Carson City prisoner is fifth Nevada inmate to die since November

From: News3
Dec 19th 2013

CARSON CITY, Nev. (Las Vegas Sun) -- A prison inmate serving time for second-degree murder has died at the Northern Nevada Correctional Center, the fifth inmate death in the Nevada Department of Corrections system since November.

Michael Johnson was in the medical center at the Carson City prison when he died Wednesday.

The state Department of Corrections said Thursday that Johnson, 55, had been in prison since 2008 and was serving a sentence of 10 years to life out of Churchill County.

The Clark County Coroner’s Office will conduct an autopsy.

Johnson is the fifth Nevada prison inmate to die since early November.

Read more here.

Corrections department flouts new law requiring autopsies for inmates who die in custody

In: Las Vegas Sun, Dec. 16, 2013

By: Ana Ley

More than two months after prison inmate Richard Ferst’s corpse was discovered inside a cell at the Northern Nevada Correctional Center, it remains unexamined inside a cold chamber at a funeral home in Carson City.

Ferst’s mother, Sandy Morningstar of Las Vegas, hopes preserving the body will help reveal how her son died — something prison officials haven't explained.

Following her son's wishes, Morningstar wants to scatter Ferst’s ashes into the Pacific Ocean at Newport Beach, Calif., where he grew up. It was Ferst's favorite place.

“Because of their screwing around, my son is still in a refrigerator,” Morningstar said. “It's maddening.”
Ferst is one of four state prison inmates who died in October at the same facility under the care of the Nevada Department of Corrections. Officials never said whether a death investigation was requested in the cases. Three other prisoners have since died at other facilities, and autopsies revealed a cause and manner of death for two of them.

Relatives and civil rights advocates say they have grown increasingly frustrated by the prison system's lack of urgency in determining why some of the men died.

The Nevada Department of Corrections did not request a postmortem examination for Ferst after he died Oct. 5, even though a new state law, effective June 2, requires department officials to do so for any inmate who dies under prison care. The law was openly endorsed earlier this year by prisons director Greg Cox, who did not respond to requests for comment via the department's public information office.


Read the rest here.

More news about the recent deaths in custody from Las Vegas Sun:

• Questions mount as state prison officials refuse to divulge causes in October deaths of four inmates
• Another Nevada prison inmate dies, the second in as many days

Nevada Cure NNCC Book Drive for the library!

Attention all NV-CURE Members and Supporters:

NV-CURE is in the process of gathering books to donate to the NDOC for prisoners at the Northern Nevada Correctional Center (NNCC). 

--> All books must be paperback.  NO HARD COVERS.

Anyone with books to donate should contact:

Southern Nevada:

Kim,  [email protected], SUBJECT: NNCC BOOK DRIVE-KIM, or

Northern Nevada:

Marie,  [email protected], SUBJECT: NNCC BOOK DRIVE-MARIE

(or phone Nevada Cure at 702.347.1731)

When the NDOC approves the donations, which may take 6-8 weeks, all Southern donated books will be transported to Marie in the North and Marie will coordinate the book drop off with NNCC Officials.

Thank you for your help. The people at this medical facility are in need of books to read to help pass the time.  Again, thank you.

DONATE BOOKS NOW.  Do not be late.

Prisoner at NNCC retaliated against for his complaint about Human Rights Abuses

On August 20th 2012 Nevada-Cure sent this message out via email about retaliation against a prisoner held in NNCC (Carson City, NV). Philip Tragale has asked the Courts for a Guardian and/or Lawyer to protect prisoner Daniel Stenner who is blind and mentally handicapped. Mr Tragale filed the text here underneath to the District Court in Nevada on June 6th 2012.

We have another case Mr Tragale filed which contains complaints about a few employees of NDOC who are alleged to be abusive towards prisoners. We will soon post that case here too.

Please write to your Legislator and Director Cox of NDOC to ask them to have an independent commission look into these alleged abuses, and have them stopped.

NV-CURE has not conducted an independent evaluation of Mr. Tragale's claims. However, such an investigation must be conducted by a person that is fair and impartial. The truth and actual events must be made public and scrutinized by the Legislature. Please e-mail / write NDOC Director COX and members of the NV Legislature with your views and opinions on this matter.
Thank you.

The text is published here.