United States District Court Magistrate Rules on Discovery Issues in Prison Gang Death
On November 21, 2013, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Hawaii, a magistrate judge denied in part and granted in part the plaintiff’s motion to compel CCA records of practices that were a moving force in Bronson Nunuha’s death. Bronson Nunuha was attacked and killed by two other Hawaiian prisoners in his cell in the Special Housing Incentive Program area of Saguaro Correctional Center (SCC) in Eloy, Arizona, per a correctional service agreement between Hawaii’s department of corrections and Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), to address problems with Hawaiian prison gang members. The attack occurred on February 18, 2010, after Nunuha was threatened by United Samoan Organization (USO) members and after his request to be transferred to a safer housing area.
The plaintiffs, Nunuha’s family, filed suit against the State of Hawaii on February 15, 2012, asserting claims of wrongful death, negligence/gross negligence, cruel and unusual punishment, deprivation of substantive due process, and violation of Nunuha’s rights as expressed in the First, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution.
The plaintiffs sought four classes of documents:
- Disciplinary records of the 29 SCC prisoners. ...
Study Details States’ Abuses of Out-Of-State Prisoner Transfers to For-Profit Prisons
by Derek Gilna
The corrections industry maintains that one of its priorities is to help detainees maintain ties with their family and communities to assist them in reintegrating back into society after their release. However, a new study, by the non-partisan Grassroots Leadership Organization, has shown that the practice of interstate transfers to for-profit facilities is contrary to that goal. Currently over 10,500 state prisoners are confined from 450 to 3,000 miles from their home in for-profit institutions, according to the study, showing that making money trumps rehabilitation.
According to the report, “the interstate transfer of prisoners to for-profit private prisons across the U.S. impedes prisoner rehabilitation, diminishes prisoners’ ties to family and community, serves the interests of an industry that views prisoners as commodities, and perpetuates our nation’s mass incarceration crisis, compromising rather than enhancing the public good and public safety.” The study further notes that as incarceration has increased in the United States over the past few decades, the “for-profit prison industry (is) a significant, yet hidden, apparatus that perpetuates mass incarceration.”
Such out-of-state transfers of state prisoners are only one facet of the insidious influence of ...
Vermont Seeks to Improve Management of Prisoner Medical Costs
by Derek Gilna
Vermonters have a well-deserved reputation for fiscal responsibility, so it is no surprise that State Auditor Doug Hoffer’s 2013 audit report detailing spending on Vermont’s in-state prisoners was critical of a $4.2 million deficit, over the past three-year period, out of total budget of $49.1 million. With respect to outside contractor Correct Care Solutions (CCS), Hoffer noted that “cost monitoring was not robust during the earlier years of the contract, but has improved since late 2012.”
Vermont’s contract with the company calls for a “cost-plus management fee” method of reimbursement, which the auditor feels gives the contractor no incentive to reduce costs. He also pointed to several instances wherein state officials could have been more diligent in recovering medical reimbursement when prisoners were covered by other insurance programs or by Medicare or Medicaid. The audit turned up one example where CCS failed to bill Medicaid for a prisoner’s medical procedure which cost the state $84,000.
The report was noteworthy for another reason; it made clear that adequate medical care for prisoners was a priority for Vermont. Vermont Director of Corrections, Dr. Dee Burroughs Biron, said, “Maybe they have ...
Prison Health Services Must Indemnify Vermont against Wrongful Death Claims
by Mark Wilson
On December 20, 2013, the Vermont Supreme Court held that Corizon Health, Inc. – formerly Prison Health Services, Inc. (PHS) – was required to defend the State against a wrongful death action brought by a prisoner’s estate.
In January 2007, PHS entered into a $24 million contract with Vermont to provide prisoner medical care. The contract required PHS to defend the State against any claims arising from PHS’ acts or omissions.
On August 14, 2009, Ashley Ellis began serving a 30-day sentence. Due to an eating disorder, she weighed just 90 pounds and “suffered from hypokalemia, a life-threatening condition linked to dangerously low potassium levels.” Prior to admission, prison officials were alerted that Ellis “was taking a potassium supplement called K-Clor to treat the hypokalemia.” When Ellis entered the facility, PHS was short staffed, had no potassium supplement in stock and did not obtain any.
On the morning of August 16, 2009, a guard found Ellis “nonresponsive in her cell.” Neither PHS staff nor guards could “locate a cardiopulmonary-resuscitation (CPR) mouth guard, delaying resuscitation attempts.” Ellis died and the cause of death was found to be “a ...
