And now:Ish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
From: "John Russell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: 'DIPITY Activist criticizes U.S. prison conditions
Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 14:39:43 -0500
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Activist criticizes U.S. prison conditions
3.17 p.m. ET (1917 GMT) April 13, 1999
By Clare Nullis, Associated Press
GENEVA (AP) Female prisoners in the United States suffer frequent sexual abuse
from male guards and are often held in leg irons or shackles in violation of
international standards, a U.N. human rights expert said Tuesday.
Radhika Coomaraswamy, a U.N. investigator, said both federal and state
governments should do more to ensure minimum standards of treatment for female
prisoners and better training for prison guards.
In a report presented to the U.N. Human Rights Commission, Coomaraswamy urged
the Clinton administration to review drug laws, pointing out that many women
were jailed because of drug-related offenses that could be better handled by
community-based programs.
"The United States is criminalizing a large segment of its population; this
segment is overwhelmingly composed of poor persons of color and is increasingly
female,'' Coomaraswamy said in her report to the 53-nation commission.
The number of women in U.S. prisons rose to nearly 65,000 in 1995, up from
12,300 in 1980, according to U.S. government figures.
Neal Walsh, a spokesman for the U.S. diplomatic mission to the United Nations
in Geneva, said most of the deficiencies cited in the report had already been
highlighted by U.S. authorities.
"We welcome this sort of scrutiny as it serves as an example to other countries
that we provided the necessary access,'' Walsh said.
A series of U.N. human rights experts have visited the United States in the
past year at the invitation of the Clinton administration.
Abuse of women in U.S. prisons has also been highlighted by Amnesty
International, which has mounted a campaign against human rights violations in
the United States.
Coomaraswamy's 55-page report documented individual cases of abuse such as rape
of women prisoners in a California jail and the use of tear gas against a woman
shackled to a bed in a Michigan jail.
It also looked at the huge differences in state practices praising Minnesota
for high standards and forward-looking policies while singling out Michigan for
most criticism.
Coomaraswamy criticized the use of restraints such as leg irons and shackles in
prisons throughout the country, saying that it was against international rules
on the treatment of prisoners.
"Women in labor are also shackled during transport to hospital and after the
baby is born,'' she wrote, citing one case in which the woman remained shackled
during delivery.
Rape was fairly rare, Coomaraswamy wrote. Women frequently agreed to have sex
with male guards, however, in return for favors and were subject to harassment
when being frisked by men or monitored during showering.
"It is clear that sexual misconduct by male corrections officers against women
inmates is widespread,'' she wrote.
The report also criticized the practice of keeping female asylum seekers in
prisons for want of lack of space elsewhere.
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Tsonkwadiyonrat (We are ONE Spirit)
Unenh onhwa' Awayaton
http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/
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