prisons

“Split Sentences” and the Right to Housing

The room I rent in a Georgia boarding house for people on the sex offender registry costs $800 per month.…

December 7, 2023

WA Prisons Still Using Drug Test Kits at Center of False-Positives Lawsuit

Sabastian Johnson had been unsuccessfully trying to get copies of a legal document related to his case into Washington Corrections…

December 4, 2023

On Thanksgiving I’m Grateful to Have Internet, Until Our Prison Catches Us

I am thankful that on my 33rd Thanksgiving in prison, I’ll be allowed an early shower. Thankful to have gotten…

November 22, 2023

The Nightmare of Prison Suicide Watch, Where Watching Is All We Do

Imagine looking through a window into a room at someone who’s been forcibly taken from their home, stripped naked and…

November 20, 2023

For Decades, Tattoos Helped Me Make Sense of Death and Prison

I got my first tattoo at 15, a Grim Reaper profile with the scythe arcing over its head. My father…

November 17, 2023

The Right to Consensual Sex—and Condoms—in Prison

Greg* has been incarcerated in Tennessee for about 18 months. He’s been on a waiting list for job placement for…

November 8, 2023

Tennessee’s HIV Sex Offender Law Discourages Testing, Not Transmission

In the mid-'90s at Washington State Penitentiary, a corrections officer (CO) and I had been yelling at each other for…

November 2, 2023

In Brazil, New Era of Private Prisons as Feds Auction Contracts to Build Them

On October 6 in Rio Grande do Sul, the government of Brazil held the first auction for a public-private partnership…

October 26, 2023

Texas’s “Drug-Busting” Prisons Lockdown Will Only Harm Us

From September 6 to October 16, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) implemented a “systemwide lockdown and comprehensive search”…

October 26, 2023

Do These Sex Offender Employment Restrictions Make Sense to Anyone?

In the month since I was released from Georgia Department of Corrections custody, I’ve been offered four different jobs. I…

October 19, 2023