Manus Island detention centre closing down with refugees still inside

source: The Guardian
published: 5 July 2017

The Manus Island detention centre is being shut down around refugees and asylum seekers while they are still living in it.

Refugees inside the centre reported on Wednesday that immigration officials have said they will cut the power from the Charlie compound on Friday, forcing out refugees still living there.

The entire Manus camp is being progressively shut down, with the Australian and Papua New Guinea governments insisting it will be closed and emptied by 31 October.

17 February 201621 December 2022 4WardEverUK

Sarah Reed told family of alleged sexual assault in hospital

source: The Guardian
published: 4 February 2016

The prisoner on remand who died in her cell last month wrote to her family to say she had been sexually assaulted while receiving treatment at a secure mental health unit.

The Guardian has learned that Sarah Reed, 32, was charged with grievous bodily harm with intent over the incident in October after striking back at her alleged abuser. But rather than being released back into a secure hospital, she was held on remand at Holloway prison, north London, where she was found dead on 11 January.

Reed’s family, who she wrote to from jail, insist that she was acting in self defence.

14 January 201621 December 2022 4WardEverUK

Death penalty receives another blow, this time in Pennsylvania

source: Above The Law
published: 5 January 2016

The death penalty has come under fire recently in state courts. Now a recent case out of Pennsylvania highlights a possible role for state executives in hastening the death penalty’s demise.

Remember how last summer the Connecticut Supreme Court issued an opinion ending the death penalty in Connecticut? The court held that the death penalty violates the Connecticut constitution’s cruel and unusual punishment provision — the state analog of the Eighth Amendment — because the practice of killing convicts “fails to comport with contemporary standards of decency” and “is devoid of any legitimate penological justifications.”