We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

STAFF ON INMATE, INMATE ON STAFF…

A former FCI Dublin (California) correctional officer was sentenced to six years last Wednesday after he admitted to sexually abusing more than a half-dozen women at the scandal-plagued facility.

Nakie Nunley, 48, became the seventh Dublin staff member to be sentenced in recent years, part of what the officers called a “rape club” at the facility that tormented inmates. The defendants have included a warden and chaplain.

An eighth officer has pled guilty to sexual misconduct charges but has not yet been sentenced.

Nunley was convicted of four counts of sexual abuse of a ward and five of abusive sexual contact of five women. He also admitted to lying to federal officials. His sentence comes amid mounting concerns that the initial wave of arrests has done little to reform a toxic culture at the prison that has left inmates in constant fear of retaliation for reporting their guards’ alleged misdeeds.

Meanwhile, a second suit has been filed in Ft. Worth alleging that a former prisoner at FMC Carswell was repeatedly raped by former BOP employee Marerllis Nix. Nix has denied the allegations in the first suit and has not yet responded to the second complaint.

A 2022 investigation by the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram found a pattern of abuse and cover-ups at Carswell that KERA-TV has called “among the worst of any facility across the US.”

“We filed a second lawsuit, just a couple days ago on behalf of Jane Doe, not only just to get compensation for her injuries but, more importantly, to call awareness to this severe problem at the Carswell medical unit in Ft. Worth,” said Randall Kallinen, a Houston-based civil rights attorney.

At the same time, BOP officers in Illinois are pushing Congress to do something about sexual abuse in federal prisons – just not in the way you might think.

Driven by reports of BOP staff facing indecent exposure by inmates and vulgar and sometimes violent sexual remarks, officers at USP Thomson are calling for adding criminal penalties for such behavior. The union alleged more than 300 incidents in 2022 of inmates exposing themselves or engaging in sexual acts in front of staff at Thomson. Since then, Thomson has been converted to low security, and the number of incidents has fallen to near zero.

A national law is needed “to protect our correctional workers from sexual attacks from inmates at all federal prisons,” said Jon Zumkehr, president of a local American Federation of Government Employees chapter. “Victims of sexual assault crimes experience significant trauma, and these profound and understandable fears may keep victims from coming forward.”

San Jose Mercury News, FCI Dublin officer sentenced to six years in prison after admitting he sexually abused several inmates (March 28, 2024)

NBC, Former correctional officer at women’s prison in California sentenced for sexually abusing inmates (March 28, 2024)

KERA-TV, Sexual abuse a ‘severe problem’ at Fort Worth’s Carswell prison, attorneys for 2 women say (March 11, 2024)

Federal Times, Bureau of Prisons officers seek federal law penalizing sexual threats (March 28, 2024)

– Thomas L. Root