Punishment

I was recently moved to a cell with a window after years without one. I never realized how much I’d taken nature for granted.

A scathing U.S. Department of Justice civil rights investigation confirmed something people incarcerated in Georgia have long known: The state routinely hides the number of people killed inside its prisons.

One of Trump’s first executive orders says federal prisons must house trans women in men’s facilities and directs the government to remove anti-rape protections for trans prisoners.

I spoke to the people incarcerated with me about the 2024 election. They want more than a Democratic Party that abandons incarcerated people, offers little, and focuses on demonizing its opponents.

The Appeal contacted 38 facilities to ask how they’re preparing for air quality issues and possible evacuations and power outages. Thousands of people—including hundreds of children—sit in potentially impacted facilities.

Brooks’s murder by prison guards epitomizes a deeply ingrained culture of brutality perpetuated by New York’s refusal to hold staff accountable.

Spending Christmas in prison and away from my family leaves me depressed. But, after the guys on my unit started a Secret Santa, I briefly felt a happiness that eluded me for years.

Emails show Virginia Department of Corrections officials discussing how to punish people at Red Onion State Prison who self-immolated.

At least six people incarcerated at Red Onion State Prison intentionally burned themselves to get transferred out of the notorious facility.

Illinois Governor JB Pritzker tried to use the state’s parole board to safely free more people from prison. But after Republican backlash, the board’s work has essentially been frozen.

I spent years visiting prisons and courts. At every turn, facilities forced me to comply with invasive searches that left me feeling sexually violated.

Gregory Sharkey spent 15 years in prison for a crime he says he didn’t commit. He was finally freed last month—but will those responsible for caging him be held accountable?

Formerly incarcerated Californians say that if Gavin Newsom wants to keep touting his record as a “progressive,” he should stop vetoing bills that ban or restrict solitary confinement.

A state spokesperson confirmed six men at Red Onion State Prison in Western Virginia used “improvised devices” to give themselves electrical burns.

Billie Allen says he is an innocent man on death row. Allen and his supporters want President Biden to pardon him before Trump takes office.

Even though the United Nations considers more than 15 days of solitary confinement a form of torture, American prisons still use the practice liberally. Prolonged isolation makes imprisoned people more violent and less likely to reintegrate into society.

Most people in prison can’t vote. That doesn’t mean they aren’t paying attention.

For people trapped in prison for decades, simple things like book clubs can be a lifeline and help people cope with the realities of the prison system. Sing Sing Correctional Facility’s club has helped give me and others a sense of purpose and belonging.

In Georgia, a person can be charged as a “party to a crime” for simple acts like answering a phone or loaning gas money. I—and many women incarcerated alongside me—are trapped in prison for crimes committed by men or abusive partners.

New rules from the Federal Communications Commission are putting the brakes on the prison telecom industry’s exploitative practices.

State legislators subpoenaed Robert Roberson one day before the state was set to kill him—an act that delayed the execution. Lawmakers are fighting to let Roberson testify before the state House despite objections from the attorney general and governor.

Despite pleas from state lawmakers, Texas will execute Roberson on Oct. 17 unless Governor Greg Abbott grants a reprieve in his case.

Tasha Shelby was sentenced to life in prison for allegedly shaking her fiance’s two-year-old son to death. But the science around “shaken baby syndrome” has unraveled, and the lead witness against her recanted his testimony.

More than 20,000 people are incarcerated in Florida jails and prisons located in counties subject to evacuation orders. Many officials are refusing to evacuate them.

Even though a federal jury found Terence Richardson not guilty of murder, he was sentenced to life in prison. Virginia prosecutors want to keep it that way.

Prisons and jails across the Southeast have experienced utility outages, evacuations, visitation disruptions, and staff shortages in the storm’s wake.

Five women in Mississippi have been incarcerated longer than any others in the state. Each has been denied parole a multitude of times. Here, one of the women shares their stories.

In 2019, the state passed a law restricting how long prisons can hold people in isolation. But, according to a new report, people still say they’re being isolated for weeks and even months.

More than 700 prisoners at FPC Montgomery in Alabama refused meals over concerns that the Bureau of Prisons was violating sentencing reform provisions in the 2018 First Step Act.

In the early ‘90s, Oklahoma prosecutors claimed Littlejohn and another man had killed someone, even though the victim was shot with a single bullet. A state board has recommended the governor spare Littlejohn’s life.

The term short staffing is a euphemism to divert attention from the state’s continued addiction to incarceration.

Aging in prison meant realizing my son was also a victim of my crime due to my absence from his life. I try to do what I can on visits to help my son succeed.

Texas is set to execute Robert Roberson on Oct. 17 for allegedly shaking his baby to death. But numerous experts now agree the theory used to convict Roberson isn’t real—including the detective who helped arrest him.

Correctional officers allegedly used chemical spray and pepper bombs against women in handcuffs at Central California Women’s Facility.

Although my artistic pursuits began with material necessity, they have become a way for me to express myself and find inner peace within the oppressive environment in which I am confined.

With heat waves sweeping across the country, incarcerated people in states with traditionally milder climates are facing brutal conditions that have long plagued the South and Southwest. A survey by The Appeal reveals that many of the hottest states house prisoners in units without air-conditioning.

After The Appeal published an investigation into the Phoenix Police Department’s killing of 19-year-old Jacob Harris, a community coalition sprung up to help Harris’s three young friends, who are incarcerated for his death. Now, a court has granted the trio a chance to get out of prison.

“I was sentenced and put in prison for the choices I made. I was not sentenced to being raped and abused while in prison.” 

Two secretive prison units that used to almost exclusively house people said to be connected to terrorism have expanded by nearly 80 percent in 15 years, and a new unit is on the way. Formerly incarcerated people say they have been used to punish dissent.