|
The purpose of the PJC’s Prisoners’ Rights project is to effect long-term systemic improvements to prisoner health care and conditions of confinement in Maryland.
With approximately 120 prisoners cycling in and out of the Baltimore City Detention Center each day, problems inside the prison spill over to the community outside: problems such as interruption of necessary medications, unsanitary conditions, and denial of healthcare. The BCDC is the 18th largest detention facility in the country. It was built to house 2,900 inmates, but more than 4,000 inmates are frequently there. The Public Justice Center is the only legal services organization providing civil advocacy for prisoners at the jail.
The PJC focuses on ensuring that detainees receive proper healthcare. When a necessary medication regimen is interrupted -- especially for HIV, mental health problems, or other chronic conditions such as asthma or diabetes -- a chronic problem can become an acute emergency. Adding to the crisis are the unsanitary conditions of the prison overcrowding, sewage floods, and vermin-infested kitchens. And because the prison is a permeable wall, rotating detainees in and out, the healthcare emergency inside threatens the entire community with a serious public health crisis.
In 2000, 88% of inmates were pretrial detainees -- they had not been convicted of a crime. If the adage "innocent before proven guilty" is true, then these inmates are the innocent. In September of 2002, with support from the Open Society Institute-Baltimore, the PJC began advocating on behalf of the prisoners housed in the Baltimore City Detention Center.
The Right to Humane Treatment Applies to All People -- Innocent or Guilty
View our film, Infected, created by the Prisoner's Rights Project.
|
|
PJC Announces Agreement With State Officials To Make Dramatic Improvements At The Baltimore City Detention Center
In March 2010, the U.S. District Court approved a settlement agreement that will lead to dramatic improvements in the quality of medical and mental health care provided to detainees at the Baltimore City Jail and effectively settles major portions of a longstanding class-action lawsuit.
For the last seven years, the Public Justice Center has been working inside the jail to advocate for better health care and to bring attention to the conditions in the jail. With our partner, the ACLU, we filed a motion in 2003 to reopen the medical and physical plant sections of a consent decree that had been brokered in the case, Duvall v. O'Malley, which dates back to 1971. In 2004, a district court judge agreed to reopen the case, and the PJC and ACLU began settlement negotiations in 2007.
Click here to read the partial settlement agreement.
JUST KIDS
The Public Justice Center, Eric R. Villines Advocacy Institute, and Community Law In Action are partnering to gather information and promote the discussion of effectively addressing crime allegedly committed by Maryland youths. This Partnership, referred to as “Just Kids”, is funded by the Baltimore Open Society Institute, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, and the Morton and Jane Blaustein Foundation. The goals of the Just Kids Partnership are to: reduce the number of youth who are charged and tried as adults; advocate for policies that transfer fewer youth to the adult criminal justice system; and increase the number of effective community-based programs and practices that serve youth who are accused of serious offenses.
The Partnership’s investigation is in progress and its final report is scheduled to be released in Fall 2010.
|
