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 Scales of Justice

tumca

Released July 2019

Issue Topic: Writers were requested to write about legal issues arising from prison conditions.

Articles

THE UNITED STATES OF PUNISHMENT: MANDATORY SENTENCES AND THEIR IMPACT ON PRISON POPULATION 

By Brenton Browne

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"Since the early 1970's, American rates of imprisonment have increased by almost five hundred percent. Aggregate this with the United States starkly high rate of recidivism of almost eighty percent, and what develops is a country with a massive number of individuals behind bars. The United States..."

GULAG ARCHIPIÉLAGO: THE OMINOUS FUTURE FOR IMMIGRANTS IN THE JAILHOUSE

By Cameron Cerf

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"It is not often when a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States feels compelled to write, and announce, in their dissenting opinion, 'We need only recall the words of the Declaration of Independence, in particular its insistence that all men and women have 'certain unalienable Rights,' and that..."

PREGNANCY RISK FACTORS IN PRISON

By Victor Huertas

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"As the population of women's prisons rise by 1.6% each year, women have increasingly disclosed the horrific treatment and conditions while incarcerated. Incarcerated women not only face their sentenced punishment but also the hidden conditions within the institutions, such as pregnancy-risk."

THE SYSTEMATIC OPPRESSION OF TRANSGENDER INMATES IN AMERICAN PRISONS

By Jordan Hyden

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"Ms. Ashley Diamond, a transgender woman, got off a prison bus in the summer of 2012 to begin an 8-year sentence in a men's prison. She recounts being strip searched as her male counter-parts stared at her naked body. Diamond had reached a crucial stage in her transition in which she had certain..." 

LETHAL INJECTIONS: PROTECTING A NATIONAL ETHOS OVER THE RIGHTS OF INMATES

By Victoria Nevarez

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"On March 9th, 2018, a death row inmate left a failed lethal injection procedure with overlapping wounds and a bruised body. The 3-hour execution attempt was due to a technician's inability to locate a proper blood vessel to administer Alabama's lethal drug cocktail. In July, the inmate's attorney argued..."

FOR-PROFIT PRISONS: DEADLY DEFICIENCIES IN MEDICAL CARE

By Cassidy Wray

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"As of 2014, roughly 131,000 prisoners in the United States were incarcerated in a privately-controlled institution. This number has been steadily on the rise since the first implementation of privately-owned prisons at the turn of the century. The movement towards privatization was driven by a push to lessen..."

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