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Commission: Probationers, immigrant detainees may be subjected to sexual abuse

The problem of prison rape has been widely discussed and decried, but a major new report (pdf) almost six years in the making by the National Prison Rape Elimination Commission says the problem can also occur in community corrections settings, mostly as a function of coercion by probation and parole officers:As in other correctional settings, courts have found that sexual abuse in community corrections violates the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment. As a result, community corrections agencies, like prisons and jails, have a special responsibility to protect the people they supervise. Courts also have determined that the authority staff have over the individuals they monitor makes a truly consensual sexual relationship impossible...continue to full post

Full post as published by Grits for Breakfast on June 27, 2009 (boomark / email).