Denise Lord

Latest Articles

Lock-up lessons

The new corrections commissioner wants Maine prisons to learn from the state’s juvenile-treatment model
Fixing Maine’s troubled prisons is not an impossible task. In fact, if the state treated adult inmates more along the lines of how it treats juvenile offenders, prison critics — including, surprisingly, the new corrections commissioner, Joseph Ponte — think the prisons might not only become more humane, they might actually “correct” the prisoners.
By LANCE TAPLEY | April 14, 2011

'No-touch torture' in New Jersey

Maine Whistleblower Watch
Deane Brown, a Maine inmate shipped out of state because of his criticism of the Maine State Prison, is now being held in New Jersey in "one of the most repressive" prison units in the country, often reserved for "political" or activist prisoners like black radicals, says Bonnie Kerness of the American Friends Service Committee's national Prison Watch.
By LANCE TAPLEY | May 26, 2011

TB worry at Maine State Prison

'No active cases'
"Several individuals" at the Maine State Prison in Warren have tested positive for tuberculosis, but "there are no confirmed active cases," says Denise Lord, deputy Maine Corrections commissioner.
By LANCE TAPLEY | May 26, 2011

Penal future

Will LePage's zeal to cut the budget make prisoners and guards bleed?
The few things that Republican Governor-elect Paul LePage was reported as saying on crime-and-punishment issues during the campaign mostly sounded harsh and, of course, right-wing.
By LANCE TAPLEY | November 10, 2010

A mysterious new inmate death

Prison Scandal Watch
Despite a scandal earlier this year over a prisoner death, state corrections officials won’t allow the Phoenix to interview a Maine State Prison inmate who has claimed in letters that prison staff abused an ailing prisoner, Victor Valdez, before Valdez died in late November.
By LANCE TAPLEY | December 10, 2009

Another Supermax hunger strike

Dungeon Watch
Protesting that nothing had been done by prison authorities to relieve the torture of prolonged solitary confinement, on August 17 inmates of the Maine State Prison’s 100-man Special Management Unit or “Supermax” reprised a hunger strike that had been abandoned last May.
By LANCE TAPLEY | September 02, 2009

Secret, unaccountable, and co-opted

If the prison Board of Visitors had done its job, it might have helped prevent several recent tragedies
The state prison in Warren has been hammered in recent months by an inmate murder and other violence, a prisoner hunger strike, legislative investigations exposing mismanagement and poor guard morale, and a request by human-rights groups for a federal probe of prisoner mistreatment.
By LANCE TAPLEY | August 17, 2009

Putting an end to the hunger strike

Prison Watch
Maine State Prison officials ended a hunger strike involving at least 10 inmates of the solitary-confinement Supermax unit in Warren by threatening to withhold the strikers’ psychotropic medications, according to allegations by an inmate who participated in the strike.
By LANCE TAPLEY and JEFF INGLIS | May 18, 2009

By | January 01, 0001

Lawmakers to probe prison

Several investigations begin simultaneously
For years controversy has churned over the Maine State Prison's treatment of both inmates and correctional officers. For the first time, legislators have taken action.
By LANCE TAPLEY | April 08, 2009

Prisoners’ support services slashed

Baldacci’s Warehouse
Governor John Baldacci announced on December 16 that he had taken significant steps toward warehousing prisoners instead of rehabilitating them.
By LANCE TAPLEY | December 23, 2008

Letters to the Portland editor, July 25, 2008

Time to end torture
The Black Bird Legal Collective would like to thank Lance Tapley for his continued exposure of Maine prison issues.
By LETTERS TO THE PORTLAND EDITOR | July 23, 2008

Educating inmates

By LANCE TAPLEY | February 06, 2008

Stabbed in the back

Officials reward a prison hero by endangering his life
Right now, a bewildered Mark Cible is on a nightmarish journey through some of America’s most violent prisons.
By LANCE TAPLEY | September 12, 2007

A Supermax “graduate”

Watch your backs
The Supermax makes mentally unstable prisoners worse, its critics say.
By LANCE TAPLEY | July 11, 2007

Corrections Department obstructs free press

Sunshine week
This week is Sunshine Week, a time when media organizations around the country draw attention to state and federal Freedom of Information laws.
By JEFF INGLIS | March 14, 2007

Cracks in the armor

Prison employee may be disciplined in suicide case; interview policy to be rewritten
A couple of cracks have opened in the state’s armor of prison secrecy.
By LANCE TAPLEY | January 31, 2007

Lockdown

What do prison officials have to hide?
If you were a reporter and you received a letter like the one excerpted below, what would you make of it? Lance Tapley discusses reporting the prisons
By LANCE TAPLEY | December 14, 2006

Stonewalling is normal

Reporting the prison system
I could cite many examples of the difficulty in reporting to the Maine public what goes on behind the cement and bureaucratic walls of the public’s prison system — especially, in reporting brutal practices. I will give just a few.
By LANCE TAPLEY | December 13, 2006

Baldacci’s ‘political prisoner’

A life at risk
John Baldacci’s administration on November 13 sent the Maine State Prison’s chief human-rights advocate, inmate Deane Brown, to a dangerous prison more than 500 miles away, in Baltimore. Brown’s lawyer and his best friend believe this decision was in retaliation for his activism, and puts his life in danger.
By LANCE TAPLEY | November 21, 2006

Death in the Supermax

Prisons
A 25-year-old inmate killed himself in the state’s Supermax prison on October 5, corrections officers say. But while a Rockland newspaper quoted the prison warden as saying the inmate was not considered a suicide risk, Ryan Rideout had a long history of mental illness and suicidal behavior.
By LANCE TAPLEY | October 11, 2006

Arbitrary imprisonment

In a mysterious Guantánamo-like move, the state refuses to follow a judge’s order committing a mentally ill prisoner to Riverview
Joseph Steinberger thought he had won one of the most important trials of his legal career.
By LANCE TAPLEY | July 19, 2006

Pressure rising

Supermax torture revisited
Four months ago, a Phoenix investigative series revealed abuses of inmates at the “Supermax,” a 100-bed, solitary-confinement, maximum-security facility inside the Maine State Prison in Warren; since our articles were published, several important developments have taken place.
By LANCE TAPLEY | March 23, 2006