to get too deep into speculation over how the newly elected president will proceed in these areas, it’s probably useful to review some of the major controversies the candidates dealt with the area of criminal justice.
Crime Rate: What Direction Is It Heading?
As the nominee of the party out of power (until he takes office in 2017), Republican Donald Trump could be expected to criticize incumbent Democrats’ record on crime, and he quickly seized on what he maintained was an “out of control” crime rate. In a bid to establish himself as the “law and order” candidate, he charged the administration had drastically reduced criminal enforcement. Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, defended the record of the Obama administration in fighting crime, even claiming in a July appearance at Columbia University that crime had reached “historic lows.”
Judging by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s most recently issued crime statistics, however, there appears to be at least an element of truth in each candidate’s claims. The agency’s Uniform Crime Reporting System show a national 3.9 percent rise in violent crimes between 2014 and 2015, with a greater than 10 percent increase in murders, and even more extreme increases in Chicago and some other areas.
At the same time, however, the UCR system is far from perfect, since about 30 percent of police agencies opt not to send in their statistics, making comparisons inexact. Further, looking at longer periods than just a year-to-year comparison, crime rates have generally been declining, so an apparent recent spike may be just a tapering off long-term declines.
What Changes Should Be Made in Sentencing and Prison Policies?
Reducing sentences for drug offenses was a central feature of the Clinton campaign’s platform on crime, calling for cutting in half present-day mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent drug offenses, making retroactive legislation that reduced sentencing disparities for crack and powder cocaine, and no longer considering previous nonviolent drug convictions as plus factors in sentencing decisions. Despite his anti-crime speeches, Trump was far less specific on his proposals in the area.
The candidates also differed sharply on the issue of using private prisons for federal inmates: Clinton supported the Obama decision to phase them out for the Bureau of Prisons, while Trump indicated general support for federal prisons being privately owned and operated.
Ought Ex-Felons’ Voting Rights Be Restored?
Mirroring the controversy in Virginia, where Gov. Terry McAuliffe – the head of Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign – sought to issue a blanket restoration of voting rights to ex-felons who had completed their sentences, candidate Trump called such proposals “crooked politics,” accusing Democrats of having political advantage as their real motive for seeking that change.
In contrast, the platform on which Hillary Clinton ran called not only for voting rights restoration, but also for “ban the box” legislation and a presidential executive order requiring federal contractors and employers not to screen out job applicants with criminal records.
Crime Rate: What Direction Is It Heading?
As the nominee of the party out of power (until he takes office in 2017), Republican Donald Trump could be expected to criticize incumbent Democrats’ record on crime, and he quickly seized on what he maintained was an “out of control” crime rate. In a bid to establish himself as the “law and order” candidate, he charged the administration had drastically reduced criminal enforcement. Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, defended the record of the Obama administration in fighting crime, even claiming in a July appearance at Columbia University that crime had reached “historic lows.”
Judging by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s most recently issued crime statistics, however, there appears to be at least an element of truth in each candidate’s claims. The agency’s Uniform Crime Reporting System show a national 3.9 percent rise in violent crimes between 2014 and 2015, with a greater than 10 percent increase in murders, and even more extreme increases in Chicago and some other areas.
At the same time, however, the UCR system is far from perfect, since about 30 percent of police agencies opt not to send in their statistics, making comparisons inexact. Further, looking at longer periods than just a year-to-year comparison, crime rates have generally been declining, so an apparent recent spike may be just a tapering off long-term declines.
What Changes Should Be Made in Sentencing and Prison Policies?
Reducing sentences for drug offenses was a central feature of the Clinton campaign’s platform on crime, calling for cutting in half present-day mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent drug offenses, making retroactive legislation that reduced sentencing disparities for crack and powder cocaine, and no longer considering previous nonviolent drug convictions as plus factors in sentencing decisions. Despite his anti-crime speeches, Trump was far less specific on his proposals in the area.
