The Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability voted 7-3 Tuesday against closing prisons in Tamms and Dwight. It also advised against closing Tamms Correctional Center, Dwight Correctional Center, Illinois Youth Center at Joliet, Westside Adult Transition Center, Peoria Adult Transition Center, Warren G. Murray Developmental Center. The only facility the CGFA recommends closure for is a state DCFS office in Skokie, IL, although even that office and workers will be moved to another state-owned building. COGFA also clarified previous that it’s previous votes stand against closures of the Singer & Tinley Mental hospitals, Jax DC, and the Murphysboro Youth Center.

Commission votes to keep Murray Center and Tamms open.

There has been a lot of public and agency input and fact-finding about Governor Pat Quinn’s desire to close all these State facilities in the hopes of saving the State some money. Given the sinals that Quinn has put out recently about his intent to push forward with pension and medicaid cuts,  Quinn is still likely to close some if not all of these state facilities despite the CGFA recommendations. Especially since some public and professional support for at least two types of facility closures has developed over the past few months.

Forget that most if not all of the relatives of inmates who are or have been imprisoned in the Tamms Supermax prison and the ACLU want Tamms closed  because of the  alleged human rights violations committed there daily. There has been a groundswell of other voices pointing out that the closure of Tamms simply makes economic sense, and that it’s closure won’t affect public safety. Closing Tamms despite union opposition has to look pretty attractive to Governor Quinn given that, at the minimum, the State will have another opportunity to sell another state prison for money:

Our Opinion: It simply costs too much to run Tamms

Thoughts on today’s Tamms editorial

Some health experts and families are also siding with Quinn in support of the closure of four of the state’s eight developmental centers. They may be giving Quinn too much credit in attributing his plan to an overriding desire to empower persons with disabilities, but their support is likely to result in some closures.

Quinn facility closure plan hailed by activists

Judge Ken Anderson

“…The two attorneys for Judge Anderson wrote earlier this month that it would “compound the tragedy” of Mr. Morton’s wrongful conviction to pursue criminal charges against the former prosecutor. They argued that a court of inquiry was not an appropriate vehicle for such an investigation…”

Morton lawyers: Anderson’s silence ‘speaks volumes’

Former state prison warden loses appeal in wrongful death case

DALLAS (AP) — Three men convicted in the robbery of an elderly woman nearly 20 years ago will be declared innocent Friday, though two of the men also convicted of other crimes won’t immediately go free, according to prosecutors and the Innocence Project of Texas.

Five people were originally implicated in the November 1994 purse-snatching in Dallas by an eyewitness who saw the robbery take place. But four other people would later come forward to admit they had committed the robbery, and attorneys successfully argued that the eyewitness’ initial identification was faulty.

One of the people wrongfully accused, Darryl Washington, had been convicted and sentenced to 99 years in prison for the incident. The two other adults, Shakara Robertson and Marcus Lashun Smith, reached plea deals and received probation. The two remaining people wrongfully implicated were juveniles.

Washington, Robertson and Smith are expected to appear Friday morning before Judge Lena Levario in state district court to be formally declared innocent. It will be the first time Dallas County — which has overturned wrongful convictions against more than 20 people in the last decade — will exonerate three people of one crime at once.

But while Smith is out of jail, Washington and Robertson are not. Washington is also serving a 20-year sentence on separate drug charges, said Gary Udashen, president of the Innocence Project of Texas. Udashen said Washington should be released from prison soon, as it’s likely he would have been paroled already on the drugs conviction had it not been for the burglary charge.

Robertson is serving a three-year sentence for failing to comply with sex offender restrictions in 2011, which stems from a conviction five years earlier for indecency with a child, according to online records.

A former University of Houston law student led the push to overturn the three men’s convictions. Tracey Cobb began looking into Washington’s case a decade ago. She graduated, became a lawyer and continued to pursue the case. Years after she started, Cobb found someone who confessed to having robbed the woman, she said Thursday.

Cobb eventually located four people who admitted — both to her and to Dallas County prosecutors — that they had committed the crime, she said. The fifth person had already died, she said.

Meanwhile, attorneys argued that the eyewitness who allegedly saw Washington, Robertson, Smith and the two juveniles was wrong. Udashen said police detained the group of five and asked the witness if they had been the ones to do the robbery.

“If you pulled five black guys at random and brought them in front of the witness under these circumstances, they probably would have said they did it,” he said.

At a court hearing last month, the four men who were later identified confessed to their involvement. Levario said she found all the witnesses to be credible, according to a transcript of the hearing.

Washington, Robertson and Smith could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Prosecutors are not opposing the request to have the three declared formally innocent. Russell Wilson, who heads the Dallas County District Attorney’s conviction integrity unit, which investigates wrongful convictions, said the case began to “fall in place” as the actual robbers came forward.

