May 3, 2013
The Guardian (UK) – Alan Travis
Supreme Court upholds payouts to prisoners over delayed parole hearings – Test case will lead to payouts for scores of convicted murderers, rapists and other violent prisoners who face hearing delays
The court ruled a compensation of £6,500 due to a convicted lifer for delays in parole hearings. “The supreme court ruling follows payouts totaling more than £314,500 to 89 offenders, including 38 murderers and seven rapists, who have been awarded sums of between £300 and £10,000 each since 2010 because of delays. They include payments to 10 prisoners so far this year.” The government has passed the adjudication of release under indeterminate sentences of imprisonment cases to a swamped parole board service without adding resources to cope. Is this sort of recourse available to Canadian inmates whose charter rights are breached or to inmates suffering from failure of the rule of law in our prisons? http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/may/01/court-payouts-violent-prisoners-parole-delays
Behavioural Healthcare – Dennis Grantham
Mass shootings, criminal violence: Can’t be predicted, but can be mitigated
Long time community and criminal-justice psychiatrist Fred Osher, who heads the behavioural health division of the Council of State Governments’ Justice Center (Bethesda, Md.), considers mental illness and risk factors, including abuse of drugs, and suggests that professionals use “bands of risk” assessment to trigger additional assessments and treatment. http://www.behavioral.net/article/mass-shootings-criminal-violence-cant-be-predicted-can-be-mitigated
The Norman Transcript (Oklahoma) – Jim Drummond
Legislature needs to take steps in criminal justice
A lawyer is celebrating Law Day with a reflection on some legislative changes needed while listing some of the consequences of the prevailing system’s on-going short falls. http://normantranscript.com/opinion/x1169347586/Legislature-needs-to-take-steps-in-criminal-justice
Indymedia Australia – Gerry Georgatos
Australia’s Aboriginal children detained at the world’s highest rates
Australia incarceration rates are generally lower than the worst offender (the US) but there has been an alarming increase in the incarceration of Aboriginal juveniles. “Although the United States boasts the world’s highest imprisonment rates and Australia comes nowhere near American rates of detention Australia’s record is not pretty, not when we break it down to Aboriginal peoples and especially to Aboriginal children. Australia’s Aboriginal peoples are the world’s most imprisoned peoples – adults and children. Former Governor of Western Australia, General John Sanderson once said that in most countries such incarceration rates of any minority population would have led to either civil strife or to a civil war.” http://indymedia.org.au/2013/05/02/australia%E2%80%99s-aboriginal-children-detained-at-the-world%E2%80%99s-highest-rates
Annie Casey Foundation: Richard A. Mendel
No place for kids: The case for reducing juvenile incarceration
The Australian report cited above has drawn material from this U.S. foundation’s 2011 fifty-one page report. The report has two powerful sections, one the ills of the present juvenile system and two, six priorities for effective change. http://www.aecf.org/KnowledgeCenter/Publications.aspx?pubguid={017F0783-0900-4699-89C9-061BE79BAD74} Full pdf format report: http://www.aecf.org/~/media/Pubs/Topics/Juvenile%20Justice/Detention%20Reform/NoPlaceForKids/JJ_NoPlaceForKids_Full.pdf
Channel 4 News (UK)
Vulnerable women still being failed by justice system
The story is about Melanie Beswick, a young mother of two, who hanged herself in a British prison, after re-imprisonment for failure to pay a theft debt, and the efforts by Baroness Jean Corston to confront the failure to address specific gender issues. In the light of government retrenchments in policy, the Baroness said “This government does not understand the situation with regard to women generally – what gender-specific services are, and what kind of priority should be given. If they did, it would not have taken one year and ten days to publish what is a thin, mean document.” http://www.channel4.com/news/vulnerable-women-still-being-failed-by-justice-system
Gazette (Colorado Springs) – Ryan Handy
Colorado governor calls for review of sex offender sentencing laws
Colorado’s Lifetime Supervisory Act is getting pushed by Republicans who want to adopt Jessica’s Law, a punishment of a mandatory 25 years in prison for certain types of sex crimes against victims under 12 years of age. http://gazette.com/colorado-governor-calls-for-review-of-sex-offender-sentencing-laws/article/1500170