The US has handed over the prison at Bagram Air Force base to Afghanistan, in the latest in a series of transitions to have the Afghans take control of their own security. The prison transfer was part of a bargain won months ago by Afghan President Hamid Karzai. However, hundreds of prisoners at the facility remain under US control.

A “primer” from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) seems to encourage the use of isolation to break down prisoners in overseas prisons. Published in 2011, it advocates the use of this coercive measure to break detainees ahead of interrogations, which violates or runs contrary to FBI policy.

If you liked for-profit prisons pushing tougher sentencing and leading to a sharp increase in the warehousing of US citizens, then you’ll love for-profit probation.

A historic congressional hearing on solitary confinement in United States’ prisons happened on Tuesday. It was held by the Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights. Chaired by Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, the hearing was the first-ever hearing on the use of isolation in prisons and the human rights, fiscal, and public safety consequences created.

I appeared on RT America to discuss the hearing and solitary confinement.

A variety of links to articles/interviews/speeches on current topics that may be of interest.

Last night after an hour of vegging out in front of my computer, I moved on to the television. As I surfed the channels, I landed on a reality show about female police officers.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has called for the decriminalization of public possession of 25 grams or less of marijuana. In a state with fairly harsh Rockefeller-era drug laws, this would be a modest change.

It never becomes the top-shelf, salient issue in American elections until after one or two get stolen. But the permanent discriminated class we’re building out of voter suppression laws should be the headline story to the party that stands to lose the most from the situation. Voter registration among Hispanics and African-Americans has dropped significantly since 2008.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the ACLU of Michigan reports the Michigan Department of Corrections has decided to no longer routinely subject women to body cavity searches at the Women’s Huron Valley Correctional facility. The facility had been forcing women to spread their vaginas for searches after shifts in prison jobs, after receiving medical care and after being visited by family, religious workers, lawyers or any other person who might want to see them in prison.

A consortium of civil liberties, religious and health organizations, and experts including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) are challenging a strip-search procedure prisoners in Michigan’s Women’s Huron Valley Correctional Facility (WHV) are forced to submit to that is nothing less than sexual sadism by the state. In the prison that operates under the umbrella of the Michigan Department of Corrections, women are forced to remove their clothing and spread the lips of their vaginas so that a guard can peer inside. Female prisoners are forced to do this after they meet with family members, religious workers, their lawyers, or anyone else who may visit them in prison.