The candidates also differed sharply on the issue of using private prisons for federal inmates: Clinton supported the Obama decision to phase them out for the Bureau of Prisons, while Trump indicated general support for federal prisons being privately owned and operated.
Ought Ex-Felons’ Voting Rights Be Restored?
Mirroring the controversy in Virginia, where Gov. Terry McAuliffe – the head of Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign – sought to issue a blanket restoration of voting rights to ex-felons who had completed their sentences, candidate Trump called such proposals “crooked politics,” accusing Democrats of having political advantage as their real motive for seeking that change.
In contrast, the platform on which Hillary Clinton ran called not only for voting rights restoration, but also for “ban the box” legislation and a presidential executive order requiring federal contractors and employers not to screen out job applicants with criminal records.
November 4, 2016
Obama’s Commutations Continue, But What About Pardons?
With two more batches of sentence commutations granted in October, President Obama now holds a couple of records in that area.
By issuing commutations for 102 federal inmates on Oct. 6, followed by 98 more on Oct. 27, he set the record for commutations in a single year. His total for 2016 reached 688 – more in a single year than any other president. A few months earlier, on Aug. 3, he also claimed the all-time single-day record by issuing 214 commutations.
Thus far in his presidency, Obama has handed 872 federal inmates shorter sentences, second only to the 1,366 commutations total issued by Woodrow Wilson, mostly after World War I. Since the White House says the president will continue to issue meritorious commutations through the rest of his term, Wilson’s record could yet be broken.
But when it comes to another, broader form of clemency – issuing full presidential pardons – the administration has made far less of a mark. As of the first week of October, Obama had issued only 70 pardons since taking office. That’s well behind the pace for presidential pardons by his other two-term predecessors: Bill Clinton issued 396; Ronald Reagan granted 393; and George W. Bush handed out 189. In fact, as of this writing, Obama has granted the fewest presidential pardons of any two-term president since George Washington.
Commutations shorten sentences but do not affect post-release restrictions, such as parole or restrictions on the right to possess firearms. A significant number of the Obama-issued commutations have been conditioned on inmates enrolling in residential drug treatment before being released – which led one inmate to refuse to accept his commutation. Full pardons, on the other hand, bring full legal forgiveness, effectively wiping out record of a crime.
Several factors may help to explain Obama’s relative lack of attention to pardons. First, ever since the administration announced its new clemency initiative in mid-2014, commutations have virtually monopolized its clemency efforts. If you don’t count pardons handed to four Iranians as part of a prisoner exchange earlier this year (which go through a different process than pardons for federal inmates), Obama has only granted two pardons since December 2014.
The administration could argue it had no choice but to focus almost exclusively on commutations, since its clemency initiative, as well as retroactive changes in federal sentencing guidelines for some drug offenses, produced a huge wave of commutation applications — over 29,000, by official records. Another possible reason is that pardons may have become politically more suspect, due to historic situations like President Ford’s pardon of Richard Nixon, George H.W. Bush’s pardons of figures in the Iran-Contra scandal, and Bill Clinton’s issuing 140 pardons on his final day in office, including one to a fugitive financier whose former wife was a major contributor to the Democratic party.
The imbalance between sentence commutations and pardons may be about to end, however. Fielding a question on the disparity at an August news conference, Obama acknowledged his administration had “focused more on commutations than… pardons," but said that by the time he leaves office, he will have issued pardons “roughly in line” with the numbers granted by other presidents.
By issuing commutations for 102 federal inmates on Oct. 6, followed by 98 more on Oct. 27, he set the record for commutations in a single year. His total for 2016 reached 688 – more in a single year than any other president. A few months earlier, on Aug. 3, he also claimed the all-time single-day record by issuing 214 commutations.
Thus far in his presidency, Obama has handed 872 federal inmates shorter sentences, second only to the 1,366 commutations total issued by Woodrow Wilson, mostly after World War I. Since the White House says the president will continue to issue meritorious commutations through the rest of his term, Wilson’s record could yet be broken.
