The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "prison inmates" ...
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Grandma can’t accept your call: Inmates disconnected by phone costs
This series of stories started with a simple question. Why does it cost so much for inmates to make calls from the Cook County Jail? In the course of my reporting on criminal and legal affairs for WBEZ, the public radio station in Chicago, I had heard numerous people complain about the high cost of phone calls. Some digging confirmed that the price could be as high as $15.00 for 15 minute calls. Three or four calls a week at that price gets expensive even for financially stable middle class folks, but the people paying these fees were mostly the poorest residents in Chicago. That’s because most of the people in the Cook County Jail are there because they and their families couldn’t afford to post bond of a couple thousand, or sometimes even just hundreds of dollars to secure their freedom while awaiting trial. They are the people who are least able to afford such expensive phone calls. A few FOIA requests revealed the scheme (and scheme is the right word… I just looked it up: a crafty or secret plan of action). Cook County gave an exclusive phone contract to a company called Securus Technologies. Securus charged inflated phone rates and their exclusive deal in the jail meant inmates wanting to talk to their families or arrange their defense had no choice but to pay the rates. Securus then paid back to the county 57½ percent of the revenue from the calls. It netted the county about $4 million a year. Securus wouldn’t tell us their take but I imagine they did alright too. All of the money was coming out of the pockets of the poorest residents in Cook County, people who couldn’t even afford to post bond for their freedom. (As an aside, this isn’t just an issue in Cook County. According to its website Securus provides the phone systems for 850,000 inmates in 2,200 jails and prisons across the country.) Our reporting shed public light on a hugely profitable contract that no one was paying attention to. We documented the lives of the impoverished people getting hammered by the policy and then turned the hammer on the local elected officials to ask them to explain how this was a good policy. The public officials responded in a way that once again proved the genius of democracy. Our efforts and the results are detailed in subsequent answers below.
Tags: prison inmates; phone calls; fees
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What Violent Criminals Could Be Paroled
The North Carolina Department of Correction had many of inmates facing life sentences set to be paroled with the public unaware while the governor and attorney general attempted to keep these men from walking out the front door.
Tags: prison; murders; North Carolina
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Secret early release of Illinois prisoners
The series finds that the Illinois state government had secretly released 1,700 inmates from prison early in an attempt to save money and reduce overcrowding. Many of those released had committed violent crimes or been convicted of driving under the influence.
Tags: prison; state prison; criminals; meritorious good time; Department of Corrections
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California Prisons: Behavior Modification and Suppression of Due Process
The author uncovers evidence of cruelty and near torture in California's prisons. The abuse and suppression of inmate rights that pervaded these prisons was initially reported by researchers, but was covered up by officials.
Tags: prisons; torture; prison system
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"Cruel and Unusual: The Culture of Punishment in America"
In this book, author Anne-Marie Cusac reveals how America has become a nation of victims searching for revenge, rather that a "community that cares for its own." The cultural shift has impacted the criminal justice system, causing even "law-abiding" citizens at risk of "suffering retribution in American jails." The book illustrates how cultural trends have "transformed" America into a "society of punishment."
Tags: prison; jail; punishment; inmates; capital punishment; punitive physical pain; corporal punishment; Abu Ghraib; Guantanamo
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"Prison Predator"
Overcrowding in California's 33 prisons has led to inmate violence, death and an alarming lack of accountability among prisons workers. In the past year, Lancaster state prison has seen two deaths as a result of inmate violence. In both cases, officials have keep quiet. A federal court ruling has asked California prison officials to relieve the overcrowding by releasing 40,000 inmates, though the ruling has been met by resistance by the governor and other politicians.
Tags: Lancaster; California prisons; inmate violence; jail violence; Greg Thomas; Cayenne Byrd; California Department of Corrections
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Trapped in Tamms
The Tamms Correctional Center is touted as housing some of the worst criminals in the state. Yet state research revealed that many of the inmates were mentally ill and were left untreated. Lengthy consecutive sentences were frequently handed to prisoners who spit or threw body wastes at guards. Food and water was also withheld from inmates and punishments were often excessive.
Tags: Tamms; prisoners; correctional center; abuse; mental illness; crime; punishment; inmate; wastes; Anthony Gay;
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Brian Ross Investigates: Bodies: The China Connection
The investigation uncovered black market trade that supplies bodies of Chinese executed prisoners for display in Premiere Exhibitions' for-profit "Bodies" show in cities around the world. The shows have been seen by millions and has brought huge profits to the Atlanta-based company.
Tags: China; inmate rights; black market; body factory; skeleton; plastinate; body parts
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Law and Disorder
This series revealed how criminals free on probation or parole in South Carolina kill, rob and rape all too often in a state where repeat offenders routinely are released into a system that is too under-manned and ill-equipped to maintain control.
Tags: probation agents; parole agents; criminals; repeat offenders; overcrowded prisons; probation violators; rehabilitation; prison inmates; jail; justice system; suspects; offenses; supervised release
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I Lit the Fire: Jared Petrovich Admits His Role in the Killing of John Chamberlain. But why did he target the gay?
These four articles probed the culture of violence at tTheo Lacy Men's Jail in Orange, CA, beginning with an exclusive interview of Jared Petrovich, the accuse ringleader of the Oct. 5, 2006 murder of John Chamberlain, an inmate suspected of child molestation who was brutally beated inside the jail. That story included combined interviews with Petrovich and other inmates and guards at the facility with transcripts and notes of interviews with inmates and guards that the reporter obtained from lawyers representing inmates, including Petrovich, who were charged in the attack. The article contained allegations that Deputy Kevin Taylor, a prison guard who was never charged in the crime, told Petrovich that Chamberlain was a child molester, and that Taylor routinely use inmates like Petrovich to enforce prison rules and mete out punishment to various inmates. Petrovich provided an example of this behavior that I did not include in my original story, alleging that Taylor had known about--and approved--a previous beating of an inmate in Sept. 2006. He only knew the inmate's first name--Mark--but claimed the inmate had been a guitarist for the rock band Kiss. He claimed another inmate, nicknamed "Sick Dog" had witnessed Taylor being informed of the planned attack and, after it was carried out, rewarding the inmates with sack lunches. Through a California Public Records Act request, the reporter obtained the Sheriff Department's jail file on the beaten inmate, Mark Leslie Norton, aka Mark St. John of the rock band Kiss, and found information which corroborated Petrovich's account of the incident, and obtained his death certificate. St. John died of a brain hemorrhage several months after being released.
Tags: prison beatings; rock band Kiss; California; prisoner brutality; bribe; prison regulation