The prisoners write in carefully lettered script or on old electric typewriters. There are sometimes grammatical errors or misspellings. But the language is direct. They describe facing Stage 4 cancer ...

In the 1980s and 1990s, a series of Supreme Court decisions and a new law sought to curb "frivolous" prisoner lawsuits and give more deference to prison officials. Together, they changed the legal ...

Four years ago, a Ninth Circuit panel ruled (in Martin v. City of Boise) that “the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment bars a city from prosecuting people criminally for ...

The Eighth Amendment to the Constitution protects us from “cruel and unusual punishment” by the government. This seemingly simple language raises a host of complicated questions. “Cruel” by what ...

The Annenberg Public Policy Center released a film titled “The Eighth Amendment: Cruel and Unusual Punishment” on Annenberg Classroom in recognition of Constitution Day on Sept. 17. The 24-minute film ...

Washington — The Supreme Court will hear arguments on Monday in a case involving the homeless and bans on where they may sleep — the most significant case on the issue in decades. The dispute involves ...

Oral argument before the Supreme Court this week showed why it is nonsense to claim that anti-vagrancy laws violate the Constitution‘s Eighth Amendment provision against “cruel and unusual punishment.

The US Supreme Court on Tuesday, December 10, heard oral argument in Hamm vs. Smith, a capital case that could reshape how courts evaluate intellectual disability under Atkins v. Virginia and its ...