California
DOJ to investigate sexual abuse allegations at women’s prisons
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The U.S. Department of Justice announced Wednesday that it has opened an investigation into allegations that correctional officers systematically sexually abused incarcerated women at two state-run California prisons.
Authorities found “significant justification” to open an investigation into the Central California Women’s Facility in Chowchilla and the California Institution for Women in Chino, the DOJ said in a news release. Both are run by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
The corrections department said in a statement Wednesday that it does not tolerate sexual abuse in its prisons and that it welcomes the investigation.
The formal inquiry was sparked by hundreds of private lawsuits over the past two years alleging that women incarcerated at the Chowchilla prison were raped or otherwise sexually abused, according to the news release. A single lawsuit filed on behalf of 21 women incarcerated at the Chino facility alleges that from 2014 to 2020, correction officers there groped and forcibly raped the women, forced them to participate in oral copulation, and threatened them with violence, the release said.
Correctional staff are accused of seeking sexual favors in return for contraband and other privileges, according to the Justice Department. It added that some of the accused include prison officials who are responsible for handling sexual abuse complaints at the facilities.
Jeff Macomber, secretary of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said in a statement that the department welcomes the independent investigation. “Sexual assault is a heinous violation of fundamental human dignity that is not tolerated — under any circumstances — within California’s state prison system,” he said.
In April, the federal Bureau of Prisons announced it will close a women’s prison in Northern California known as the “rape club” after an Associated Press investigation exposed rampant sexual abuse by correctional officers.
Alaska
Man serving 20-year sentence in New York gets on ballot for Alaska’s lone House seat
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — A man serving time on a 20-year prison sentence for threatening officials in New Jersey has made it onto Alaska’s general election ballot for the state’s lone U.S. House seat this November.
Eric Hafner was convicted in 2022 of threatening to kill judges, police officers and others and sentenced to serve 20 years in federal prison. He originally came in sixth in Alaska’s ranked choice primary, which allows only the top four vote-getters to advance to the general election.
But Republican Matthew Salisbury withdrew from the race just ahead of Monday’s deadline, and Republican Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom withdrew last month.
That means Hafner will appear on the November general election ballot along with Alaskan Independence Party chairman John Wayne Howe and frontrunners Democratic U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola and Republican Nick Begich.
Peltola finished with the most votes in a field of 12 in the Aug. 20 primary, followed by Begich and Dahlstrom, who was backed by former President Donald Trump. Far behind them were Salisbury and Howe, who combined received just over 1% of the vote and led the remaining candidates. Hafner received just 0.43% of the vote.
There are no state laws prohibiting felons from running for election in Alaska, which means both Hafner and Trump will have a place on the ballot.
But state law does require an elected U.S. representative to reside in the state. Hafner has no apparent ties to Alaska and is serving time at a federal prison in Otisville, New York, according to the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, with a release date set for Oct. 12, 2036. There are no federal prisons in Alaska, so even if the long-shot candidate was elected, he would be unlikely to meet the residency requirement.
This isn’t Hafner’s first attempt to win a congressional seat. He has unsuccessfully run for office in Hawaii and Oregon, and he’s filed a flurry of failed federal lawsuits in recent years claiming to be a candidate for congressional races in New Mexico, Nevada, Vermont and other states.
Massachusetts
Driver who repeatedly hit an Asian American man gets 18 months in prison
BOSTON (AP) — A Massachusetts man has been sentenced to 18 months in prison for threatening to kill a group of Asian Americans and repeatedly hitting one of them with his car.
John Sullivan, a white man in his late 70s, was sentenced Wednesday after pleading guilty in April to a federal hate crime, specifically charges of willfully causing bodily injury to a victim through the use of a dangerous weapon because of his actual and perceived race and national origin.
In December 2022, Sullivan encountered a group of Asian Americans including children outside a Quincy post office. He yelled “go back to China” and threatened to kill them before repeatedly hitting one of them, a Vietnamese man, with his car. Prosecutors said the victim fell into a construction ditch and was injured.
There had been a dramatic spike in verbal, physical and online attacks against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, which was thought to have originated in China. Stop AAPI Hate, a reporting center, documented over 9,000 incidents — mostly self-reported by victims — between March 2020 and June 2021. Last year, the FBI reported a 7% increase in overall hate crimes in 2022, even as the agency’s data showed anti-Asian incidents in 2022 were down 33% from 2021.
Special Agent in Charge Jodi Cohen, of the FBI Boston Field Office, said all Massachusetts communities “deserve respect and the ability to live, work, and raise their children without fear.”
“A run of the mill trip to the post office turned into a nightmare for this Vietnamese man when John Sullivan decided to target him because of the color of his skin and the country of his ancestors,” Cohen said in a statement. “There is no way to undo the damage Mr. Sullivan caused with his hateful, repulsive and violent behavior, but hopefully today’s sentence provides some measure of comfort.”
Sullivan’s defense attorney, in a sentencing memorandum, argued that his client should not be judged solely on this one act. They had requested six months of home confinement and three years of supervised release.
“There are bad people who do bad things and good people that do a bad thing,” the attorney wrote in the sentencing memorandum. “Jack Sullivan is a good person who made a bad decision on the date of this offense. Jack will suffer the consequences of his poor decision. His background suggests his behavior in this case was an aberration and not the norm for him.”