But when it comes to another, broader form of clemency – issuing full presidential pardons – the administration has made far less of a mark. As of the first week of October, Obama had issued only 70 pardons since taking office. That’s well behind the pace for presidential pardons by his other two-term predecessors: Bill Clinton issued 396; Ronald Reagan granted 393; and George W. Bush handed out 189. In fact, as of this writing, Obama has granted the fewest presidential pardons of any two-term president since George Washington.
Commutations shorten sentences but do not affect post-release restrictions, such as parole or restrictions on the right to possess firearms. A significant number of the Obama-issued commutations have been conditioned on inmates enrolling in residential drug treatment before being released – which led one inmate to refuse to accept his commutation. Full pardons, on the other hand, bring full legal forgiveness, effectively wiping out record of a crime.
Several factors may help to explain Obama’s relative lack of attention to pardons. First, ever since the administration announced its new clemency initiative in mid-2014, commutations have virtually monopolized its clemency efforts. If you don’t count pardons handed to four Iranians as part of a prisoner exchange earlier this year (which go through a different process than pardons for federal inmates), Obama has only granted two pardons since December 2014.
The administration could argue it had no choice but to focus almost exclusively on commutations, since its clemency initiative, as well as retroactive changes in federal sentencing guidelines for some drug offenses, produced a huge wave of commutation applications — over 29,000, by official records. Another possible reason is that pardons may have become politically more suspect, due to historic situations like President Ford’s pardon of Richard Nixon, George H.W. Bush’s pardons of figures in the Iran-Contra scandal, and Bill Clinton’s issuing 140 pardons on his final day in office, including one to a fugitive financier whose former wife was a major contributor to the Democratic party.
The imbalance between sentence commutations and pardons may be about to end, however. Fielding a question on the disparity at an August news conference, Obama acknowledged his administration had “focused more on commutations than… pardons," but said that by the time he leaves office, he will have issued pardons “roughly in line” with the numbers granted by other presidents.
October 31, 2016
Proposed Rules Could Ease Inmate Child-Support Payments
Time is growing short for the Obama administration to act on rules it proposed almost two years ago to revamp federal rules on child support.
One significant part of the November 2014 proposal from the Office of Child Support Enforcement in the Department of Health and Human Services would redefine inmates’ child-support requirements. A White House official acknowledges a final redraft of the regulations has been under review there since July, and predicts it will be adopted before Obama leaves in January.
Child-support payments are often a problem for inmates, since they have virtually no income while incarcerated and may become deeply indebted for child support payments they cannot make. An administration study in 2010 showed nearly 29,000 of the 51,000 federal inmates subject to child-support orders were not keeping up with required payments, with an average shortfall almost $24,000.
When released, inmates may face sizeable debts for missed child support payments — usually with accumulating interest, fees and penalties — adding to their obstacles to re-entering society. Most states allow modification of child-support requirements for incarcerated parents, but more than a dozen won’t permit it.
Surely it makes sense to let newly released inmates concentrate on finding employment as a first step in rebuilding their lives. Having a sizable outstanding debt or even a civil judgment for non-payment of child support makes it far more difficult to find work. In some states, child-support debt nonpayment can even send an inmate back to prison or jail — the modern-day equivalent of long-ago debtors’ prisons.
Why hand taxpayers the tab for sending ex-offenders back behind bars, when they are ready to make a fresh start? Especially since doing so in no way helps a child-support system’s intended beneficiaries. And, under the Supreme Court’s 2011 Turner v. Rogers decision, when facing possible imprisonment for child-support nonpayment, even indigent defendants have no right to assistance by a court-appointed lawyer, making incarceration for unmet child-support requirements all the more likely.
The Obama administration’s draft child-support rule would require all states to let inmates modify child-support orders, and mandate that state courts base their orders on a prisoner's actual income.
