[sacbee.com – 5/27/18] The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is changing how inmates are housed, saying current separations between general population inmates and those held in sensitive needs yards have been ineffective in eliminating gangs and violence within prison walls. The agency will instead move toward creating some “non-designated program” facilities, where both groups will be tasked with co-existing. The current system has bred new gangs within the sensitive needs yards, resulting in escalating violence, CDCR Undersecretary of Operations Ralph Diaz said. “We are going to do behavior-based programs…
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CA: All of Mugshots.com’s alleged co-owners arrested on extortion charges
[UPDATED LINKS 5/20/18] [arstechnica.com 5/17/18] Two alleged owners of Mugshots.com—Sahar Sarid and Thomas Keesee—have been arrested in south Florida on a recently issued California warrant. The notorious website publishes mugshots and then demands payment for their removal. On Wednesday, the attorney general of California brought criminal charges against not only Sarid and Keesee, but also Kishore Vidya Bhavnanie and David Usdan. The quartet has been charged with extortion, money laundering, and identity theft. Bhavnanie was arraigned by a Pennsylvania state judge also on Wednesday—his bail was reportedly set at $1.86…
Read MoreCA: Posting mugshots on internet draws criminal charges from California attorney general
[sacbee.com 5/16/18] California Attorney General Xavier Becerra on Thursday filed extortion and money laundering charges against the owners of a website that publishes mugshot photos and charges a fee to remove them. His office is targeting Mugshots.com, which pulls photos and identifying information about criminal suspects from law enforcement departments around the country. The site charges a “de-publishing fee” to remove someone from its archives, according to Becerra’s office. Becerra said it has frustrated people who were accused of crimes they did not commit. “This pay-for-removal scheme attempts to profit…
Read MoreCA: Judge in Stanford rape case breaks silence amid sentencing controversy, recall effort
[cbsnews.com 5/8/18] SANTA CLARA COUNTY, Calif. — A California judge whose sentence for a former Stanford University swimmer in a sex assault case garnered national controversy broke his silence Tuesday ahead of next month’s recall vote. The effort to recall Santa Clara County Judge Aaron Persky is being closely watched for its national political implications. If it’s successful, Persky would be the first California judge recalled from office in 86 years after he sentenced then-sophomore Brock Turner to six months in jail in June 2016 for sexually assaulting a young…
Read MoreCA: L.A. County Sued Over Ban on Sex Offenders as Poll Workers [by ACSOL]
[usnews.com 5/7/18] LOS ANGELES (AP) — Two registered sex offenders are suing Los Angeles County for the right to become poll workers. City News Service says the suit filed Monday argues that the county’s policy banning offenders violates state law and the Constitution. The suit was filed by two offenders who live in the county and by the Alliance for Constitutional Sex Offense Laws, a nonprofit group. California’s sex offender registration website lists more than 13,000 people in L.A. County, including those convicted of nonviolent offenses. Read more
Read MoreCA: New CDCR Regulations Deny Prop. 57 Benefits to Registrants
[ACSOL 5/4/18] The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) has issued new regulations that continue to deny the benefits of Proposition 57 to registrants. The new regulations are dated May 1, but were not publicly available until today. “The new CDCR regulations are inconsistent with a court order issued earlier this year,” stated ACSOL Executive Director Janice Bellucci. “The court in that case clearly ruled that CDCR cannot exclude all registrants from the benefits of Proposition 57.” In its newly issued regulations, CDCR specifically prohibits “inmates convicted of a…
Read MoreCA: San Diego DA Candidate Summer Stephan’s Bad Day
[sandiegofreepress.org 5/3/18] Wednesday, May 2, wasn’t a good day in appointed interim District Attorney Summer Stephan’s quest to win her first election in the June Primary. In Justice Today, a leading publication in the field of criminal justice reform called out Stephan’s claims about human trafficking, suggesting she’s used inflated numbers to bolster her political and professional profile. And Genevieve Jones-Wright, Stephan’s opponent in the upcoming June primary, has asked the State Attorney General’s office to investigate ten alleged violations of state law prohibiting employees–in this case, local law enforcement–from…
Read MoreCA: Wilk sex offender bill passes Senate with unanimous vote [Senate Bill 1199]
[signalscv.com 5/3/18] A bill that State Sen. Scott Wilk, R-Antelope Valley, introduced to reform the release and placement for California sex offenders unanimously passed the Senate on Thursday. Senate Bill 1199 would expand current protections against the ‘dumping’ of sexually violent predators into random communities. Now it would include, when reasonably possible, requiring authorities to take familial and community ties into consideration when determining where inmates convicted of registerable sex offenses are placed upon release. Read more
Read MoreCA: Can You Fire Someone For Being A Sex Offender?
