Heat in Texas prisons has killed inmates. A landmark trial starting this week could force the use of AC.

Tough love in Texas! Don't do crime in Texas!

"... Nearly 70% of Texas prisoners live without AC, or roughly 90,000 inmates, according to the legal filings, and temperatures in cells routinely climb to above 90 degrees during the summer. ..."

Texas faces landmark trial over lack of air conditioning in prisons

What Happens When an incarcerated criminal Gets Cancer in Prison?

Bad news! One more good reason to stay out of prison!

What this PJP may not have investigated is how much prisoners were themselves negligent or ignorant to diagnose and undergo treatment? 

"People who are imprisoned are more likely to die from cancer than the general population in the United States. Chronic stress and unhealthy food contribute to poor cancer outcomes, as do delays in diagnosis, patchy treatment and lack of coordination with outside healthcare systems. Contributors to the Prison Journalism Project (PJP) reported symptoms being ignored or downplayed, follow up appointments being missed because of administrative failures or resourcing issues and being strip-searched and chained when seeing doctors, receiving treatments or travelling for healthcare. PJP contributors described recovering from cancer in prison as a unique kind of hell." (Nature Briefing Cancer)

What Happens When You Get Cancer in Prison? — Prison Journalism Project "PJP contributors on what it’s like to suffer from the leading killer behind bars."

'It's tripled in 5 years!' – what's behind the rise in female prison officers sleeping with male inmates?

Gender equality gone awry? Do they marry? Are some women attracted to violent males?

There are also videos in the public domain showing these romances.

Caveat: I did not watch the whole video.

'It's tripled in 5 years!' – what's behind the rise in female prison officers sleeping with inmates? - YouTube

Sweden wants to send inmates to empty Estonian prisons

Amazing stuff! However, language as an issue was not even mentioned in the entire video! Swedish and Estonian are not exactly the same language!

Lawsuit: Female Inmates Forced to Live with Trans-Identifying Males at Texas Special Needs Women’s Prison After Initial Court Win

As a female prisoner I would probably not be enthusiastic to share a shower or a prison cell etc. with a transgender woman. Trust but verify!

"Two female inmates at a federal prison for women with special needs in Fort Worth, Texas, saw a landmark early court win in November when a judge ordered transgender-identifying male inmates to be housed away from them following claims of sexual abuse. ..."

Exclusive — Lawsuit: Female Inmates Forced to Live with Trans-Identifying Males at Texas Special Needs Women’s Prison After Initial Court Win

Trump Department of Justice ‘immediately’ stops enforcing prison rape protections for LGBTQ individuals

Good news! Why should LGBTQ individual be privileged as if they are not already privileged and celebrated!

How much does it cost taxpayers to have prisoners undergo sex change procedures in prison to join the LGBTQ club? 

Why are LGBTQ individuals e.g. allowed to have separate showers in prison?

"... Those rules include requiring trans and intersex prisoners to be allowed separate showers, banning body searches purely for the purpose of finding out what genitals they have, and requiring prison staff to consider their safety when assigning them to male or female wings. ..."

Global Health NOW: The Hepatitis B Vote: A Pivotal Moment for U.S. Vaccine Policy

Trump DoJ ‘immediately’ stops enforcing prison rape protections for trans and intersex people, according to leaked memo "The Department of Justice instructed prison auditors across the country to simply stop assessing whether facilities are violating laws designed to shield LGBT+ prisoners from sexual abuse"

An AI model trained on prison phone calls now looks for planned crimes in those calls

How many crimes have been directed from prison?

It seems the article does not describe how such calls were linked to any actual committed crimes.

"A US telecom company trained an AI model on years of inmates’ phone and video calls and is now piloting that model to scan their calls, texts, and emails in the hope of predicting and preventing crimes.

Securus Technologies president Kevin Elder told MIT Technology Review that the company began building its AI tools in 2023, using its massive database of recorded calls to train AI models to detect criminal activity. It created one model, for example, using seven years of calls made by inmates in the Texas prison system, but it has been working on models for other states and counties. ..."

An AI model trained on prison phone calls now looks for planned crimes in those calls

An AI model trained on prison phone calls now looks for planned crimes in those calls

Louisiana prison reunites prisoners with their daughters at father-daughter dance

Good idea!

Rapist transferred into a female prison in Scotland as a transgender woman

Very recently, I learnt about this case. This case also raises the question how many male prisoners undergo sex change in prison at what cost to the taxpayer?

As a female prisoner, how would you feel about the prospect that a male rapist comes to your prison? What a wonderful world!

This is not a new story! Dates back to 2023.

According to Wikipedia "A Freedom of Information request by The Times reported that, in October 2022, there were a total of 19 transgender prisoners in Scotland, 12 of whom began transitioning while in prison."

"... Bryson made the decision to transition from a man to a woman while awaiting trial ...

Bryson, 31, was initially remanded to a women's jail after being found guilty, but was then moved to a men's facility. ...

The case ultimately led to an urgent review and a change in policy which will see all newly-convicted or remanded transgender prisoners initially placed in jails according to their birth sex. ..."

Isla Bryson case - Wikipedia (This Wikipedia article seems to be lousy!)

Isla Bryson: Transgender rapist jailed for eight years "A double rapist who changed gender while waiting to stand trial has been jailed for eight years."

Massachusetts correction officer accused of having sex with an inmate

Life continues behind bars so they say! Maybe this was an erection officer?

Caution: irony!

"A former correction officer has been indicted for allegedly having sex with an inmate, according to the Suffolk DA’s office.

Boston man William Cooper, 37, has been charged with one count of rape of a person in custody.