It would also end the practice, currently found in the child-support programs of a dozen or so states, of equating incarceration with “voluntary unemployment." This applies when, for example, a parent refuses to work in order to reduce earnings the state uses in calculating the amount of child support the parent must pay. In such cases, the state is authorized to look at the parent’s available assets and lifestyle, assign a more realistic figure, and block the parent from seeking a reduction in required payments.
True, the administration’s broader child-support proposal has drawn opposition from some Capitol Hill Republicans, who have attacked it as another example of the administration trying to legislate by regulation, bypassing Congress. But even if there may be debatable issues with other sections of the wide-ranging proposal, shouldn’t everyone be able to agree that it does no good to impose unrealistic payment demands on inmates, much less treat them as voluntarily seeking refuge in prison in order to shirk child-support obligations?
One significant part of the November 2014 proposal from the Office of Child Support Enforcement in the Department of Health and Human Services would redefine inmates’ child-support requirements. A White House official acknowledges a final redraft of the regulations has been under review there since July, and predicts it will be adopted before Obama leaves in January.
Child-support payments are often a problem for inmates, since they have virtually no income while incarcerated and may become deeply indebted for child support payments they cannot make. An administration study in 2010 showed nearly 29,000 of the 51,000 federal inmates subject to child-support orders were not keeping up with required payments, with an average shortfall almost $24,000.
When released, inmates may face sizeable debts for missed child support payments — usually with accumulating interest, fees and penalties — adding to their obstacles to re-entering society. Most states allow modification of child-support requirements for incarcerated parents, but more than a dozen won’t permit it.
Surely it makes sense to let newly released inmates concentrate on finding employment as a first step in rebuilding their lives. Having a sizable outstanding debt or even a civil judgment for non-payment of child support makes it far more difficult to find work. In some states, child-support debt nonpayment can even send an inmate back to prison or jail — the modern-day equivalent of long-ago debtors’ prisons.
Why hand taxpayers the tab for sending ex-offenders back behind bars, when they are ready to make a fresh start? Especially since doing so in no way helps a child-support system’s intended beneficiaries. And, under the Supreme Court’s 2011 Turner v. Rogers decision, when facing possible imprisonment for child-support nonpayment, even indigent defendants have no right to assistance by a court-appointed lawyer, making incarceration for unmet child-support requirements all the more likely.
The Obama administration’s draft child-support rule would require all states to let inmates modify child-support orders, and mandate that state courts base their orders on a prisoner's actual income.
It would also end the practice, currently found in the child-support programs of a dozen or so states, of equating incarceration with “voluntary unemployment." This applies when, for example, a parent refuses to work in order to reduce earnings the state uses in calculating the amount of child support the parent must pay. In such cases, the state is authorized to look at the parent’s available assets and lifestyle, assign a more realistic figure, and block the parent from seeking a reduction in required payments.
True, the administration’s broader child-support proposal has drawn opposition from some Capitol Hill Republicans, who have attacked it as another example of the administration trying to legislate by regulation, bypassing Congress. But even if there may be debatable issues with other sections of the wide-ranging proposal, shouldn’t everyone be able to agree that it does no good to impose unrealistic payment demands on inmates, much less treat them as voluntarily seeking refuge in prison in order to shirk child-support obligations?
More Than 6 Million Blocked From November Vote Due to Criminal Records
More than six million citizens will be handcuffed from voting this November.
After updating a study it did four years ago, The Sentencing Project released the estimated number of Americans that won’t be permitted to vote in this year’s elections due to their criminal records. Using new Census data on the voting age population, and adjusting for recent changes in state disenfranchisement laws, the study placed the number of disenfranchised ex-felons at 6.1 million.
The number of disenfranchised persons has climbed alongside the growth in incarceration totals. Forty years ago, an estimated 1.1 million people had lost their voting rights due to criminal convictions. Twenty years later, the total had risen to 3.3 million. In 2000, the number reached 4.7 million, rose to 5.4 million by 2004, and to 5.9 million by 2010, according to a study released in 2012 by some of the same authors of the most recent study.
