A new prison post from my good friend, Gunther Fiek.
Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Inside the Fence: Chow Call!
Monday, August 6th, 2018Guilty until proved innocent is the new legal standard
Monday, March 19th, 2018A New Blog Post From Prison
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Thursday, December 29th, 2016…to help the National Center for Reason and Justice and receive a tax-deduction for 2016.
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A new post from Gunther Fiek
Saturday, December 3rd, 2016“I looked forward to the weekends and holidays because my window gave me a view of family and friends that were coming in to visit their loved ones. I could see individuals of all ages, families, elderly, children, …etc. I wondered: that is someone’s mother, father, wife, girlfriend, or kid. Needless to say, the time I really took advantage of that sight was when my family was coming to visit me. Sometimes I could see them drive in and park. I could see them going through the main front gate, walk through the open walkway to the main building where they would go through a security check and register. A few minutes later I was being summoned to the visitation room.”
Read Gunther’s full post.
Opposition to Differential Response Dealt Heavy Blow
Saturday, September 24th, 2016
Read the article by Richard Wexler in The Chronicle of Social Change.
Could Removing Brock Turner’s Judge Hurt Poor and Minority Defendants?
Sunday, June 19th, 2016“When we as a community reprimand or condemn a judge for engaging in such a holistic analysis and for exercising discretion, such efforts can have a chilling effect on judicial courage and compassion,” the letter states. Punishing him, the defenders explain, will “deter other judges from extending mercy and instead encourage them to issue unfairly harsh sentences for fear of reprisal.” The Santa Clara County Bar Association has also released a statement saying that removing Persky would be a “threat to judicial independence.”
Read the article by Maurice Chammah at the Marshall Project.
Anatomy of a Snitch Scandal
Thursday, May 19th, 2016
Alexandra Natapoff, a law professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles and the nation’s leading expert on the use of snitches, said the fact that Orange County officials engaged in unconstitutional behavior similar to what made headlines years earlier in Los Angeles County reveals the “entrenched” nature of the practice of using snitches in questionable ways. “We see it from the outside as a scandal that should not be repeated. But apparently Orange County officials didn’t see it that way,” she said. “They saw it as business as usual.”
Read the article in The Intercept by Jordan Smith.
Dishonest Prosecutors, Lots of Them
Sunday, October 4th, 2015
“Prosecutors who bend or even break the rules to win a conviction almost never face any punishment. But even given lax controls, the blatant and systemic misconduct in the Orange County district attorney’s office in Southern California stands out. In a scheme that may go back as far as 30 years, prosecutors and the county sheriff’s department have elicited illegal jailhouse confessions, failed to turn over evidence that is favorable to defendants and lied repeatedly in court about what they did.”
Read the editorial by the editorial board of the New York Times.