By Jean F. Andrews Police and jail officers are often confused by the many forms of English that come from the mouths and lips, and off the fingers and hands of deaf suspects. Just because the deaf person can speak some words, and lipread the question, “what is your name,” or even sign some words
By BitcoDavid We officially launched this site on Mar 4th, 2012. In honor of our upcoming birthday, I have made several improvements, and would like to take a minute to spell them out for you. Immediately, you will notice a difference in our top menu. We no longer have individual pages for the authors. Instead,
By BitcoDavid I am fortunate enough to live in quiet bedroom community outside of Boston, but it was not always thus. I used to live in the heart of one of the inner city’s biggest ghettos, Roxbury. I bring this up, because it was there, that dwelt a profound and long-lived piece of graffiti. Sprayed
By BitcoDavid While reading Prison Riot, I was struck by how similar this story is to the classic Melville novella, Billy Budd. Of course, the latter was written in a much more stilted voice, and was built on Biblical allegory – but the thread of the story is very much the same. Here we have
By BitcoDavid This past Sunday marked Correction Corporation of America’s 30th birthday, making this article about as timely as a CCA guard feeding a diabetic inmate. Let me tell you a little story. In 1905, the state of Mississippi launched an experiment in crime prevention. The program was referred to as the convict lease system.
By Joanne Greenberg Next time someone tells you to go fly a kite, show them this. Ray Bethell is in his 80s, and Deaf. A Canadian, Ray comes to the Washington State Kite Festival every year. He flies 3 kites. Two with his hands and one attached to his waist. The audience signals their applause
By BitcoDavid Michelle Alexander has written a book that has received mention on these venerable virtual pages – The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. She recently wrote an OpEd for the NYT, on the propensity of police officers and other law enforcement to lie on the stand in regards to
By BitcoDavid The Washington Post reports that William Pierce, a 44 year-old Deaf HIV patient has filed suit against the city of D.C. because he was denied treatment, unfairly kept in solitary, and handcuffed – essentially a gag for the Deaf. The ACLU, which is handling the case, has stated Pierce was denied access to
By BitcoDavid The following announcement and the associated PDF embed are courtesy of H.E.A.R.D. Deaf Community members & Allies should submit comments to the FCC by March 25, 2013. On December 28, 2012, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) released a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to address the long-standing issue of high prison telephone rates. Hearing
By Jean F. Andrews While it is commonly accepted to provide interpreters in court, deaf suspects and offenders still struggle to get sign interpreters for arrest, booking, medical/psychological intakes, classification, grievance committee meetings and for translation of the inmate handbook. Most vulnerable are hard of hearing persons who use sign language, and profoundly deaf persons