Many will find it surprising that less than a quarter of these people — roughly 23% of those unable to vote due to criminal records — are currently incarcerated. The study indicated that 77% of the disenfranchised live among us in our nation’s communities. Those who have completed their sentences number nearly three million and make up 51% of the disenfranchised. Citizens on probation for felonies account for over 1.1 million — about 18% of the total. Over half a million, comprising about 8% of the total, are parolees.
State disenfranchisement rates for this year’s elections will vary substantially, largely due to differences in how broadly the state’s provisions apply. Fourteen states disenfranchise only those currently in prison, while four states also include those released on parole. Disenfranchisement laws in 18 more states also cover former inmates out on probation, and 12 states include former inmates who have completed their sentences, including parole or probation. Only Maine and Vermont currently let inmates vote in their elections, and thus have no disenfranchised voters.
Seven states disenfranchise less than half a percentage of their population, while the rates in the rates in six southern states hit over 7%. The new study notes that felony disenfranchisement laws “vary tremendously across racial and ethnic groups,” with more Hispanics and African-Americans affected. In some states — Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia — disenfranchisement rates for African Americans make up more than 20% of the voting age population, and that rate is 5% or higher in 23 states.
Despite the large and growing numbers of current or former inmates unable to vote, the trend in recent years has been to eliminate or reduce barriers to former prisoners’ voting. The best-known recent instance is Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe’s issuance of an executive order earlier this year, attempting to restore voting rights for all Virginians who had completed their sentences. However, after a court found that exceeded his legal powers, he issued separate orders restoring voting rights to nearly 13,000 individuals in August.
A number of states have begun processes to return voting rights to those with criminal records. In Alabama, legislators simplified the voting rights restoration process for those who had completed sentences for crimes not involving moral turpitude. California restored voting rights for convicted felons residing in jails (but not in prisons). Maryland lifted disenfranchisement for those on parole or probation. And Wyoming restored voting rights after five years for those who completed sentences for first-time, non-violent felonies.
After updating a study it did four years ago, The Sentencing Project released the estimated number of Americans that won’t be permitted to vote in this year’s elections due to their criminal records. Using new Census data on the voting age population, and adjusting for recent changes in state disenfranchisement laws, the study placed the number of disenfranchised ex-felons at 6.1 million.
The number of disenfranchised persons has climbed alongside the growth in incarceration totals. Forty years ago, an estimated 1.1 million people had lost their voting rights due to criminal convictions. Twenty years later, the total had risen to 3.3 million. In 2000, the number reached 4.7 million, rose to 5.4 million by 2004, and to 5.9 million by 2010, according to a study released in 2012 by some of the same authors of the most recent study.
Many will find it surprising that less than a quarter of these people — roughly 23% of those unable to vote due to criminal records — are currently incarcerated. The study indicated that 77% of the disenfranchised live among us in our nation’s communities. Those who have completed their sentences number nearly three million and make up 51% of the disenfranchised. Citizens on probation for felonies account for over 1.1 million — about 18% of the total. Over half a million, comprising about 8% of the total, are parolees.
State disenfranchisement rates for this year’s elections will vary substantially, largely due to differences in how broadly the state’s provisions apply. Fourteen states disenfranchise only those currently in prison, while four states also include those released on parole. Disenfranchisement laws in 18 more states also cover former inmates out on probation, and 12 states include former inmates who have completed their sentences, including parole or probation. Only Maine and Vermont currently let inmates vote in their elections, and thus have no disenfranchised voters.
Seven states disenfranchise less than half a percentage of their population, while the rates in the rates in six southern states hit over 7%. The new study notes that felony disenfranchisement laws “vary tremendously across racial and ethnic groups,” with more Hispanics and African-Americans affected. In some states — Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia — disenfranchisement rates for African Americans make up more than 20% of the voting age population, and that rate is 5% or higher in 23 states.
