How to prosecute and prosecute sexual misconduct in prisons: a high-level review by the deputy attorney general and recommendations for the corrections department
The Justice Department has been told by the deputy attorney general that prosecutors have to use all available tools in order to hold federal corrections employees accountable for sexually abusing women in their custody.
Her directive follows a high-level review this year that uncovered hundreds of complaints about sexual misconduct by Bureau of Prisons employees over the past five years, but only 45 federal prosecutions during that same period.
Weaknesses in administrative discipline against some prison workers and flaws in how prosecutors assessed abuse reports were identified by the working group.
In one case in Florida, authorities declined to prosecute corrections officer Jimmy Highsmith after first receiving tips about him in 2010, only to reverse course years later. Highsmith was sentenced to 48 months in prison in March 2022, for having sex with a woman while she was in prison.
A bipartisan Senate investigation has found widespread sexual abuse of women in prison by the male wardens, officers and volunteers tasked to protect them, uncovering incidents inside at least two-thirds of the federal facilities that housed women over the past decade.
Pay is tied to the security level of the prison. The low or medium- security classifications for women’s prisons differ from higher levels for men’s prisons.
The working group recommended that the Bureau of Prisons create a hotline that inmates can use to report abuse, and that they be able to speak to someone about it. That’s critical since many women in prison face threats of retaliation, including threats by wrongdoers to limit women’s visits with their children.
The group also recommended that moving women who report abuse into restricted housing units should be a “last resort.” Often, those women are transferred into special housing units, where they lose access to phone calls, commissary access and other privileges, which can add to their trauma.
Instead, the Justice Department should consider creating a special unit or task force of sex crimes investigators, a kind of special victims’ unit that could include agents from the FBI or the Inspector General, and align with how many large cities already investigate sexual abuse.
The new report tread gingerly on an issue of ongoing deliberation: whether women who report abuse and agree to testify against their abusers should be eligible for reduced prison sentences or U.S. visas. The study said prosecutors and the BOP should make case-by-case assessments about those issues, and said they may be best suited after a case or investigation has ended.
The working group said the authorities who initially prosecuted the women should be consulted on any such step, as well as the victims of the underlying conviction.
Five Bureau of Prisons employees have been charged with crimes and are being asked for compassionate release by survivors of abuse inside a prison in Dublin, Calif.
Kevin Ring, who advocates for people in prison and their families said that they turned around when they were raped in prison and cooperated with the investigation. “And you’re going to say we have no power to give them relief, that they’re supposed to heal inside a prison?”
The working group, led by the associate deputy attorney general Marshall Miller, met with some of the women who have escaped abuse in prison, including the American Civil Liberties Union.
Sensitivity to the sexual abuse of prison employees: Sensitive senator Ossoff and a female prisoner accused of raping behind bars
The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations also identified serious flaws in how such allegations are investigated and punished by the Justice Department.
The findings of the investigation show that the BOP is failing to prevent, detect and address sexual abuse of prisoners by their own employees, said Senator Jon Ossoff, who led the investigation.
In one California facility, the chaplain and warden were convicted of preying on women behind bars. The person in charge of complying with a federal law designed to prevent prison rape there also was abusing women.
Wiping tears from her eyes as she testified Tuesday, Briane Moore said a captain at the federal prison in Alderson, W. Va., began targeting her in 2017. Moore had been seeking a transfer to be closer to her daughter.
Moore said that he was taken to areas in the prison where there were no cameras. He said he was aware that I wanted to go to another prison. He said, ‘the paperwork goes through me.’ “
After word finally came that she could move to a different prison, Moore said, the captain raped her one last time. Moore said she continues to seek treatment for mental health issues three years after she was released from prison.
“After the abuse, I could not sleep for full nights for months,” she said. I had recurring nightmares that were like a broken record. I woke up in cold sweats.”
Another witness at the subcommittee hearing, Linda De La Rosa, said it took three years to arrest, convict and sentence the prison worker who raped her, even though he had been investigated for predatory behavior several times before.
The problem, De La Rosa believes, is the old boys club. Staff in prisons, managers and investigators all work together for years if not decades. No one wants to listen to female inmates alone on a boat.
The law professor at American University wants the Justice Department to hire more women to work in women’s prisons and to beef up audits of prison conditions with independent verification.
Smith said that there’s not a lot of diversity when it comes to people being audited.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/12/14/1142520821/senate-probe-found-some-federal-prison-staff-abused-female-inmates-without-disci
Corrections Director Collette Peters: Why do wardens in facilities for women are selected and supervised? A reply to Senator Peters
Collette Peters, the new chief of the federal prisons, told Senators she’s looking at how wardens in facilities for women are selected and supervised. She was going to improve camera systems in prison.