November 06, 2009
NY: Families Rally for Emancipation and Empowerment launches our original Survival Guide
Allied Sister and Brothers!!
I really hope you can come out and support! And, remember - if you can't attend the event, you can still help us reach our goal of raising $5,000 to distribute this unique Survival Guide!
Imagine learning that someone you love has just been sentenced to prison – where do you turn? What should you expect? How do you keep yourself and your family together?
Families Rally for Emancipation and Empowerment launches our original Survival Guide, on November 14, 2009 - a unique reference created BY and FOR people with incarcerated loved ones. And now YOU have an OPPORTUNITY to make sure that information gets into the hands of those who need it most! Don’t miss this exciting event!
FREE! IS RAISING $5,000 TO DISTRIBUTE OUR "SURVIVAL GUIDE" FOR FAMILIES AND WE NEED YOUR HELP! IF 100 PEOPLE DONATE JUST $50 EACH WE WILL REACH OUR GOAL QUICKLY! ALL DONATIONS OF $25 OR MORE WILL RECEIVE ONE TICKET TO OUR SURVIVAL GUIDE LAUNCH PARTY AND YOUR OWN COPY OF OUR SURVIVAL GUIDE! (You can request that your copy be sent to a family member of your choice, or to a low-income member of FREE!)
The Survival Guide Launch Party will be held November 14th, 2009, from 4-7pm, at La Pregunta Arts Cafe, 1528 Amsterdam Avenue, Harlem, NY (btw 135th/136th Streets).
Featuring live entertainment, a Prison Art Auction by Inside Out Art, Inc., this event is also an opportunity to announce leadership transitions as our Founder and Acting Director, Kym Clark, steps aside, and we welcome Marion Rodriguez back into the Organizer position, and other members step forward to carry various torches of our work! Bid farewell to Kym, Happy Birthday to Cheri, Kym and Denise, and make your very first donation to Families Rally for Emancipation and Empowerment - FREE!
Go to: www.freefamilies.us and click on the CHIPIN widget to donate, or to http://survivalguide.chipin.com/free-survival-guide-launch-party. BE SURE TO INDICATE THE NAME AND ADDRESS FOR THE LAUNCH PARTY TICKET AND GUIDE when you donate!
DON’T WANT TO DONATE ONLINE? Make checks payable to our Fiscal Sponsor, "Brecht Forum", and write "FREE Families Rally" in the memo section.
Mail to: Families Rally for Emancipation and Empowerment
c/o Fortune Society
Long Island City, NY 11101
Please drop us an email at prisonfamz@gmail.com or leave a phone message so we can look out for your donation. 718-706-0195.
The Survival Guide was made possible in part by the North Star Fund, and the New York Foundation, and Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz.
Posted by lois at 07:08 PM | Comments (0)
Grants NM: Chamber of Commerce and Prison work to keep CCA prison for women open
Community works to keep women’s prison open
By Donald Jaramillo
Beacon publisher/managing editor
November 5, 2009
GRANTS - An emergency community relations meeting organized by the New Mexico Women's Correction Facility and supported by the Grants/Cibola County Chamber of Commerce in effort to keep the facility open was held on Nov. 5 at La Ventana Steak House. Area prisons and law enforcement agencies regularly meet monthly, however, because of the possible closure of the women's facility in Grants, this month's meeting was identified as an emergency meeting in effort to keep the women's correctional facility open.
Continue reading "Grants NM: Chamber of Commerce and Prison work to keep CCA prison for women open"
Posted by lois at 04:09 PM | Comments (0)
What the census will get wrong--gerrymandering prisoners
What the census will get wrong
By MARY SANCHEZ
McClatchy Newspapers
Published: Friday, Nov. 6, 2009 - 7:56 am
The 2010 U.S. Census will soon be upon us, and by now you may have heard one of the patriotic pitches to comply.
Every breathing soul must be tallied during the massive federal endeavor, the national headcount taken every decade. The census is central to the functioning of our democracy, we're told. The data are used to distribute $400 billion in government spending, to compile countless reports on educational needs, to plan for economic development and formulate public policy.
More important, census data have a direct bearing on congressional districts and the Electoral College. The information is crucial to help us uphold the constitutional principle of one person, one vote.