Despite the large and growing numbers of current or former inmates unable to vote, the trend in recent years has been to eliminate or reduce barriers to former prisoners’ voting. The best-known recent instance is Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe’s issuance of an executive order earlier this year, attempting to restore voting rights for all Virginians who had completed their sentences. However, after a court found that exceeded his legal powers, he issued separate orders restoring voting rights to nearly 13,000 individuals in August.
A number of states have begun processes to return voting rights to those with criminal records. In Alabama, legislators simplified the voting rights restoration process for those who had completed sentences for crimes not involving moral turpitude. California restored voting rights for convicted felons residing in jails (but not in prisons). Maryland lifted disenfranchisement for those on parole or probation. And Wyoming restored voting rights after five years for those who completed sentences for first-time, non-violent felonies.
Can Nationwide Prison Labor Strike Organizers Back Up Claims of Success?
You may have heard about a recent event described by its backers as the “largest prison strike in history,” designed to confront the issue of forced prison labor. A nationwide prisoners strike was scheduled to start on Friday, September 9th, the 45th anniversary of the uprising at the Attica Prison in western New York.
You can readily find uncritical claims that the alleged nationwide movement to refuse work assignments saw large numbers of inmates in 24 states participate. Estimates in some accounts range as high as 24,000 — about 1% of all inmates nationwide, or approaching 3% of the estimated 900,000 inmates working for pay. But what seems to be missing is any solid substantiation of claims about the size of the strike, much less its effectiveness.
For one thing, The Marshall Project puts the number of states where inmates participated in strike-related activities at 12, not 24. And lower figure could even be an exaggeration. Admittedly, it’s no easy task to track what actually happens inside a prison, if inmates have little or no ability to report their actions and responses by prison officials, or to communicate with the outside world. Some accounts of the alleged strike noted organizers used contraband cellphones.
But even by accounts emerging since September 9th, there’s scant evidence of widespread or sustained inmate participation. A look at some responses most publicized by the strike backers strengthens, rather than dispels, skepticism surrounding claims of a massive response to the national strike call. Take, for instance, reports from Alabama’s troubled Holman Correctional Facility, which strike backers identify as one of the most active institutions, with the Free Alabama Movement, a group of Holman inmates, their families and other backers, spearheading the movement. But even at this hotbed, backers could point to only 45 inmates who answered the call for a strike by staying in their cells rather than reporting to their job assignments — though backers later claimed credit for a reported walkout by nine correction officers there. But it's more likely that, rather than showing solidarity with striking workers, the guards were protesting their own working conditions in the notoriously violence-prone, understaffed facility.
At one correctional facility on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, kitchen staff and some other inmate workers refused to report to work; demonstrations followed the next day, and fires and vandalism rendered two residential units unlivable. About 150 inmates regarded as ringleaders were transferred to other prisons. Florida also saw some demonstrations and destruction of dorms at a Panhandle prison. Corrections officials in several other states claimed by strike backers as active deny that any work refusals or stoppages happened.
The most outspoken backer of the event is the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee (IWOC), an arm of the International Workers of the World, a long-time international union with a taste for revolutionary rhetoric (from your high school American history textbook, you may recall the “Wobblies” of the IWW). IWOC’s manifesto exhorts inmates to refuse to work while incarcerated, or in its words, to “end slavery in America.” The union’s ultimate goal, apparently, is not to abolish prison labor, but instead to unionize inmates and to press collectively for higher pay and better working conditions, and to raise prison wages to discourage use of prison labor by making it less profitable.
You can readily find uncritical claims that the alleged nationwide movement to refuse work assignments saw large numbers of inmates in 24 states participate. Estimates in some accounts range as high as 24,000 — about 1% of all inmates nationwide, or approaching 3% of the estimated 900,000 inmates working for pay. But what seems to be missing is any solid substantiation of claims about the size of the strike, much less its effectiveness.
