In the past 25 years, the number of women and girls caught up in the criminal justice system has skyrocketed. Many have been swept up in the War on Drugs and subject to punitive sentencing policies for nonviolent offenses.
In Pennsylvania, thousands of woman cycle through the county jail system every year. Unfortunately, the county prisons that house these women — 57 in total — have been slow to adapt to the changing demographics of their prisoners. As a result, the unique health care needs of women have been largely ignored, leaving the health of this vulnerable population at risk.
This week marked the opening of the trial in the ACLU of Pennsylvania’s challenge to the state’s restrictive voter ID law. The trial began with testimony from Ms. Viviette Applewhite, a feisty 93-year-old African-American great-great-grandmother who uses a wheelchair. Ms. Applewhite, who once marched with Martin Luther King, Jr., has voted in almost every election for the past 50 years and cast her first vote for president for FDR. Despite her age and limited physical mobility, Ms. Applewhite traveled two hours from Harrisburg to Philadelphia to testify as to how she may not be able to vote in this year’s presidential election because she does not have has not been able to obtain an acceptable ID under the state’s new law.
If you have a potty mouth, stay away from the Keystone State. It turns out that police in Pennsylvania have delicate sensibilities. A recent ACLU of Pennsylvania Right to Know Law request revealed that in a one-year period, the Pennsylvania State Police issued over 770 disorderly conduct citations for profanity or profane gestures. That's two citations a day. Illegal citations, I should emphasize, as the courts have made it very clear that profanity, unlike obscenity, is constitutionally protected speech.
After a long, but inspiring day in Washington D.C., our weary contingent slowly made its way back to our bus. While we waited for the stragglers, we traded stories. One of my fellow activists told us how her mom had her at the age of 17. Although her mom chose not to have an abortion, both she and her mom feel strongly that every woman should have the right to make that decision for herself.
Elizabeth Mort and Alex Rodriguez, of New Castle, Penn., thought the most difficult thing facing them when they arrived home from the hospital with their newborn daughter Isabella would be the sleepless nights.
Instead, they were faced with the unthinkable — having their three-day-old daughter taken from them for five days by Lawrence County Children and Youth Services (LCCYS) because of Elizabeth's false-positive drug test performed by the hospital where Isabella was born. Elizabeth, who was eventually cleared of illegal drug use, had eaten an "everything" bagel with poppy seeds two hours before being admitted to the hospital, causing the inaccurate test result (eating poppy seeds can cause drug tests to show false positives for opiate use). Elizabeth was not even told she had tested positive for opiates until two police officers and two caseworkers came to her home and took her newborn baby daughter.
A pair of February 4 federal appeals court decisions from Pennsylvania involving ACLU clients made the important issue of how much authority school officials can exercise over students' out-of-school Internet speech as clear as, well … mud. See if you can figure it out.
In one case, student Justin Layshock used his grandmother's computer to post a mock profile of his principal on MySpace, using the principal's name and picture to pretend it was the principal. The profile said things like the principal was "too drunk to remember" his birthday and has been drunk many times; was a "big steroid freak" and belonged to "Steroids International," in the past month smoked a "big blunt" (I'm guessing most of you don't need me to explain what blunt means in a footnote, like the court did!), and took "pills"; does not have a "big dick," is a "big fag" and is "transgender."
After the ACLU of Pennsylvania successfully sued last week to force the city of Pittsburgh to allow several groups to hold demonstrations around the G20 Summit, it seemed that free speech would prevail in the Steel City.
Unfortunately, this has not proven to be the case. Following the court ruling, the Pittsburgh police department has engaged in a pattern of harassment of G20 demonstrators, singling out the Seeds of Peace Collective, one of several groups providing food support to the protestors.
The testimony in the suit against Hazleton's illegal immigration ordinance continued Friday. Two Code Enforcement Officers, who are charged with investigating violations of the ordinance, both testified that they wouldn't know how to determine whether complaints against illegal immigrants were valid, and that they
After a last-ditch effort by the defense's attorneys to stop him from testifying, Hazleton City Council President Joseph Yanuzzi took the stand in yesterday afternoon's proceedings. Yanuzzi admitted that the city council hadn't thoroughly researched the "findings" that the ordinances are based upon, namely that illegal immigrants increased v
If you have a potty mouth, stay away from the Keystone State. It turns out that police in Pennsylvania have delicate sensibilities. A recent ACLU of Pennsylvania Right to Know Law request revealed that in a one-year period, the Pennsylvania State Police issued over 770 disorderly conduct citations for profanity or profane gestures. That's two citations a day. Illegal citations, I should emphasize, as the courts have made it very clear that profanity, unlike obscenity, is constitutionally protected speech.