Diana Rademacher Diana Rademacher

U.S. SENATE HOLDS BIPARTISAN HEARINGS ON DISASTROUS STATE OF U.S. PRISONS AND THE URGENT NEED FOR REFORM 

Today, the Senate held two important hearings on the urgent need for reform in prisons. The Senate Judiciary convened a full committee hearing in an effort to find ways to prevent deaths of incarcerated individuals in federal prisons, while the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice and Counterterrorism held a subsequent hearing examining the crisis of inadequate correctional staffing and its toll on both corrections officers and incarcerated persons. 

Coming in the wake of a new bombshell DOJ watchdog report showing over 300 preventable deaths in federal prisons over an eight-year period, the Senatorial hearings covered issues related to the operation and management of the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) that have contributed to preventable deaths in custody, including the overuse of solitary confinement, BOP employee misconduct, inadequate medical care, poor facilities maintenance, and critical staffing shortages.

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