Tag Archives: thomson

More Sexual Abuse Fallout in the BOP – Update for April 2, 2024

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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.

sexualassault211014Nakie 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.

attack240402Driven 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

BOP’s Ship Takes On Water – Update for July 12, 2022

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

EDITOR’S NOTE: ARE WE INFLUENTIAL OR WHAT?

Only a couple of hours after we posted this, the Dept. of Justice announced that Colette Peters had been hired as BOP director.  While some may say that this is post hoc, ergo proper hoc reasoning, we’re quite willing to think that Merrick Garland starts his day with LISA’s posts.

BOP’S SHIP SLOWLY SINKS AS SEARCH FOR CAPTAIN SEEMS TO BE STALLED

sinking220712With July 4th, last week was short. Good thing, too, because the Bureau of Prisons probably could not have taken a fifth day of bad news.

First, an Associated Press report on a lawsuit about conditions at FCI Sheridan said that the Oregon Public Defender Lisa Hay alleged in a filing that the BOP turned off water at the Sheridan detention center in order to end refusal by some detainees to eat.

The warden allegedly issued a memo to detainees that “showers are postponed due to continued threats of assault to staff.” The court filing said that temperatures in Sheridan reached 90 degrees when showers were withheld.

Oregon Public Broadcasting said BOP “didn’t answer questions about the memo or whether the water was cut off in an effort to end the hunger strike.”

Conditions inside the federal prison have been the subject of concern since the pandemic took hold in 2020. Hay has in court filings detailed lockdowns that have lasted for days. In other filings, her office has documented poor medical and dental care that has left many suffering.

Meanwhile, in a letter Wednesday to Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, USP Thomson staff and union leaders called for the immediate removal of Warden Thomas Bergami, citing “an abundance of serious incidents” and the mass departure of 60 correctional officers since March.

“Warden Bergami has failed within his position of trust and has placed the staff, inmates and communities at risk,” AFGE Local 4070 President Jonathan Zumkehr wrote. “Attempts to address these issues directly have gone unheeded and even to the extent of being covered up and or distracted from the facts… Managers are blatantly violating laws and refusing to adhere to local agreements, placing the hard-working staff in limbo with ever-changing policies and procedures that have done nothing but set USP Thomson ablaze.”

Bergami has only been at Thomson since March.

The BOP settled two lawsuits last week. One, a 20-year old suit by six people detained after 9/11 at MDC Brooklyn, included a cash payment and letters to each of the plaintiffs from BOP Director Michael Carvajal wrote a letter to each of the men saying the Dept of Justice had determined they were “held in excessively restrictive and unduly harsh conditions of confinement and a number of individuals were physically and verbally abused by certain MDC officers.”

sorry190124“I don’t know that the director of the Bureau of Prisons has ever signed a letter of this nature before to individual clients, so that is unique,” Rachel Meeropol, an attorney for the men, said.

On June 28, the BOP settled the two-year-old FCC Lompoc class action, agreeing “to comply with Attorney General Barr’s March 26 and April 3, 2020 memoranda, the current BOP guidance at the time of each review, and the standards set forth in this Court’s orders when making decisions about a request for home confinement. In addition, the agreement requires Respondents to transfer individuals within one month of the decision granting home confinement and, if the transfer does not occur timely Respondents must provide an explanation of the reasons for the delay.”

The agreement substantially contains the terms previously imposed by the court in an injunction and enforcement orders.

covidneverend220627Last week, the BOP reported two more inmate COVID deaths, an April 21 death at USP Tucson and a May 16 death at Yazoo City Medium. Both men had previously had COVID and been declared to have recovered. The federal prisoner inmate COVID death total now stands at 319 or higher. COVID cases ended the week at 520 (inmates) and 338 (staff), the highest since the beginning of March.

Finally, there seems to be no movement on a new BOP Director since Colette Peters, director of the Oregon prison system, was reported to be a finalist for the post almost a month ago. One would hardly blame her for any second thoughts she might be having.

KGW-TV, Lawyer: People at federal prison in Oregon denied showers amid hunger strike (July 5, 2022)

Corrections1, Prison staff, union call for warden’s removal after ‘abundance of serious incidents’ (July 7, 2022)

Colorado Springs Gazette, Feds settle suit alleging abuse by men detained after 9/11 (July 5, 2022)

Santa Maria Times, Settlement reached in Lompoc prison COVID-19 class action laws (July 7, 2022)

Joint Motion, Torres v Milusnic, Case No 2:20cv4450 (CD Cal)

BOP, Inmate Death at USP Tucson (July 6, 2022)

BOP, Inmate Death at FCI Yazoo City Medium (July 6, 2022)

– Thomas L. Root

Prisons Not Testing Right For COVID, CDC Says – Update for August 26, 2020

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

BOP LOSING AT WHACK-A-MOLE

whack200602Not quite three months ago, Bureau of Prisons Director Michael Carvajal confidently told the Senate Judiciary Committee, “at this point, we have more recoveries than new infections. And I believe that this shows that we are now flattening the curve.”