For one thing, The Marshall Project puts the number of states where inmates participated in strike-related activities at 12, not 24. And lower figure could even be an exaggeration. Admittedly, it’s no easy task to track what actually happens inside a prison, if inmates have little or no ability to report their actions and responses by prison officials, or to communicate with the outside world. Some accounts of the alleged strike noted organizers used contraband cellphones.
But even by accounts emerging since September 9th, there’s scant evidence of widespread or sustained inmate participation. A look at some responses most publicized by the strike backers strengthens, rather than dispels, skepticism surrounding claims of a massive response to the national strike call. Take, for instance, reports from Alabama’s troubled Holman Correctional Facility, which strike backers identify as one of the most active institutions, with the Free Alabama Movement, a group of Holman inmates, their families and other backers, spearheading the movement. But even at this hotbed, backers could point to only 45 inmates who answered the call for a strike by staying in their cells rather than reporting to their job assignments — though backers later claimed credit for a reported walkout by nine correction officers there. But it's more likely that, rather than showing solidarity with striking workers, the guards were protesting their own working conditions in the notoriously violence-prone, understaffed facility.
At one correctional facility on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, kitchen staff and some other inmate workers refused to report to work; demonstrations followed the next day, and fires and vandalism rendered two residential units unlivable. About 150 inmates regarded as ringleaders were transferred to other prisons. Florida also saw some demonstrations and destruction of dorms at a Panhandle prison. Corrections officials in several other states claimed by strike backers as active deny that any work refusals or stoppages happened.
The most outspoken backer of the event is the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee (IWOC), an arm of the International Workers of the World, a long-time international union with a taste for revolutionary rhetoric (from your high school American history textbook, you may recall the “Wobblies” of the IWW). IWOC’s manifesto exhorts inmates to refuse to work while incarcerated, or in its words, to “end slavery in America.” The union’s ultimate goal, apparently, is not to abolish prison labor, but instead to unionize inmates and to press collectively for higher pay and better working conditions, and to raise prison wages to discourage use of prison labor by making it less profitable.
Federal Grand Jury Charges 80 in Maryland Prison Rackets
It's an explosive story that reads like it came straight out of the script of one of the hottest prison-centered TV shows.
A pair of sweeping new federal indictments have resulted in charges for 80 people, including 18 corrections officials, 35 inmates and 27 outside facilitators, with being part of a major smuggling and racketeering conspiracy inside the Eastern Correctional Institution (ECI), in Westover, Maryland. With over 3,300 inmates, the medium-security men’s facility is Maryland’s largest state prison.
In an October 5 press conference, U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein outlined charges including smuggling of drugs and other contraband, bribery of corrections officials, and denial of civil rights—stemming from two separate nstances this July when corrections officials allegedly got inmates to stab other inmates suspected of informing on their illegal activities.
The detailed indictments sketch a conspiracy in which inmates used money, and in some cases sexual favors, to persuade corrections officials to smuggle a wide variety of contraband into the prison, primarily drugs–including heroin, cocaine, ecstasy, oxycodone, marijuana, synthetic marijuana and Suboxone, a much-abused drug prescribed to treat heroin addiction–along with cellphones, pornographic DVDs, and tobacco.
Separate indictments were issued for each of ECI’s two four-unit compounds, and each indictment named nine different corrections officials for smuggling contraband into the prison by hiding it on their persons to evade security searches, or retrieving it from their cars during work breaks. Once the contraband was inside the prison, the corrections officials would distribute it to inmates in their cells, or deliver it to pre-selected stash locations.
Inmates with work assignments allowing them to travel outside their cells would retrieve dropped-off contraband, deliver it to customers, and arrange to pay corrections officials, either directly or with the aid of persons outside the prison.
The indictments also claim corrections officials warned inmates involved in the conspiracy when prison searches were scheduled so that contraband could be hidden. They also warned their confederates when an inmate was thought to be trying to inform prison authorities of the illegal activities. Four corrections officials and four inmates were named in two incidents of stabbings of suspected informers.