Mississippi Private Prisons Have High Prisoner Assault Rates
by Matt Clarke
A report on the number of prisoners assaulted in Mississippi prisons shows that the assault rates in private prisons average two to three times the rate of assaults in state-run prisons. One extreme example, the Walnut Grove Correctional Facility (WCGF), had a prisoner assault rate of 27 per 100 prisoners while the highest prisoner assault rate in a state-run prison was 7 per 100. The GEO Group ran WGCF and two other Mississippi prisons until it left the state in 2012. Management and Training Corporation (MTC), which currently runs WGCF and Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) continue to operate private prisons in Mississippi.
"On its face, that's a huge disparity [between violence rates at private prisons and state prisons]. If inmates in private prisons are not as safe as those in the state [prisons], something needs to be done about it," said prisoners’ rights attorney Ron Welch.
"The PEER (Performance Evaluation and Expenditure Review) committee should investigate and come up with recommendations as to whether the [private prison] contracts need to be changed, whether there are performance requirements that ought to be included."
The use of private prisons in ...
$1,250 Settlement for CCA Prisoner Subjected to Pepper Spray
Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) reached a $1,250 settlement in a prisoner’s negligence claim stemming from the improper use of chemical agents and failure to provide proper medical care afterwards.
While housed at the West Tennessee State Penitentiary, prisoner Edward C. ...
First Circuit Reverses Summary Judgment for Retaliation Claim
On February 6, 2013, the First Circuit Court of Appeals reversed summary judgment granted to Correctional Medical Services, Inc. ("CMS") for an alleged retaliation claim under the Americans with Disabilities Act.
In spring 2007, Katherine Kelley, a licensed practical nurse, was employed by CMS at the Maine State Prison. While horseback riding in July 2007, she injured the right side of her pelvis and required surgery. She took a six-week medical leave of absence. CMS sent Kelley's supervisor Theresa Kesteloot as her interim replacement.
Kelley returned to work on September 17, 2007 with a medical note on her restrictions. Kesteloot refused to let Kelley return to work because the restrictions were not on the appropriate CMS form. The director of nursing overruled her, allowing Kelley to return to work with crutches.
Of the three stations at the prison, the main clinic, the infirmary, and the close unit, Kelley primarily worked at the infirmary and the main clinic and occasionally responded to code blues at the prison using her crutches. Experiencing leg and health problems over a period of time, her physician authorized the use of a cane and limited her work time ...
Ohio Appellate Court Orders Review of State Budget Over Private Prison Sale
by Gary Hunter
Ohio Governor John Kasich joined legislators in protesting an order by Ohio’s Tenth District Court of Appeals that instructed a trial court to edit the state’s biennial budget bill. The appellate court held that lawmakers had violated the “one subject/one bill” rule of Ohio’s Constitution when they inserted a prison privatization proviso in the budget.
In October 2013, the Ohio Court of Appeals unanimously found that lawmakers had improperly enacted a law that allowed for the sale and privatization of up to five state prisons. The Court overturned a trial court’s dismissal of the complaint, filed by the Ohio Civil Service Employees Association (OSCEA) and Progress Ohio, and ruled that the private prison language had “no rational reason” for being included in the budget.
As a result of the provision in the budget bill, state officials sold one prison, the Lake Erie Correctional Facility, to Corrections Corporation of America in 2011 for $72 million. The state pays CCA to house Ohio prisoners at the facility, at a cost of $29 million per year plus an annual ownership fee of almost $4 million. [See: PLN, Nov. ...
Pennsylvania Detainee’s Estate Claims Financial Incentive Motive for Denial of Medical Care; $325,000 Settlement
by David Reutter
A Pennsylvania federal district court ordered medical personnel employed by Correctional Medical Care, Inc. (CMC) to face claims brought by the estate of a pre-trial detainee who died from alleged deliberate indifference to ...
Presidential Candidate Bernie Sanders Files “Justice is Not for Sale Act”
by Derek Gilna
Democratic presidential candidate and U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, along with Rep. Raul Grijalva of Arizona in the House, filed companion bills on September 17, 2015 to address some of the many problems in the U.S. criminal justice system. The highlights of their legislation include abolishing all for-profit prisons and reinstating parole for federal prisoners.
The proposed legislation, which must pass both houses of Congress before being signed into law by the President, also takes aim at various other criminal justice issues – including a quota that requires Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to incarcerate 34,000 detainees at any given time. The bill further addresses excessive charges for prison phone calls and money transfer services, requires ICE to better monitor its facilities and ends the detention of immigrant families.
Senator Sanders, who has advocated other social reforms, including raising the minimum wage and increasing oversight of large banks, noted in a press release that announced the filing of his bill that the private prison industry generates billions of dollars in annual revenues and employs teams of lobbyists to persuade government officials to continue mass incarceration ...
