By BitcoDavid The New York Times, on January 3rd, reported on the case of Joseph A. Buffey. Eleven years ago, Buffy was sentenced to 70 years for the robbery and rape of an 83 year old woman. According to the Times, Buffey confessed to the crime, but DNA tests prove his innocence. In fact, Buffey
By BitcoDavid The New York Times did a photo-essay on the burgeoning trend of teaching yoga to inmates, as an attempt at corralling the recidivism problem. Even though states’ spending on corrections has quadrupled during the past two decades, to $52 billion, the rate of recidivism has remained stubbornly high, with roughly four in 10
By BitcoDavid Well, I’m feeling pretty good about myself. Today, December 19th, the New York Times reported on the city of Oaxaca, Mexico’s use of Deaf officers to monitor the city’s surveillance cameras. But DeafInPrison.com reported on this story on Oct. 25. That’s right. The Gray Lady – the paper that broke Watergate and the
By BitcoDavid * A moment to mourn the victims of today’s school shooting in Connecticut. * The New York Legislature greatly improved the treatment of mentally ill inmates in 2008, when it required the prison system to place seriously mentally ill inmates who violate rules into a treatment program instead of solitary confinement, where they
By BitcoDavid As writers, we become sensitive to certain words and phrases. Just ask me to go 12 rounds on the word folks, and you’ll see what I mean. One phrase that is increasingly starting to bother me is prison industry. It’s a sad commentary on the state of our union when we have to
By BitcoDavid I’ve been swamped and working hard on getting caught up on videos and other projects, which I know you’ve been waiting for. Trust me, they’re coming. But I wanted to get a post up here, which will bring you up to speed on some of what’s going on within the prison system. On
By BitcoDavid I finally got a second to get a post up on here! I’ve been swamped, working on several upcoming projects, including the last video in the series of interviews with Felix Garcia by Jim Ridgeway and Pat Bliss, the PDF serialization of Felix’s story and an Idea Jim Ridgeway and I are hammering
Today’s New York Times reports on a Deaf couple that have opened a pizzeria restaurant in San Francisco. Russ and Melody Stein, who are [D]eaf, own Mozzeria, a restaurant in San Francisco. Workers use sign language, pen and paper, bulletin boards and the Web to communicate. What strikes me, is something that I’ve been saying
George Whitmore died in anonymity and poverty, at the age of 68. In 1963, Whitmore was wrongfully convicted in the double homicide of Janice Wylie, 21 – a magazine editor, and Emily Hoffert, 23 – a schoolteacher. He was 19 years old. The interrogation by a group of all-White detectives lasted 22 hours. Whitmore, a
On Sept. 13th, we posted an e-mail from Change.org that told the story of Terrence Williams, the Pennsylvania death row inmate, scheduled for execution on Oct. 3rd. Williams was found guilty of murdering the men who had continuously raped him since his early teens. Here’s the link to the New York Times
