Hot sauce, simulated sex, and echoes of the notorious Abu Ghraib prison are allegedly involved in one of this week’s most disturbing stories. Yahoo! News reports here that six inmates from Sampson Correctional Institution claim that prison staff “forced them to perform numerous humiliating acts for the entertainment of guards, including stripping nude and pretending to have sex . . . being forced to gulp a super-hot [sauce] . . . and slather it on their testicles,” among other indignities. The warden of the prison and a correctional officer have been placed on paid leave while the SBI investigates. In other news: Raleigh lawyer James Crouch has been sentenced to at least a year in prison as a result of backdating documents in DWI cases. The News and Observer has the story here. It isn’t the first DWI document tampering scheme in recent years, but here’s hoping that it is the last. Marijuana use is now legal under state law in Colorado and Washington, and recent polling data, discussed here and here, shows a significant increase in the number of Americans across the country who support legalization. In some polls, legalization has majority support, and the margin is quite large among younger people. Expect more legal changes in this area. I noted last week that North Carolina Supreme Court Justice Patricia Timmons-Goodson was retiring, and that Governor Perdue was likely to appoint a successor without consulting the judicial nominating commission she recently created. The News and Observer reports here that the [...]
Faculty Coordinators