Continue reading "What the census will get wrong--gerrymandering prisoners "
Posted by lois at 04:05 PM | Comments (0)
MI: Former Youth Prison Owned by GEO Bids for BOP for immigrants
Hearing on Lake County prison set
Contract with U.S. could bring 327 jobs to Baldwin
Kevin Braciszeski - Daily News Staff Writer
Friday, November 6, 2009
BALDWIN — The closed — and recently expanded — prison near Baldwin is being considered as a possible home for low-security federal prisoners from foreign countries.
Continue reading "MI: Former Youth Prison Owned by GEO Bids for BOP for immigrants"
Posted by lois at 03:53 PM | Comments (0)
November 05, 2009
Focus on “Criminal Aliens” Increases Demand for Private Immigrant Detention Business – According to New Profit Reports
Focus on “Criminal Aliens” Increases Demand for Private Immigrant Detention Business – According to New Profit Reports
5 November 2009
From the Business of Detention http://www.businessofdetention.com/
In earnings reports released this week the nation’s two largest private prison operators cited “significant growth opportunities” for detaining immigrants, driven largely by the Obama administration’s emphasis on detaining “criminal aliens.”
The GEO Group – an international private prison operator that draws about 75 percent of its revenue from controlling a quarter of the U.S. private prison industry – said it believes that “this federal initiative to target, detain, and deport “criminal aliens” throughout the country will continue to drive the need for immigration detention beds over the next several years.”
Posted by lois at 05:06 PM | Comments (0)
Western MA: women arrested in 8 massage parlors by ICE and police
3 women arrested on prostitution charges as police raid 8 massage parlors in Hampden, Hampshire counties
By Patrick Johnson
November 04, 2009, 8:10PM
Springfield Republican
SPRINGFIELD – State and local police and federal officials Wednesday afternoon arrested three women on prostitution charges and six others for immigration violations during simultaneous raids on several area massage salons in Hampden and Hampshire counties, officials said.
Continue reading "Western MA: women arrested in 8 massage parlors by ICE and police"
Posted by lois at 04:56 PM | Comments (0)
Corrections Corporation of America Announces Third Quarter 2009 Financials
Corrections Corporation of America Announces Third Quarter 2009 Financial Results
Marketwire
Third Quarter EPS of $0.39, or $0.33 Excluding Special Items
November 04, 2009: 04:05 PM ET
Corrections Corporation of America (NYSE: CXW) (the "Company" or "CCA"), the nation's largest provider of corrections management services to government agencies, announced today its financial results for the third quarter and nine-month period ended September 30, 2009.
extensive financial review at:
http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/marketwire/0555368.htm
Posted by lois at 09:43 AM | Comments (0)
November 04, 2009
CA to send 1,300 prisoners to CCA Prison in OK
California sending inmates to Oklahoma
OKLAHOMA CITY, Nov 04, 2009 (Tulsa World - McClatchy-Tribune California officials plan to send more than 1,300 inmates to a private prison in Sayre.
Corrections Corporation of America, which runs the North Fork Correctional Facility in Sayre, says the move will create about 200 jobs, company spokesman Steve Owen said.
CCA houses 7,900 California inmates in its facilities in various states.
Rep. Randy Terrill, R-Moore, said moving California prisoners to the Sayre prison "should lessen some of the political pressure at the Capitol to fill the empty private beds with Department of Corrections inmates."
He said that area of the state needs jobs and that the added prisoners will create jobs with benefits.
Terrill is chairman of the House Public Safety and Judiciary Subcommittee, which oversees the budget of the Department of Corrections.
The California prisoners will be housed in medium-security space, said Renee Watkins, administrator of private prisons and jails for the DOC.
The inmates are expected to arrive in December or January, she said.
Private prisons in Oklahoma now house 4,849 out-of-state inmates from California and Arizona, Watkins said.
The Sayre prison holds 1,036 California inmates. The Diamondback Correctional Facility in Watonga, which is also run by CCA, holds 2,053 Arizona inmates, she said.
The Great Plains Correctional Facility in Hinton holds 1,760 Arizona inmates, she said. That prison is run by Cornell Cos.
Private prisons in the state also hold 4,725 Oklahoma offenders, Watkins said.
Posted by lois at 04:23 PM | Comments (0)
" Missouri Department of Corrections calls prison population boom no problem" and scroll down for a link to the blog National Public Service Council to Abolish Private Prisons
Missouri Department of Corrections calls prison population boom no problem
Tuesday, November 3, 2009 | 12:01 a.m. CST
BY Cheston McGuire
JEFFERSON CITY — An all-time high number of inmates in Missouri prisons has officials searching for the reasons.
