Prison News | Washington

• Education & Rehabilitation
• Executions, Death Row, & the Death Penalty
• Gangs in Prison
• Health & Medical Treatment
• Prison Classification, Placement, and Release
• Prison Conditions & Corruption
• Prison Life & Prison Culture
• Riots, Lockdowns & Escapes
• Suicides in Prison
• Workplace & Industry News and Science & Tech

Education & Rehabilitation

• People behind bars: shifting paradigms of American inmates
  
  “Sixty percent of our offenders will fail within three years of release,” she said. “So we might be doing something wrong.”... [ more ]
  Daily Evergreen, Wednesday, March 5, 2014
  
  
• Inside a youth treatment center
  
  Tony was 12 when he sexually assaulted the 10-year-old sister of his best friend.... [ more ]
  Seattle Post Intelligencer , Saturday, June 9, 2007
  
  

Executions, Death Row & the Death Penalty

• Inmate released under new justice reform law accused of murder
  
  Joel Francisco was 14 years into a life sentence when he became one of the first prisoners released under President Donald Trump's criminal justice reform law. Now he's accused of murder.... [ more ]
  hazard-herald.com, Saturday, November 9, 2019
  
  
• Serial killer�s execution on hold as US Supreme Court considers final appeals
  
  Gary Ray Bowles killed 6 men from Daytona Beach to the Washington D.C. area and scheduled to die by lethal injection at 6 p.m. at Florida State Prison.... [ more ]
  news-journalonline.com, Wednesday, August 21, 2019
  
  
• Owner of Vancouver, Washington Precious Metals Firm Sentenced to Prison for Wire Fraud
  
  A Vancouver, Washington, business owner who stole from later clients to pay off earlier ones in the style of a Ponzi scheme was sentenced today in U.S. District Court in Tacoma to four years in prison, announced U.S. Attorney Brian T. Moran. AARON MICHAEL SCOTT, 40, of Portland, Oregon, was indicted in October 2018 following state and federal investigations of his internet precious metals business, Blue Moon Coins.... [ more ]
  U.S. Attorney�s Office | Western District of Washington, Saturday, April 6, 2019
  
  
• Paul Manafort�s Prison Sentence Is Nearly Doubled to 7.5 Years
  
  WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Wednesday nearly doubled the prison sentence of President Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, to seven and a half years, denouncing him as a man who “spent a significant portion of his career gaming the system.”... [ more ]
  New York Times, Wednesday, March 13, 2019
  
  

Gangs in Prison

• Guilty plea in Marysville home invasion homicide likely to send man, 45, to prison for decades
  
  EVERETT, Washington — Snohomish County prosecutors are recommending a 21-year prison sentence for 45-year-old Johnathan "Bigfoot" Frohs for killing a man during a home invasion robbery at Marysville.... [ more ]
  Associated Press, Wednesday, August 14, 2013
  
  
• Cities in King County, Washington, SCORE with Award-Winning Jail
  
  When King County, Washington ran out of room in their jails and decided to no longer accept misdemeanor arrests from cities in the county, seven cities in the King County area formed a multijurisdictional committee to develop a plan to address the housing of individuals arrested for misdemeanor offenses in their cities. The South Correctional Entity Multijurisdictional Jail (SCORE) was built by the SCORE Public Development Authority and is managed by the SCORE governmental administrative agency which has representation from all seven member cities. The planning and effort spent on this project resulted in a successful misdemeanor jail facili... [ more ]
  National Jail Exchange, Tuesday, July 2, 2013
  
  
• Prisons hardly ripple when 31 Crips arrive
  
  HILLTOP SWEEP: Nearly half of violence among inmates is gang-related, but several factors diluted the influx from Tacoma... [ more ]
  Bellingham Herald, Saturday, June 4, 2011
  
  
• Inside a youth treatment center
  
  Tony was 12 when he sexually assaulted the 10-year-old sister of his best friend.... [ more ]
  Seattle Post Intelligencer , Saturday, June 9, 2007
  
  
• Dial-a-breathalyzer: Gadget monitors county inmates
  
  A black box equipped with a bendable straw can detect the slightest amount of booze...... [ more ]
  HeraldNet , Friday, June 8, 2007
  
  
• Gang rivalries cited in Tacoma killings
  
  ... [ more ]
  Associated Press Newswires, Wednesday, December 13, 2006
  
  
• Gun linked to 2 killings ; Man suspected in another killing before shooting deputy | Rival gang member shot, hours before deputy | Porter failed drug tests since August release from prison
  
  ... [ more ]
  Seattle Times, Tuesday, December 5, 2006
  
  

Health & Medical Treatment

• Judge denies order for mentally ill in jails
  
  SEATTLE (AP) — A federal judge said Wednesday she has serious constitutional concerns about the way the state handles mentally ill people waiting in jails for competency evaluations and treatment, but she denied a temporary restraining order, saying she needs more information before making changes to Washington's mental health system.... [ more ]
  Associated Press, Wednesday, October 8, 2014
  
  
• Should Prisoners Get Expensive Hepatitis C Drugs?
  