The indictments show the contraband trade was lucrative. For example, a thin strip of Suboxone retailing for $3 outside could fetch $50 inside ECI. Smuggled cellphones were used for internal communications. The indictments contain excerpts of conversations on smuggled cellphones or prison communications systems. The normal rate for a correction official to smuggle in a package was $500, the indictments claim, with payments made in cash, money orders, or through PayPal, transacted inside prison directly by cellphone, or outside through assistants using mailboxes.
The conspiracy apparently came to light through a whistleblowing corrections official. Stephen Moyer, who took over as Secretary of the state’s Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services last year, said he put eight investigators to work on the case, and drew on assistance from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other state and federal agencies.
Defendants could receive up to 20 years in prison for racketeering and for the drug smuggling conspiracy. Those involved in the stabbings of suspected informants could get up to another 10 years. While the alleged ECI conspiracy appears to be Maryland’s largest prison scandal to date, it is not an isolated incident. Contraband smuggling in Maryland corrections facilities prompted 44 federal indictments in 2014 and 24 in 2009.
A pair of sweeping new federal indictments have resulted in charges for 80 people, including 18 corrections officials, 35 inmates and 27 outside facilitators, with being part of a major smuggling and racketeering conspiracy inside the Eastern Correctional Institution (ECI), in Westover, Maryland. With over 3,300 inmates, the medium-security men’s facility is Maryland’s largest state prison.
In an October 5 press conference, U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein outlined charges including smuggling of drugs and other contraband, bribery of corrections officials, and denial of civil rights—stemming from two separate nstances this July when corrections officials allegedly got inmates to stab other inmates suspected of informing on their illegal activities.
The detailed indictments sketch a conspiracy in which inmates used money, and in some cases sexual favors, to persuade corrections officials to smuggle a wide variety of contraband into the prison, primarily drugs–including heroin, cocaine, ecstasy, oxycodone, marijuana, synthetic marijuana and Suboxone, a much-abused drug prescribed to treat heroin addiction–along with cellphones, pornographic DVDs, and tobacco.
Separate indictments were issued for each of ECI’s two four-unit compounds, and each indictment named nine different corrections officials for smuggling contraband into the prison by hiding it on their persons to evade security searches, or retrieving it from their cars during work breaks. Once the contraband was inside the prison, the corrections officials would distribute it to inmates in their cells, or deliver it to pre-selected stash locations.
Inmates with work assignments allowing them to travel outside their cells would retrieve dropped-off contraband, deliver it to customers, and arrange to pay corrections officials, either directly or with the aid of persons outside the prison.
The indictments also claim corrections officials warned inmates involved in the conspiracy when prison searches were scheduled so that contraband could be hidden. They also warned their confederates when an inmate was thought to be trying to inform prison authorities of the illegal activities. Four corrections officials and four inmates were named in two incidents of stabbings of suspected informers.
The indictments show the contraband trade was lucrative. For example, a thin strip of Suboxone retailing for $3 outside could fetch $50 inside ECI. Smuggled cellphones were used for internal communications. The indictments contain excerpts of conversations on smuggled cellphones or prison communications systems. The normal rate for a correction official to smuggle in a package was $500, the indictments claim, with payments made in cash, money orders, or through PayPal, transacted inside prison directly by cellphone, or outside through assistants using mailboxes.
The conspiracy apparently came to light through a whistleblowing corrections official. Stephen Moyer, who took over as Secretary of the state’s Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services last year, said he put eight investigators to work on the case, and drew on assistance from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other state and federal agencies.
Defendants could receive up to 20 years in prison for racketeering and for the drug smuggling conspiracy. Those involved in the stabbings of suspected informants could get up to another 10 years. While the alleged ECI conspiracy appears to be Maryland’s largest prison scandal to date, it is not an isolated incident. Contraband smuggling in Maryland corrections facilities prompted 44 federal indictments in 2014 and 24 in 2009.