DOJ to investigate sexual abuse allegations at women’s prisons
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The U.S. Department of Justice announced Wednesday that it has opened an investigation into allegations that correctional officers systematically sexually abused incarcerated women at two state-run California prisons.
Authorities found “significant justification” to open an investigation into the Central California Women’s Facility in Chowchilla and the California Institution for Women in Chino, the DOJ said in a news release. Both are run by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
The corrections department said in a statement Wednesday that it does not tolerate sexual abuse in its prisons and that it welcomes the investigation.
The formal inquiry was sparked by hundreds of private lawsuits over the past two years alleging that women incarcerated at the Chowchilla prison were raped or otherwise sexually abused, according to the news release. A single lawsuit filed on behalf of 21 women incarcerated at the Chino facility alleges that from 2014 to 2020, correction officers there groped and forcibly raped the women, forced them to participate in oral copulation, and threatened them with violence, the release said.
Correctional staff are accused of seeking sexual favors in return for contraband and other privileges, according to the Justice Department. It added that some of the accused include prison officials who are responsible for handling sexual abuse complaints at the facilities.
Jeff Macomber, secretary of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said in a statement that the department welcomes the independent investigation. “Sexual assault is a heinous violation of fundamental human dignity that is not tolerated — under any circumstances — within California’s state prison system,” he said.
In April, the federal Bureau of Prisons announced it will close a women’s prison in Northern California known as the “rape club” after an Associated Press investigation exposed rampant sexual abuse by correctional officers.
Alaska
Man serving 20-year sentence in New York gets on ballot for Alaska’s lone House seat
JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — A man serving time on a 20-year prison sentence for threatening officials in New Jersey has made it onto Alaska’s general election ballot for the state’s lone U.S. House seat this November.
Eric Hafner was convicted in 2022 of threatening to kill judges, police officers and others and sentenced to serve 20 years in federal prison. He originally came in sixth in Alaska’s ranked choice primary, which allows only the top four vote-getters to advance to the general election.
But Republican Matthew Salisbury withdrew from the race just ahead of Monday’s deadline, and Republican Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom withdrew last month.
That means Hafner will appear on the November general election ballot along with Alaskan Independence Party chairman John Wayne Howe and frontrunners Democratic U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola and Republican Nick Begich.
Peltola finished with the most votes in a field of 12 in the Aug. 20 primary, followed by Begich and Dahlstrom, who was backed by former President Donald Trump. Far behind them were Salisbury and Howe, who combined received just over 1% of the vote and led the remaining candidates. Hafner received just 0.43% of the vote.
There are no state laws prohibiting felons from running for election in Alaska, which means both Hafner and Trump will have a place on the ballot.
But state law does require an elected U.S. representative to reside in the state. Hafner has no apparent ties to Alaska and is serving time at a federal prison in Otisville, New York, according to the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, with a release date set for Oct. 12, 2036. There are no federal prisons in Alaska, so even if the long-shot candidate was elected, he would be unlikely to meet the residency requirement.
This isn’t Hafner’s first attempt to win a congressional seat. He has unsuccessfully run for office in Hawaii and Oregon, and he’s filed a flurry of failed federal lawsuits in recent years claiming to be a candidate for congressional races in New Mexico, Nevada, Vermont and other states.
Massachusetts
Driver who repeatedly hit an Asian American man gets 18 months in prison
BOSTON (AP) — A Massachusetts man has been sentenced to 18 months in prison for threatening to kill a group of Asian Americans and repeatedly hitting one of them with his car.
John Sullivan, a white man in his late 70s, was sentenced Wednesday after pleading guilty in April to a federal hate crime, specifically charges of willfully causing bodily injury to a victim through the use of a dangerous weapon because of his actual and perceived race and national origin.
In December 2022, Sullivan encountered a group of Asian Americans including children outside a Quincy post office. He yelled “go back to China” and threatened to kill them before repeatedly hitting one of them, a Vietnamese man, with his car. Prosecutors said the victim fell into a construction ditch and was injured.
There had been a dramatic spike in verbal, physical and online attacks against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, which was thought to have originated in China. Stop AAPI Hate, a reporting center, documented over 9,000 incidents — mostly self-reported by victims — between March 2020 and June 2021. Last year, the FBI reported a 7% increase in overall hate crimes in 2022, even as the agency’s data showed anti-Asian incidents in 2022 were down 33% from 2021.
Special Agent in Charge Jodi Cohen, of the FBI Boston Field Office, said all Massachusetts communities “deserve respect and the ability to live, work, and raise their children without fear.”
“A run of the mill trip to the post office turned into a nightmare for this Vietnamese man when John Sullivan decided to target him because of the color of his skin and the country of his ancestors,” Cohen said in a statement. “There is no way to undo the damage Mr. Sullivan caused with his hateful, repulsive and violent behavior, but hopefully today’s sentence provides some measure of comfort.”
Sullivan’s defense attorney, in a sentencing memorandum, argued that his client should not be judged solely on this one act. They had requested six months of home confinement and three years of supervised release.
“There are bad people who do bad things and good people that do a bad thing,” the attorney wrote in the sentencing memorandum. “Jack Sullivan is a good person who made a bad decision on the date of this offense. Jack will suffer the consequences of his poor decision. His background suggests his behavior in this case was an aberration and not the norm for him.”