[jdsupra.com 4/30/18] It happens more often than you think. An employee in good standing is “outed” as being listed on a sex offender registry. His/her coworkers are up in arms. Now what? Can he/she be fired? Given California’s relatively new “ban the box” law, employers are limited in how they can use criminal history in employment decisions. For current employees, once a conviction is uncovered, you can’t automatically fire someone for it. Rather, employers must make an individualized assessment to determine if the conviction has a direct and adverse relationship…
Read MoreCA: The Catalyst: Thelton Henderson
[themarshallproject.org 4/23/18] s the judge climbed the watchtower stairs in Pelican Bay prison, he heard muffled gunshots below. When he reached the top, he looked into the prison yard and saw bodies lying in the dirt. One was his law clerk, spreadeagled on the ground in his suit, alongside dozens of inmates. Guards stood over them, guns aimed. “My clerk was thinking he’s gonna die and this is his last day on earth,” Judge Thelton Henderson recalled. What appeared to be the taming of a riot was actually an audacious…
Read MoreCA: Statewide crime initiative gains local support
[benitolink.com 3/28/18] A statewide initiative to change portions of three crime-related laws is picking up steam in the local region. The Reducing Crime and Keeping California Safe Act of 2018 would change parts of Proposition 47, Proposition 57, and Assembly Bill 109 to reclassify certain “nonviolent” crimes as “violent” to prevent the early release of inmates convicted of crimes such as assault on a peace officer, rape of an unconscious person or by intoxication, and human trafficking of a child. A complete list of the purported “nonviolent” crimes can be…
Read MoreCA: Root and Rebound to Open Fresno Office to Serve Women with Criminal Records and in Reentry
[rootandrebound.org and calwellness.org] We are thrilled to announce our growth to Fresno, CA! Root & Rebound to Open Fresno Office to Serve Women with Criminal Records and in Reentry We are thrilled to finally share this news—we are opening an office in Fresno, CA thanks to the California Wellness Foundation, which will serve women in reentry and women with criminal records/past justice-involvement to move through the hurdles and obstacles they face and change the systems and structures that create unnecessary barriers to opportunity. A three-person team, composed of a reentry attorney,…
Read MoreCA: Woman awarded $6.45 million in revenge porn case
[cnn.com 4/9/18] Revenge porn can be costly. A federal district court in California last week entered a default judgment against a man and ordered him to pay $6.45 million in damages after he was accused of spreading an ex-girlfriend’s naked pictures and videos online. It’s believed to be the second-largest payout for a victim of revenge porn who was not a celebrity, according to the woman’s lawyers. The unnamed woman, who was listed as Jane Doe in legal filings, sued the man, David Elam II, in civil court. She alleged…
Read MoreCA: California death row inmate to be freed; no retrial planned
[kcra.com 4/17/18] BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (AP) — A man who spent nearly 25 years on California’s death row for raping and killing a toddler before his conviction was overturned won’t be retried and could be freed within days, authorities said Tuesday. Vicente Benavides Figueroa, 68, has remained in prison even though the state Supreme Court last month overturned his 1993 conviction on grounds that medical testimony at his trial was false. Advertisement Many doctors who testified to the cause of the girl’s injuries recanted. Kern County District Attorney Lisa Green announced…
Read MoreCA: Neighbors concerned after registered sex offender moves feet away from elementary school
[10news.com] Neighbors concerned after registered sex offender moves feet away from elementary school SAN DIEGO (KGTV) — Neighbors are concerned after they say a registered sex offender moved into their Rancho Bernardo community, just feet away from an elementary school playground. ____________, 32, was convicted of possession of child pornography and lewd and lascivious acts with a child in Tennessee in 2013. Neighbors say they became concerned after ____ moved into a townhouse in their neighborhood weeks ago. According to records on the Megan’s Law website, ____ lives on the…
Read MoreCA: California Lawmaker Banned From Hugging After Investigation
[usnews.com] SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — A California state senator has been told to stop hugging people after an investigation concluded that his trademark embraces made multiple female colleagues uncomfortable. However, the investigation released Thursday found Sen. Bob Hertzberg’s frequent hugs are not intended to be sexual and more often than not are not unwelcome. Hertzberg, a Democrat from the Los Angeles area, has earned nicknames such as “Hugsberg” and “Huggy Bear” for greeting men and women alike with giant hugs. The Senate Rules Committee formally reprimanded him on Tuesday and…
Read MoreCA: Fresno sex offender faces 1,882 years in prison
[turnto23.com] BAKERSFIELD, Calif. – A Fresno man was found guilty on Wednesday of numerous child molestation and child pornography charges and faces 1,882 years-to-life in prison. _______, 42, a registered sex offender was living with a family and was charged with sexually assaulting two female victims in their home over a period of one year from June 2014 to June 2015. Read more
Read MoreCA: California will fight a judge’s ruling ordering the state to consider earlier parole for sex offenders
[Time.com] (SACRAMENTO) — California said Monday that it will fight a judge’s ruling ordering the state to consider earlier parole for potentially thousands of sex offenders, such as those convicted of raping an unconscious person. Gov. Jerry Brown’s administration will appeal the order by Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Allen Sumner, said Vicky Waters, spokeswoman for the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. The judge previously said in a tentative ruling that prison officials must rewrite part of the parole regulations in a ballot measure passed by voters in 2016. No…
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