Free Republic

Ten years ago, Vitaly Mokrushin became the pastor of a Mennonite church in the town of Sol-Iletsk, in Russia’s Orenburg region, leading a small congregation of 20-25 people. The 42-year-old former locomotive mechanic found God in 1996. In the mid-2000s, he regularly visited the “Black Dolphin” prison colony. He visited prisoners on a weekly basis for several years, holding services, singing religious hymns, reading sermons, and using the prison’s PA system to communicate with inmates who weren’t allowed to gather in the same room. Roman Lunkin, a senior researcher at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Philosophy, told Meduza...

Prison inmates across the country are preparing to go on strike by refusing to eat or work, as a way to protest what they call 'prison slavery' and poor conditions. Though the extent of the planned strike is not known, prisoners in at least 17 states say they will be taking part in coordinated action, which will begin on Tuesday and last through September 9. Organizers say the strike is partly in response to the April riot in South Carolina's Lee Correctional Institution, where seven inmates were killed by other prisoners when gang tensions boiled over. The masterminds of the...

Great talk by Frank Luntz, right after Ben Shapiro, who is also worth listening to.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller recommended in a court filing on Friday that a judge sentence former Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos to up to six months in prison for lying to federal agents investigating whether Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Papadopoulos pleaded guilty in October to lying to FBI agents and is scheduled to be sentenced on Sept. 7. According to Mueller’s sentencing memorandum to the judge, Papadopoulos lied about his contacts with people who claimed to have ties to top Russian officials, including his meeting with a professor who said Russia had “dirt” on Democratic presidential...

Prison reform has normally been an issue embraced by Democrats, not Republicans. But, perhaps, like so many other things in the Trump administration, this, too, is about to change. Last Thursday, President Trump held a roundtable discussion at his Bedminster, New Jersey, property, five governors were in attendance. According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, 37.8 percent of prison inmates in the U.S. are black, 58.3 percent white, 2.3 percent Native American and 1.6 percent Asian. Yet, blacks are arrested more, charged more, sentenced more harshly and confined to prison longer, even for minor infractions. In Georgia, according to Department...

Trump has swallowed the Criminal Justice Reform Hoax, hook, line, and sinker. Something he never did in the primaries but now is embracing.

Kanye West might have worried a little bit about wife Kim Kardashian West when she visited President Donald Trump. The “Fade” rapper, 41, shared his thoughts on the Keeping Up with the Kardashians star’s visit to the White House in May during a wide-ranging interview with Jimmy Kimmel on Jimmy Kimmel Live! on Thursday night in which the musician spoke about everything from his love of Trump, porn and his Bipolar diagnosis. When Kimmel, 50, asked West how he felt about the reality star meeting Trump on behalf of a 62-year-old great-grandmother who was incarcerated for 22 years, the father...

Baltimore Rev. Jamal Bryant had strong words for the influential inner-city pastors who met with President Donald Trump on Thursday for a meeting about prison reform, job growth and other issues affecting inner cities. “This is a stain on the body of Christ. This is a stain on our community,” the pastor said in a 25-minute Periscope video Thursday night. “I need to know how all of ya’ll were smiling at that table while the whole world frowns at what this represents and what it looks like. The blood is dripping off your hands.” The pastors have been heavily criticized...

It is rare these days in Washington to see bipartisan support for anything, let alone for a major issue with far reaching implications for the nation. This is why the bipartisan passage in the House, 360-59, of the First Step Act to reform our federal prisons is such big news. The 360 "yes" votes included 134 Democrats. The bill focuses on improving the management of our existing federal prison population and the abysmal statistics regarding recidivism -- the likelihood that an ex-con will wind up back in prison. Data point to 68 percent of those released within three years, and...

The Minnesota Department of Corrections confirms a corrections officer at the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Stillwater died after an assault by an offender Wednesday afternoon. A release stated Joseph Gomm was attacked in an industry building around 1:30 p.m. He was rushed to Regions Hospital where he was later pronounced dead. Gomm had been with the department for 16 years. Sources confirmed the identity of the offender as Edward Muhammad Johnson. Johnson is serving a sentence for homicide, according to DOC records. Sources also confirmed Johnson attacked Gomm with a hammer. At a press conference Wednesday afternoon, DOC Commissioner Tom...

A member of the House Committee on the Judiciary said during a hearing Thursday that a government watchdog found that nearly all of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s emails were sent to a foreign entity and that the FBI didn’t follow-up on that finding. The Intelligence Community Inspector General (ICIG) found an “anomaly on Hillary Clinton’s emails going through their private server, and when they had done the forensic analysis, they found that her emails, every single one except four, over 30,000, were going to an address that was not on the distribution list,” Republican Rep. Louie Gohmert of...

