Month: January 2017

Even With Legal Help, Transgender Prisoners Are Never Safe in Prison

  • Melanie Asmar
  • August 18, 2015
  • Westword

Samantha Hill knew it was going to happen. Her cellmate was leering at her and acting strangely. Although Hill had only been housed with him for a few days at the U.S. penitentiary in Florence, she’d been in prison long enough to recognize the warning signs. But when her cellmate began stuffing rosary beads into

Even in prison, rape is no joke

  • Burt Constable
  • August 25, 2015
  • Daily Herald

No matter how you became aware of it — from friends on Facebook, strangers on Twitter or even the New York Post newspaper — the comment in question remains nothing more than a rape joke. The punch line is that Jared Fogle, the formerly obese man who made a living as the unassuming pitchman for

Solutions to jail rapes are available

  • May 14, 2015
  • The Florida Times Union

Third of four parts. Jacksonville’s jail is a facility where sexual abuse is rampant. From 2010 to 2013, the jail here reported more assaults per inmate than in Hillsborough, Orange and Broward county jails. Only in Miami-Dade’s jail, the largest in the state, is sexual abuse more prevalent. But not by much. Indeed, Miami-Dade’s jail

Sex: The prison system’s dirty little secret

  • August 1, 2015
  • Delaware Online

When the word sex is mentioned, there are myriad things that can be associated with it. Lust. Desire. Love. Procreation. Sex has always been a very important part of life. Some need it. Others want it. It’s an inescapable conversation that transcends gender, cultures and race.… But what’s going on in the prison systems in

Prisons Treat Transgender Inmates Like Shit — This Lawsuit Could Change That

  • Avi Asher-Schapiro
  • September 25, 2015
  • Vice News

A judge in Maryland has forced prison officials to overhaul their treatment of transgendered inmates, after a transgender prisoner reported repeated sexual abuse at the hands of correctional officers in a maximum-security prison. Transgender advocates are calling it a landmark case that puts prisons on notice, and shines a light on the nearly 40 percent