Blog of Rights

Will the Supreme Court Stop Georgia from Executing an Intellectually Disabled Man?

By Brian Stull, ACLU Capital Punishment Project at 12:24pm

When Georgia death-row prisoner Warren Hill was young, his sister remembers their mother and grandfather calling him "stupid retard,"...

With all Eyes on Congress, States Lead the Way on Better Laws Towards Immigrants

By Jonathan Blazer, ACLU at 12:12pm

This week saw an unprecedented advance in state campaigns expanding driving privileges to immigrants. Nevada's legislature...

Excluding Women from Combat Is Just Plain Wrong: A Navy Captain's Story

By Dwayne Oslund, USN (Ret.) at 10:29am

On January 24, 2013, we saw a great victory for U.S. servicewomen when the Department of Defense announced it was ending the ban on women serving...

I Was Raped at East Mississippi Correctional Facility

By Anonymous Prisoner, East Mississippi Correctional Facility at 2:20pm

My name is ______ and I am 23 years old and although my past criminal record isn't at its best, at heart I'm still a great kid!

After being locked up for about six months, I suffered from something many young males would hate to speak on and that's rape. I was raped at Eastern Mississippi Correctional Facility in Meridian, MS. I was beat brutally and faced several facial and rectum injuries from this attack. I was raped, robbed, and assaulted by several other prisoners.

If the Government Is Tracking Your Location or Reading Your Email, Would You Ever Know?

By Patrick C. Toomey, Fellow, ACLU National Security Project at 12:36pm

Court rulings unsealed last week in Washington show for the first time a behind-the-scenes legal battle over when the government should have to tell you that it's tracking your location and reading your email. These documents—which came to light only as the public learned more about the government's controversial investigation of Fox News journalist James Rosen—reveal significant new details about the government's obligation to provide notice, after the fact, when it obtains geolocation data or obtains stored email messages. Indeed, the court orders bring to light a striking contrast: federal prosecutors in Washington routinely provide notice to individuals they track using cell-phone geolocation data, even if that notice is delayed, yet the government strenuously resists giving any notice to individuals when searching and reading their emails.

Feds Settle Lawsuit by Bradley Manning Supporter Over Border Laptop Search

By Catherine Crump, Staff Attorney, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 12:24pm

We announced some excellent news last night: the U.S. has agreed to settle a lawsuit brought by David House over the...

NEW LAWSUIT: Massive Human Rights Violations at Mississippi Prison

By Gabriel Eber, ACLU National Prison Project & Margaret Winter, National Prison Project at 10:34am

East Mississippi Correctional Facility is hyper-violent, grotesquely filthy and dangerous. Patients with severe psychiatric disabilities go without basic mental health care. Many prisoners attempt suicide. This video is the story of a young man who succeeded.

mytubethumbplay
Privacy statement. This embed will serve content from youtube.com.

"Joe's Law" Gets the Boot: A Lawyer for the Plaintiffs Explains

By Andre Segura, Immigrants' Rights Project at 10:13am

Plaintiffs have established that the MCSO had sufficient intent to discriminate against Latino occupants of motor vehicles. Further, the Court concludes that the MCSO had and continues to have a facially discriminatory policy of considering Hispanic appearance probative of whether a person is legally present in the country in violation of the Equal Protection Clause. The MCSO is thus permanently enjoined from using race, or allowing its deputies and other agents to use race as a criteria in making law enforcement decisions with respect to Latino occupants of vehicles in Maricopa County.

Should Facebook Censor Misogynistic Material?

By Jay Stanley, Senior Policy Analyst, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 9:57am

The New York Times ran an article yesterday about pressure that is mounting on Facebook to censor websites full of awful misogynistic material. The company said it was reviewing its processes for dealing with content under its hate speech policy.

Reproductive Health Restrictions Hurt Asian-American Women

By Zeenat N. Hasan, Co-Founder, National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum (NAPAWF), Arizona Chapter at 2:40pm

The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Arizona filed a lawsuit today on behalf of the NAACP of Maricopa County and the National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum (NAPAWF) challenging a state law that relies on harmful racial stereotypes to shame and discriminate against Black women and Asian and Pacific Islander (API) women who decide to end their pregnancies. A version of the following piece by Zeenat N. Hasan, co-founder of the Arizona chapter of NAPAWF originally ran in Arizona Central on April 3, 2013.