Last week Grassroots Leadership joined people from around the country in Nashville, TN to protest outside of Corrections Corporation of America's annual shareholder meeting where, this year, the for-profit prison company was "celebrating" their 30th anniversary.  Among the protestors was long-time Grassroots Leadership ally Alex Friedmann who is a former prisoner and current President of the Private Corrections Institute (PCI).  Alex spent six years in a CCA-operated prison and since his incarceration he has dedicated his life to criticizing the private, for-profit prison industry.  To that end, he became a CCA shareholder in order to engage in shareholder activism.  Alex owns enough shares in the company to attend shareholder meetings and to advance shareholder resolutions; a tool that he has used to try and force the hand of the company to acknowledge and address its record of abuse, neglect and mismanagment.  

After two puzzling celebrations -- Black History Month and Women's History Month -- CCA is back at it, this time with Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month.  We have our own ideas about CCA's treatment of people of color and, after the jump, a special message from Kat Brady, our ally in Hawai'i and longtime activist for criminal justice in her state.

Not surprisingly, Hawai'i incarcerates the largest proportion of Asian American and Asian Pacific Islander (API) individuals, and more than 1,700 people from Hawai'i are incarcerated in CCA facilities on the mainland.  As a result, Asian/API men are disproportionately represented in CCA facilities relative to state-operated facilities.  In state-operated facilities, Asian/API men represent 63% of the total population, whereas in out-of-state CCA facilities Asian/API men represent 69% of the total population.  These facts make CCA's latest public relations exploit of people of color particularly nauseating.  It's Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and you-know-who is "honoring" it!  In his commemorative blog post, CCA CEO Damon Hininger writes,

"Last year, I visited Little Tokyo in Los Angeles, Calif. I was inspired by the preservation of history and values in the midst of other cultural influences in L.A. The fact that it remains a close-knit community is evidence that we all carry the strength to keep traditions alive and uphold standards set before us at CCA."

We had no idea that CCA holds up the preservation of history, traditions and culture and standards for their company!  We decided to reach out to our new friend in Hawai'i, Kat Brady, to see what she knows about Hawai'i's incarcerated population in CCA facilities.  

Since 1996, Mississippi law requires that convicts serve at least 85% of their sentences.  At that time the state began relying on private prison operators who are mandated to operate correctional facilities at 10% less than what it costs to run public facilities. Read more about Humpday Hall of Shame: Come on, Mississippi!

A year and a half after his induction, Terry Stewart is making a return appearance on the Humpday Hall of Shame.  Stewart has a checkered past in corrections, dating back to his time as the Arizona Department of Corrections director from 1995 to 2002 and, most recently, in a questionable deal between Arizona and private prison health care provider Corizon.

Since he left his post as ADOC director, Stewart has made a healthy career in the prison industrial complex.  In 2003, he started his own prison privatization consulting firm, Advanced Correctional Management, and began hawking for-profit private prisons to his own former co-workers as a consultant for companies like MTC (Management and Training Corporation) and Corizon Correctional Healthcare.