Corrections Department spokeswoman Jacqueline Lapine said three factors are probably leading to the prison population growth: more crimes being committed, more stringent sentencing and, in some areas such as St. Louis, an attempt to push cases through the courts more quickly.
The high of 30,720 inmates has dropped off by about a dozen since originally announced at the end of September by the Corrections Department. Corrections officials said the number does not worry the department. No matter what, officials said, they are more than ready to handle the large number of prisoners.
Posted by lois at 04:12 PM | Comments (0)
November 02, 2009
NYC: Varick Street jail for detained immigrants run by Alaska Native Corporation bills ICE $227.68 for each prisoner
Immigrant Jail Tests U.S. View of Legal Access
By NINA BERNSTEIN
Published: November 1, 2009- NY Times
A startling petition arrived at the New York City Bar Association in October 2008, signed by 100 men, all locked up without criminal charges in the middle of Manhattan.
Daniel I. Miller, a former detainee at the Varick Street center, complained of abuses there. “These people have no rules,” he said.
In vivid if flawed English, it described cramped, filthy quarters where dire medical needs were ignored and hungry prisoners were put to work for $1 a day.
The petitioners were among 250 detainees imprisoned in an immigration jail that few New Yorkers know exists. Above a post office, on the fourth floor of a federal office building in Greenwich Village, the Varick Street Detention Facility takes in 11,000 men a year, most of them longtime New Yorkers facing deportation without a lawyer.
Posted by lois at 09:01 PM | Comments (0)
November 01, 2009
Peter Shellem, Investigative Reporter Who Wrote About Wrongful Convictions, Dies at 49
Peter Shellem, Investigative Reporter Who Wrote About Wrongful Convictions, Dies at 49
By DENNIS HEVESI
Published: October 31, 2009
New York Times
Peter Shellem, whose relentless digging into dusty court records, erroneous crime-lab reports and coerced confessions during his 23 years as a reporter for The Patriot-News in Harrisburg, Pa., led to the release of five wrongly convicted prisoners, died Oct. 24 at his home in Gardners, Pa. He was 49.
In one case, a man who was a teenager when he was convicted of killing a neighbor was released after 28 years in prison. In another, DNA evidence that Mr. Shellem recovered from a professor’s refrigerator in Leipzig, Germany, exonerated a retarded man of rape and murder.
Posted by lois at 05:15 PM | Comments (0)
October 31, 2009
Standish MI: Prison Being Considered for Guantanamo or PA prisoners to be closed for now
Michigan to Close Prison Considered for Gitmo Detainees
By ALEX P. KELLOGG
Wall Street Journal- Oct 31, 2009
A state prison in Michigan that is being considered as a potential location for holding terror detainees from Guantanamo Bay is expected to close Saturday, a state Department of corrections spokesman said. The 600-bed maximum-security prison is a victim of the state's financial troubles.
The closure of the Standish prison will eliminate 340 jobs. Residents and politicians in Standish, a town of 1,600 near the coast along Saginaw Bay, first embraced the possibility of housing Guantanamo detainees before cooling to the idea. But a number of local and county officials continue to be in favor of the move.
Posted by lois at 11:07 AM | Comments (0)
Navajo Reservation: LA Times Story Celebrating Building New Jails with Federal Stimulus Money
Navajo hope stimulus cash closes a revolving prison door
Criminals at Navajo holding facilities like this one in Kayenta, Ariz., are usually released within a day of being booked. Kayenta and two other towns will get new jails next year, thanks to a grant from the Justice Department.
October 31, 2009-- LA Times
Reporting from Tuba City, Ariz. - More than 50,000 people are arrested across the Navajo reservation each year -- yet there are only 59 jail beds here.
Officials say the lack of jail space has led to a revolving door for criminals, most of whom are released within a day of being booked, and few of whom serve out an entire sentence.
Posted by lois at 10:58 AM | Comments (0)
IA: Possible layoffs unsettle prison guards and workers
Possible layoffs unsettle prison officers, workers
Posted By William Petroski On October 30, 2009
Newton, Ia. — The mood was tense and somber at the Newton Correctional Facility during Thursday’s first shift change, as rank-and-file prison workers await the outcome of union negotiations that could determine their fates.
The Newton prison, which houses 1,100 inmates, is among nine state prisons and eight community corrections districts where 515 Department of Corrections workers face layoffs if budget-cut negotiations falter between union leaders and Gov. Chet Culver.
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Posted by lois at 10:49 AM | Comments (0)