“Normally, you’re going to be very skeptical of folks acknowledging crimes and stuff like that. It’s just a rare, rare instance that it would happen,” Wilson said Thursday. “It began to ring very true, the more that we dug into it.”

via 3 to be declared innocent in 1994 Dallas robbery – Houston Chronicle.

Does new technology make us more free or less free?

It’s easy to say “both,” and point to examples on either side. And in fact, some uses of technology support the cause of individual liberty and others work against it.

I believe the biggest threat to our freedom in the long term is when governments or law enforcement agencies grab the exclusive right for themselves to use new technologies.

Here’s how it works. A new technology appears. Police say they can use it but citizens can’t. If this is accepted by the courts and the public, the government now has more power and citizens less.

Over time, the accumulation of these new powers upsets the balance of power between the state and the people, and our freedom is increasingly eroded.

One old example is the use of audio and video recording technology during police interrogations.

A century ago, no such recordings were made. Police interviewed suspects and witnesses. In court, it was the detective’s word against the suspect’s. But new tape recording and later video recording technology enabled a successful power grab by the police.

Police can record interrogations. Suspects cannot. As a result, both honest and abusive police have a technology advantage, and both innocent and guilty suspects have a disadvantage that didn’t used to exist before the technology existed.

Police can present any subset of an interrogation they like, or claim that it wasn’t recorded if the recording doesn’t support their case. The suspect has no such advantage, and is denied the opportunity to gather evidence of police misconduct.

There are much newer examples.

Local police spy and track via cell phone

A groundbreaking story in The New York Times this weekend revealed that hundreds of local police departments in the United States routinely spy on citizens via their cell phones, and track their locations, “with little or no court oversight.”

The article points out that cell phone carriers have set up profitable menus of services to offer to these departments, such as suspects’ locations, the tracing of texts and phone calls and others.

Any citizen requesting similar information would be denied.

It’s a new technology capability, and police are asserting a monopoly on its use. Even more disturbing is that this de facto monopoly on the use of these technologies is being granted not by congress or the courts, but by corporations.

We can also see new technology power grabs coming soon.

The drone wars

The widespread police use of remote-controlled drone aircraft predicted by just about everybody will raise some interesting legal questions. For example, can police use drones to peek into people’s backyards, or does that violate the Constitution’s 4th-Amendment protection against “unreasonable searches and seizures”?

One possibility is that, as with many technologies in the past, law enforcement agencies will be granted the exclusive right to use drone technology along with an exception to (or a new definition of) the 4th Amendment.

Another possibility was raised recently by John Villasenor, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in an NPR interview. He points out that a 2001 case established that when “the government uses a device that is not in general public use to explore details of the home that would previously have been unknowable without physical intrusion, the surveillance is a search.”

In that case, if drones grow in popularity among consumers to the point where they can be found to be “in general public use” then drone spying on backyards would not be “searches,” and would thereby not be banned by the Constitution.

In either of the cases, the police would retain exclusive use of the information gathered by drones, as well as the knowledge of exact details of the surveillance.

Are we going to accept this?

The bigger question is this: What should a free society do in order to safeguard its freedom as new technologies come online?

Unfortunately, the Constitution doesn’t mention video cameras, cell phones or drones. But it clearly attempts to prevent government exclusivity over and use and control of, say, media technology or gun technology.

via How to Stop Cops from Abusing Technology – Datamation.

April 4, 2012, 3:28 p.m.

You check in on Foursquare, post geotagged photos on Facebook and tweet every mundane detail of your life. You overshare. But do you really want the cops tracking your cellphone without your knowledge?

A recent review of law-enforcement practices by the American Civil Liberties Union revealed that it’s not uncommon for cellphones to be virtually tailed using either the phone’s own GPS or cellular triangulation — without obtaining a warrant or subpoena.

“The overwhelming majority of the over 200 law enforcement agencies that provided documents engaged in at least some cellphone tracking — and many track cellphones quite frequently,” the ACLU found. And only 10 agencies said that they have never tracked cellphones.

The organization had its 35 affiliates across the country file 380 requests for documentation of policies and practices on tracking of cellphones. ACLU said it received responses from more than 200 police departments.

Among the more interesting examples were Lincoln, Neb., and Gilbert, Ariz. In Lincoln, police gain access to GPS data, which is more accurate than cell tower triangulation, without having to offer probable cause, the organization said. And the Gilbert Police Department went ahead and got their own cellphone-tracking technology, ACLU said.

Other agencies sought information about all the cellphone numbers that used the cell tower at a particular location in a given period.

That use was slightly different, said Joel R. Reidenberg, founding academic director of the Center on Law and Information Policy at Fordham University in New York. He said it was more akin to taking a photo of everyone at Grand Central Station.

Right about now you’re probably asking: What about the 4th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which says you need a warrant to search and you need probable cause to get a warrant?

