Prisoners Rights

The Defense Department had an eye on history Monday when it announced capital murder and war crimes charges against six detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, saying the alleged Sept. 11 plotters would be given an "extraordinary set of rights" when they go on trial. They will receive more rights than the top Nazis tried at Nuremberg, military officials pointed out, and far more than the plotters in the assassination of President Lincoln, who were hanged within three months.

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said in a radio interview broadcast Tuesday that interrogators can inflict pain to obtain critical information, such as the location of a bomb about to explode or the plans or whereabouts of a terrorist group. "It seems to me you have to say, as unlikely as that is, it would be absurd to say you couldn't, I don't know, stick something under the fingernail, smack him in the face.

The counselor at Salinas Valley State Prison paid a surprise visit to Nicholas Shearin's cell with good news: He would go home in two days, after a decade behind bars. She did not mention that he should have been freed eight months earlier. Shearin was among as many as 33,000 state inmates whose sentences may have been wrong because they were not given all the time off they earned for good behavior and for working in prison.

California does a bad job of compensating people wrongfully convicted in its courts, a blue ribbon commission said Friday. Men and women imprisoned for years, even decades, for crimes they didn't commit are offered fewer benefits than convicts released on parole, the commission said.

In a stinging ruling, a Los Angeles federal judge said immigration officials' alleged decision to withhold a critical medical test and other treatment from a detainee who later died of cancer was "beyond cruel and unusual" punishment. The decision from U.S. District Judge Dean Pregerson allows the family of Francisco Castaneda to seek financial damages from the government. Castaneda, who suffered from penile cancer, died Feb. 16.

A San Francisco judge on Wednesday ordered the state to adhere to strict standards in monitoring county juvenile halls across California, ending a lawsuit over what lawyers said were deplorable conditions in some institutions. The order by Superior Court Judge Patrick J. Mahoney effectively requires the Corrections Standards Authority -- the agency responsible for monitoring juvenile halls -- to comply with existing law that advocates for juvenile offenders said had not been enforced.

A wave of change appears headed toward the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, with all three major presidential candidates vowing to abolish the military prison. And somewhat surprisingly, closing the camp and moving the prisoners to the United States may be the easy part, said U.S. officials, former administration aides and legal experts. But nobody has yet found a way through the legal thicket in the way.

A House Judiciary Committee panel voted to subpoena vice presidential aide David Addington as part of a broad inquiry into the Bush administration's treatment of detainees. Addington, chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, has signaled that he might testify under oath about controversial interrogation policies if lawmakers compelled him to do so. On a voice vote, Democratic lawmakers called on Addington to answer questions about his role in drafting legal memos that underpinned coercive U.S. interrogation measures, including waterboarding.

Critics of the war crimes tribunal at Guantanamo Bay have consistently assailed the coerced confessions that may be used as evidence against the defendants and have repeatedly charged that the prisoners' severe isolation causes mental illnesses that make them unable to aid in their own defense. Now, the critics add, evidence has emerged to show that the government advised interrogators to destroy their notes to evade legal consequences for their actions.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown survived a crucial battle of wills with Parliament on Wednesday over expanding terrorism laws, securing initial approval for holding terrorism suspects as many as 42 days before they are charged or freed. The legislation squeaked through the House of Commons by nine votes amid concerns it could threaten innocent citizens with the loss of their homes, jobs and social networks even if they are released after spending six weeks behind bars.