Alabama’s governor has begun to cut off a gravy train for the state’s sheriffs: the unspent money for prisoners’ meals that the sheriffs have long been allowed to keep for themselves. The practice, born of a bickered-over ambiguity in a state law, has let sheriffs pocket tax dollars that over the decades almost certainly ran into the millions. To curtail the practice, Gov. Kay Ivey ordered in a memorandum to the state comptroller that payments of certain funds related to jail food “no longer be made to the sheriffs personally.” Instead, the governor wrote, the money must be paid to...

If Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein does not comply with the request of two Republican lawmakers to release documents about why special counsel Robert Mueller began investigating alleged Russian collusion in the 2016 presidential election, he could be held in contempt, according to Harvard professor Alan Dershowitz. “There has never been a more important time in our history for checks and balances to be operating, whether it’s regarding President Trump’s immigration policies, where we’re seeing checks and balances in play and whether it be the Mueller investigation,” Dershowitz said during an interview with FOX Business’ Maria Bartiromo on Friday. Mueller...

Former New York congressman Anthony Weiner was visited by his mother Frances Finkelstein and 6-year-old son, Jordan on Father’s Day, according to DailyMail.com. The publication snapped pictures of the two leaving the federal prison where Weiner is currently incarcerated for sexting a teenage girl. His wife and former staffer to Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign, Huma Abedin, was not present for the visit. Huma was only present to pick the two up after their visit, according to DailyMail.com. She briefly exited the car to help her son.

“On June 24th, don’t put your fear in the envelope that you will cast in the ballot box, but your hopeful message for the future. Say “One vote HDP, one vote for Demirtas.” Below is the election speech of HDP (Peoples’ Democratic Party) Presidential candidate Selahattin Demirtaş, aired yesterday (June 17) on the TRT News channel. note: Video at the Link “Dear brothers and sisters, the beautiful people of my country, I greet you with my warmest feelings, love and longing. In this election campaign, one that will be called a disgrace in terms of our political history, I am...

Federal prosecutors indicted Elizabeth Holmes on criminal fraud charges for allegedly defrauding investors, doctors and the public as the head of the once-heralded blood-testing startup Theranos. Federal prosecutors also brought charges against the company's former second-in-command. Holmes, who was once considered a wunderkind of Silicon Valley, and her former Chief Operating Officer Ramesh Balwani, are charged with two counts conspiracy to commit wire fraud and nine counts of wire fraud each, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of California said late Friday. If convicted, they could face prison sentences that would keep them behind bars for the rest...

Activist Robinson transferred yesterday to Onley Prison with high Muslim majority, known as violent prison. Tens of thousands demonstrate. Anti-Muslim takeover activist Tommy Robinson was jailed last month for a “breach of the peace” while live-streaming a trial involving a Muslim rape gang outside Leeds Crown Court. He was sentenced to 13 months in prison for interfering with court proceedings. At first he was transferred to a prison that was considered relatively safe. However, his transfer to Onley means "certain death", say observers. Robinson’s manager Caolan Robertson said a large majority of the prison population of Onley is Muslim. Various...

Former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick – a Democrat serving a 28-year sentence for corruption – is seeking President Donald Trump’s help to get out of prison early, according to reports. Kilpatrick, writing on the Free Kwame Project website, says he has undergone a spiritual transformation since resigning from office in 2008 following a text-messaging sex scandal. “By God’s grace, I have received a pardon from Him, through Christ Jesus. I pray that I will receive the opportunity for Pardon/Clemency from the President of the United States as well,” he writes.

SEATTLE — A federal judge has ordered the Washington Department of Corrections to provide nighttime meals to Muslim inmates who have been fasting during the month of Ramadan, after several said prison officials refused to do so. The Council on American-Islamic Relations sued the department Sunday on behalf of four prisoners at the Washington State Reformatory in Monroe, including one who said he’s lost 15 pounds since Ramadan began in mid-May.

Demirtaş stated that the people are sick of the AKP and will tell Erdoğan they have had enough in these elections. He said: “We don’t have the slightest expectation from the AKP. At this point, AKP is the representative of a racist, fascist mindset." HDP (Peoples' Democratic Party) Presidential Candidate Selahattin Demirtaş responded to German news magazine Der Spiegel’s questions in writing through his lawyers. “THERE IS FASCISTIC PRESSURE, BUT OUR BASE IS COURAGEOUS” To Der Spiegel’s question “You had left your post at the party in February, you wanted to leave politics to its own rhythm. But now, you...