  If used widely, a new generation of antiviral drugs has the potential to wipe out the deadly hepatitis C virus in the United States. But the high price of the drugs might prevent their use in prisons, which house as many as one-third of those who are infected.... [ more ]
  Record Searchlight, Thursday, March 27, 2014
  
  

Prison Classification, Placement, & Release

• Ex-judges, families of murder victims, call for halt to U.S. federal death penalty
  
  (Reuters) - The relatives of murder victims, along with former judges and corrections officials, asked President Donald Trump and his attorney general on Tuesday to halt federal executions, at least for now, citing concerns about how the penalty is carried out. ... [ more ]
  reuters.com, Wednesday, November 13, 2019
  
  

Prison Conditions & Corruption

Prison Life & Culture

• Jailbreak in Washington state goes unnoticed for two days
  
  (Reuters) - A Washington state man jailed on robbery charges managed to slip away from a detention facility last week in an escape that went unnoticed for two days until his lawyer arrived for a visit, officials said on Tuesday.... [ more ]
  Reuters, Tuesday, September 30, 2014
  
  
• State's oldest female inmate earns respect among younger convicts
  
  PURDY, Wash. (AP) - Darlene Green is always perplexed whenever she sees other inmates at Washington Corrections Center for Women watching television shows set in prisons.... [ more ]
  Associated Press, Sunday, May 4, 2014
  
  

Riots, Lockdowns & Escapes

• Inmate accused of ordering hit on teen girl he allegedly raped
  
  A Utah inmate awaiting trial for allegedly raping a 13-year-old girl is now accused of trying to hire a hitman to kill her, according to authorities.... [ more ]
  New York Post, Wednesday, November 20, 2019
  
  
• US prison system long plagued by staffing crisis, violence
  
  WASHINGTON (AP) — For years, the federal Bureau of Prisons has been plagued by systematic failures, from massive staffing shortages to chronic violence. But the largest agency in the Justice Department has largely stayed out of the public view.... [ more ]
  KTAR News, Monday, November 18, 2019
  
  
• One inmate killed and five others hospitalized after clash between white and black federal prisoners
  
  WASHINGTON — One person was killed and five others were hospitalized in a violent clash between black and white inmates on Sunday at the nation’s largest federal prison complex.... [ more ]
  USA TODAY, Monday, August 5, 2019
  
  
• Inmate, 57, dies in Spokane County Jail with others present; no sign of injuries
  
  SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) - The Spokane County sheriff's office says a 57-year-old inmate John Edward Murphy died Thursday night in the county jail. The sheriff's office says there were other offenders in the dorm at the time but there were no signs of a fight or trauma.... [ more ]
  Associated Press, Friday, August 9, 2013
  
  

Suicides in Prison

• Federal prison guards falsified records of cell checks, inmate counts
  
  WASHINGTON–Federal prison employees have falsified logs to claim they conducted mandatory cell checks and inmate counts when they didn't, according to a recent examination revealed by an internal Bureau of Prisons memo.... [ more ]
  usatoday.com, Friday, November 8, 2019
  
  
• Federal prison suicides were quietly rising before Jeffrey Epstein's death in a New York detention center
  
  WASHINGTON – When accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein hanged himself while awaiting trial this month, it was the first recorded suicide at Manhattan’s federal detention center in 13 years.... [ more ]
  USA TODAY, Thursday, August 22, 2019
  
  
• Washington Prisons Will No Longer Punish Inmates For 'Self-Harm'
  
  Washington’s prison system has announced a major policy change when it comes to inmates who harm themselves. The Department of Corrections said Thursday that it will no longer sanction inmates for cutting or other acts of self-injury.... [ more ]
  Legal Monitor Online, Thursday, July 3, 2014
  
  

Workplace & Industry News, and Science & Tech News

• At a glance: A look at how Washington state handles electronic monitoring of offenders
  
  THE OFFENDERS: Electronic monitoring in Washington state is used in a variety of ways, including the use of radio frequency to track curfews, GPS to monitor more serious offenders, and alcohol testing. The state Department of Corrections ...... [ more ]
  Associated Press, Sunday, July 28, 2013
  
  
• 3 firings, 1 demotion overturned in case of prison-guard slaying
  
  Citing a pattern of institutional complacency at the Monroe Reformatory, an arbitrator has overturned the firings of three state prison officers and the demotion of a sergeant stemming from the slaying of Corrections Officer Jayme Biendl in ...... [ more ]
  Seattle Times, Tuesday, July 9, 2013
  
  
• Cities in King County, Washington, SCORE with Award-Winning Jail
  
  When King County, Washington ran out of room in their jails and decided to no longer accept misdemeanor arrests from cities in the county, seven cities in the King County area formed a multijurisdictional committee to develop a plan to address the housing of individuals arrested for misdemeanor offenses in their cities. The South Correctional Entity Multijurisdictional Jail (SCORE) was built by the SCORE Public Development Authority and is managed by the SCORE governmental administrative agency which has representation from all seven member cities. The planning and effort spent on this project resulted in a successful misdemeanor jail facili... [ more ]
  National Jail Exchange, Tuesday, July 2, 2013
  
  
• State employees to start receiving temporary layoff notices Monday unless budget deal reached
  
  OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) - Thousands of state employees will start receiving notice as early as Monday that they may be temporarily laid off on July 1 unless lawmakers move forward with a budget agreement soon.... [ more ]
  Associated Press, Thursday, June 20, 2013
  
  
• Dial-a-breathalyzer: Gadget monitors county inmates
  
  A black box equipped with a bendable straw can detect the slightest amount of booze...... [ more ]
  HeraldNet , Friday, June 8, 2007