Reidenberg points to United States v. Jones, which addressed GPS tracking without a warrant. While the justices held that law enforcement was essentially trespassing on private property by installing a device to track movements, they didn’t really touch on tracking using cellphones. But, he said, the decision clearly indicates a great concern about 24-hour monitoring.

Although an argument can be made that “the U.S. has a tradition of seeing one’s activities in public as not having an expectation of privacy,” Reidenberg said, “that’s now up in the air since technology provides the possibility of pervasive, 24-hour monitoring.”

In addition, Reidenberg said he found it disturbing that such tracking “enables others to learn systematically everywhere I go every time I step out of my door.” This takes activity in public that “may become something that’s private” — a pattern of behavior.

Ultimately, it might verge on violating the 1st Amendment’s protection of the freedom of association, he said.

Sure, a policeman could stand on a street corner and track your movements in person, though it sounds a bit like the KGB. Reidenberg asks: “Would we in a democratic society approve the budget to have police follow everyone? Democracy has checks” on that kind of expensive proposal.

However, with technology, the cost is much less — at least in terms of money.

via Police tracking of cellphones raises concerns – latimes.com.

But you’d be wrong.

As the New York Times reports, “Law enforcement tracking of cellphones, once the province mainly of federal agents, has become a powerful and widely used surveillance tool for local police officials, with hundreds of departments, large and small, often using it aggressively with little or no court oversight.” Credit for the discovery goes to the ACLU, which used freedom of information laws to survey police departments nationwide about their behavior. Some jurisdictions require officers to obtain warrants before asking always compliant wireless carriers for data on their customers. But in many jurisdictions, there is no such deference to individual rights. Depending on your phone, officers can get GPS data that shows everywhere you’ve been, and they needn’t even tell you they’re doing so. It’s a practice that renders privacy rights almost meaningless.

Perversely, cell phone carriers are even profiting from sharing information about their customers. Says the Times, “Cell carriers, staffed with special law enforcement liaison teams, charge police departments from a few hundred dollars for locating a phone to more than $2,200 for a full-scale wiretap of a suspect.” Adds the ACLU, “then there are police departments in places like Gilbert, Arizona, which have purchased their own cell tracking technology.”

There is reason to believe that the status quo wouldn’t pass muster if brought before the Supreme Court. It has previously ruled against the warrantless placement of a GPS tracking device on a drug suspect’s car. But there’s no reason to wait for a judicial solution to this problem. Legislators ought to rein in law enforcement and reassert the notion that its impermissible for police to engage in intrusive surveillance without probable cause or judicial oversight. At present, the decision to use a cell phone effectively surrenders a huge amount of privacy, but it’s hard to believe Americans favor that status quo, and changing it is within our power.

via Big Brother in Your Pocket: How Police Use Your Cell Phone to Track You – Conor Friedersdorf – Technology – The Atlantic.

“Closures are difficult. They impact every region of the state. They impact jobs and lives,” said Austin Baidas, associate director of the governor’s Office of Budget and Management. “These decisions are difficult, but they are necessary.”

He was among dozens of representatives of government, labor, the business community, health care, churches, and the general public who testified Wednesday before the Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability. Hundreds of people attended and often jeered or applauded during the session at the Dwight High School gym.

While the Department of Corrections estimates closing the prison would save about $37 million a year, Dwight officials say the economic impact would be close to $54 million.

The advisory panel is expected to meet again sometime in the next few weeks to vote on nonbinding recommendations for Gov. Pat Quinn’s plan to close nine state facilities.

Quinn directed DOC to cut about $112 million, or about 9 percent, from its budget for fiscal 2013, so “facilities must close, and employees must be affected,” said DOC Director S.A. Godinez,. He said the department expects to eliminate about 1,100 jobs statewide.

Panel member state Rep. Raymond Poe, R-Springfield, asked why the state spends hundreds of millions of dollars on tax incentives and other programs to create jobs while at the same time cutting state jobs that boost local economies.

“You can’t go out and create 1,100 jobs in the state of Illinois for $100 million,” he said, drawing loud applause. “This whole exercise is counterproductive.”

Under the DOC plan, the 961 inmates at Dwight and the 1,007 women at Lincoln Correctional Center would be combined at Logan Correctional Center in Lincoln, which now houses 1,973 men. Lincoln would be converted for male inmates.

Dwight prison, which has buildings dating to 1930, needs $18.2 million worth of repairs, including $6 million worth that must be done immediately.

While Logan requires $8.3 million in repairs, only $1.2 million in projects are considered urgent. It also would require about $524,000 in updates to create segregated space for Dwight’s mental health unit and 188 maximum-security inmates, according to DOC.

While the state estimates closing Dwight would lead to 355 DOC layoffs, local leaders say the impact would be far greater.