What is being “flattened” is the BOP’s response to the pandemic.

Twelve weeks later – after inmates spiked July 26 at 4,413 – the BOP’s numbers have stopped falling, and in fact increased slightly. As of Tuesday night, 1,597 inmates were sick, up 8% from last week. Sick staff numbered 638, up 11% from a week ago, four more inmates died, bringing the total to 122, and COVID-19 was present in 109 facilities, 89% of BOP facilities.

Complaints continued last week about the BOP’s handing of the pandemic continue, mostly from staff. When the correctional officer union president at USP Thomson (Illinois) found out he was COVID-19 positive, the 20th BOP staffer there to come down with the virus, he told ABC news he had to find an independent testing site on his own. “Testing for staff isn’t available at the prison but they test inmates for COVID-19 at the prison,” ABC quoted him as saying. “Staff also can’t get tested due to being forced to work double 16-hour shifts almost on a daily basis.”

BOPCOVID200826

Meanwhile, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a study last week that looked at 15 prisons, including five unidentified BOP facilities. The CDC found that mass testing at the facilities “suggests that symptom-based testing underestimates the number of COVID-19 cases in these settings. Mass testing resulted in a median 12.1-fold increase in the number of known infections among incarcerated or detained persons in these facilities, which had previously used symptom-based testing strategies only.” Symptom-based testing, of course, is the preferred BOP approach, in which only inmates with symptoms get tested.

Additionally, the study found that “in two federal prisons, all persons who had tested negative during mass testing events and had subsequently been quarantined as close contacts of persons testing positive were retested after 7 days. At retesting, 20.5% of persons in BOP prison 2 and 26.8% in BOP prison 3 had positive test results.”

As of last night, the BOP had still only conducted enough tests to cover 31% of the BOP population, with 26% of those tests coming back positive.

The failure of symptoms-only testing is illustrated in the whack-a-mole problems the BOP faces. Besides USP Thomson, the BOP is facing outbreaks at FCC Petersburg (Virginia), FDC San Diego and FCI Victorville in California, FCC Coleman (Florida), and FCI Manchester (Kentucky). Numbers are finally dropping at FCI Seagoville and FCI Beaumont (both Texas).

Marketwatch ran a piece last week on the cost to taxpayers of COVID-19 in prisons, noting that “the public understands the urgent need for action. A national survey found that 66% of likely voters, including 59% of those identifying as ‘very conservative,’ believe elected officials should consider measures to reduce overcrowding in prisons and jails. Survey research over many years has shown that most Americans believe the U.S. locks up too many people.”

poorcorresp200826Meanwhile, U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-Florida) is not happy, and last week, he let Attorney General William Barr know it. The Miami Herald reported that “nearly nine months after demanding an investigation of allegations of rampant sexual abuse at Coleman Federal Correctional Complex exposed in a Miami Herald story, Sen. Marco Rubio says he still hasn’t gotten a ‘substantive response’. And he is not happy — especially since there is new cause for concern with COVID-19.”

On Thursday, Rubio wrote to Attorney General William Barr to express his “dissatisfaction that the DOJ has not sufficiently responded to inquiries I have made in regard to FCI Coleman” about the allegations. As well, he complained that “my office continues to receive numerous complaints that FCI Coleman staff are not following the CDC’s Guidance for Correctional and Detention Facilities, which — among other measures — recommends BOP officers and inmates wear masks when in close proximity with others. Most concerning, my office has been made aware that facility management may have ordered staff to return to work despite testing positive for COVID-19. I have already requested the BOP take immediate action to address this allegation, and I look forward to the outcome of its investigation.”

ABC News, ‘Who is going to man the prison if everyone tests positive?’ Corrections officer union warns of dual threat facing federal prisons (August 19, 2020)

CDC, Mass Testing for SARS-CoV-2 in 16 Prisons and Jails — Six Jurisdictions, United States, April–May 2020 (August 21, 2020)

Marketwatch, U.S. taxpayers already pay a high price to support America’s giant prison population. Now COVID-19 is costing them even more (August 20, 2020)

Miami Herald, Rubio demands answers from Barr on sexual abuse, COVID response at Florida prison (August 20, 2020)

– Thomas L. Root