Cooper — who was a correction officer at the Suffolk County South Bay House of Correction — is accused of having sex with an inmate in a caseworker office near the prisoner’s cell. ..."

Massachusetts correction officer accused of having sex with an inmate

Arizona lawmakers demand answers on surge of prison homicides and safety issues

Bad news! Leniency on violent offenders in prison may have consequences.

"At least nine inmates have been killed in 2025. Meanwhile, assaults on both staff and inmates are rising. ...

“Staff level assaults have almost doubled, and from year to year, from 2023 to 2024 to 2025,” Payne told The Center Square. “Assaults on inmates has more than doubled, almost tripled.” ...

policies they say allowed high-risk offenders to be reassigned to less restrictive custody levels. ...

“Moving violent offenders into less secure settings has put staff and inmates in danger, and the results are tragic.” ...

there were approximately 1,300 prisoners in maximum custody when Thornell [Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry Director] took over. Seven months later, Payne put that number at 257. ..."

Arizona lawmakers demand answers on prison homicides | Just The News "At least nine inmates have been killed in 2025."

Meeting the mental health needs of formerly and of current incarcerated people

This is a huge skandal! Prisons should not be wardens for mentally ill individuals!

"An estimated two in five people who are incarcerated have a history of mental illness, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness. Most receive no treatment for their mental health issues during their incarceration in state and federal prisons. 

When they are released, these people are often still coping with mental health problems. But care can be equally hard for them to find on the outside, especially while they are struggling to get on their feet. ...

Their mental health problems tend to be quite complex. Most people we see carry multiple diagnoses. For example, post-traumatic stress disorder [PTSD] and substance-use disorder, or schizophrenia and substance-use disorder, as well as anxiety, depression, bipolar, personality disorder. They are also generally a pretty treatment-naïve group of individuals. Even if they are mandated treatment while still incarcerated, they might not totally receive it because of long waitlists and just not having enough clinicians in the facilities. And what they get is typically not evidence based. ..."

Meeting the mental health needs of formerly incarcerated people | Yale News

Unethical medical experiments conducted on black American inmates. Really!

As if white American, in particular poor, prisoners were spared! Such articles stressing the victimization of black Americans as if they were the only victims are preposterous! Just take this example of this notorious doctor of the San Quentin prison. 

In recent times, I have seen several articles with similar headlines! Seems to be the latest Black narrative!

"Unethical experiments conducted on Black inmates were used in the development of the antimalarial primaquine in the 1950s and 60s, particularly around genetics’ role in adverse drug reactions, finds a historical report published in JAMA Network by an ethicist-led research team. Science"

Global Health NOW Mercury Rising in Worldʼs Rivers; RFK Jr.’s New Committee Picks; and Who Squashed the Veg Sculpture Competition?

The Black Prisoners of Stateville Race, Research, and Reckoning at the Dawn of Precision Medicine (no publi access)

Novel Mental Health Care in an Los Angeles Jail: trained Inmates attending to and treating each other inmates

This seems to be a very promising approach! Worth trying!

When mental institutions were systematically closed in the 1950s and 1960s, prisons became mental institutions. What was maybe a well meaning reform back then has come with serious negative side effects!

Then there was the 1962 book and 1975 move called "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest"

"About half the people incarcerated in the Los Angeles County jail suffer from mental illness.

The need for treatment and the chronic inability to meet that need led two incarcerated men to create a peer-led initiative, in which participants are trained to assist others with severe mental illness.

In the Forensic Inpatient Stepdown program, now 4+ years old, the assistants provide emotional support, use de-escalation techniques, teach life skills, and encourage peers to follow treatment plans. 

Impact: Since 2021, the program has expanded to reach 400+ patients. 

Units using it report 6X fewer self-harm incidents and 35% fewer returns to hospitals.

Mental health advocates say the program offers a model for improving care and rehabilitation inside jails. ..."

"For years, the Los Angeles County jail has been known as the United States’ largest mental health institution. ...

For years, the U.S. Department of Justice has been monitoring the jail system – also the nation’s largest – to assess its mental health care. ...

And yet it’s making progress, particularly with a peer-to-peer program called Forensic Inpatient (FIP) Stepdown that the [Christian Science] Monitor reported on four years ago. Since then, the nascent program has grown more than sixfold overall, spreading to the women’s jail. Incarcerated people trained as mental health assistants are helping hundreds of others with severe mental illness who are held at the same facility. ..."

Global Health NOW: Argentina’s Health System Overhaul; The Legacy of Nuclear Testing in Kazakhstan; and Novel Mental Health Care in an L.A. Jail

‘Motivated and inspired’: California inmates are improving mental health behind bars

A floor painted by a former mental health assistant shines after a "Double Scrub Monday," which involves cleaning by incarcerated individuals at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility in downtown Los Angeles, on April 21, 2025.

Trump announces he will reopen infamous Alcatraz prison to house most dangerous criminals

That gives his age away! 😊 This federal prison closed in 1963.

Trump announces he will reopen infamous Alcatraz prison to house most dangerous criminals | Just The News

Why El Salvador President Bukele Is So Popular With Trump’s Inner Circle

Recommendable! There are times when it is necessary to crack down on crime like in El Salvador! Bukele is e.g. not summarily executing criminals on the spot or is he? It could be a lot worse for criminals in El Salvador!

Massachusetts correction officers bust woman for allegedly tossing drugs over jail's wall to boyfriend

Have you ever wondered how drugs get inside jails and to prisoners? Here is one way and it does not seem to require corrupt correctional officers.

What a love affair! 😊

Massachusetts correction officers bust woman for allegedly tossing drugs over jail's wall to boyfriend