Larry Vaupel, CEO at the Greater Livingston County Economic Development Council, distributed copies of a Northern Illinois University study of the economic impact the closure would have on Grundy, Kankakee, LaSalle and Livingston counties.

The total loss would be 629 jobs and $53.7 million, or 5 percent, of the “gross regional product,” he said before the hearing. When 1,700 other jobs lost in the recession are factored in, the GRP would be down 12 percent, he said.

“We can’t absorb that the way big metro areas can,” he said.

Calling the loss of the prison “devastating,” Dwight Mayor Bill Wilkey said Dwight, which recently lost two car dealerships and some jobs at the RR Donnelley plant, can’t take more job losses.

While critics of the plan question closing prisons when the DOC itself says it would be at 140 percent of rated capacity, DOC officials said that number is misleading. Rated capacity often is based on single-occupancy cells, but cells routinely house two inmates now.

Henry Bayer, executive director of American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31, whose union represents most prison workers, renewed his call to keep the facilities open by deferring hundreds of millions of dollars in tax breaks approved earlier this year for the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and Sears Holding Corp.

Bayer called on state lawmakers to reverse the closure plan by funding the facilities in the fiscal 2013 budget. That was how closures proposed last year, including Logan Correctional Center, were averted, he said.

via Officials estimate $54M blow to area economy if state shuts Dwight prison.

But he said he never lost himself.

“I was in a place that literally is hell, but I still came out not being bitter,” Rivera said. “I always looked to the future.”

Nearly three months after his release, he and others connected to the case shared their experience during a discussion called the “Innocence Panel” on Tuesday at the Northern Illinois University College of Law.

Rivera, who was 19 at the time he was convicted of the 1992 murder of Holly Staker, walked free from the Illinois Department of Corrections on Jan. 6 after DNA evidence helped prove his innocence.

Jane Raley, senior staff attorney for Northwestern University’s Center on Wrongful Convictions, started looking at Rivera’s case in 2003. It took nine years, 30 law students, nine lawyers and countless experts to set Rivera free, she said.

“It’s very, very difficult to unravel a wrongful conviction. It takes a village,” she said.

The Innocence Panel, hosted by the NIU College of Law’s Criminal Law Society, included Appellate Justice Susan F. Hutchinson of the Illinois Appellate Court, Second District and NIU Law alumna Stacey Mandell, senior law clerk to Justice Hutchinson.

Rivera’s case was tried three times before he was exonerated. A man in the Lake County Jail, who was a suspect in the case, was the first person to point the finger at Rivera, who was in police custody at the time for a property crime.

When police started questioning him, he claimed to be at a party across the street from the crime scene but wasn’t. Raley said he got so deep into the lie that he couldn’t get out of it.

Rivera was interrogated for four days. Prior to confessing, 10 officers spent 26 hours interrogating him.

Raley said his clothes were soaked because he had been crying, and he had a psychotic episode while police were preparing his statement.

Rivera said he blacked out and woke up in the fetal position.

via Daily Chronicle | Wrongful conviction center of NIU panel.

“I’m really looking forward to the public hearing,” Wilkey said. “After many meetings over the past few weeks in preparation for this hearing, I just can’t wait for us to make our case to keep Dwight open.”

The public hearing for the closure of Dwight Correctional Center is set for 4 p.m. this Wednesday, April 4, 2012, at Dwight Township High School, 801 S. Franklin St., Dwight, Ill.

The hearing will consist of several panels of individuals that will testify to the Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability COGFA. Those panels will include Senators Cultra and Hutchinson, Representatives Barickman, Roth and Mautino, Mayor Wilkey, the employee union and other local elected officials, business representatives and members of the public.

Director Godinez of the Illinois Department of Corrections is expected to testify at the hearing and answer questions from the commission members.

“I’m sure the commission will ask the right questions of Director Godinez,” Mayor Wilkey said in regard to the appearance by the Director. “There are a lot of questions regarding the IDOC closure report and proposed cost savings, and I’m confident that the commission will get to the bottom of it.”

AFSCME, the union that represents the majority of employees of the Dwight Correctional Center will testify to the validity of the IDOC report and, more specifically, to the IDOC claims that the Dwight Correctional Center is too old and needs imminent repair.

The union is expected to make a presentation to the commission during the hearing.

Mayor Wilkey will speak to the impact the closure will have on the village of Dwight. The impact will be on several aspects, including the local economy, businesses, jobs, health care, municipal funding, school funding, social and emotional impacts.

“It would devastate the village of Dwight and many of the communities around us, including Streator, Pontiac and Kankakee, where many employees reside.” the mayor added.

The public hearing is expected to have a large turnout of people who support keeping the Dwight Correctional Center open.

via morrisdailyherald.com | Public hearing next step in fight to keep DCC open in Morris, Illinois.