Turning A Blind Eye To Prison Official Malfeasance In The Fourth Circuit

This past spring we at VAPAC called on the preeminent schools of law of universities within the jurisdiction of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in holding prison officials within the circuit accountable

The University of Virginia recently announced that starting in the spring of 2022 it will present a project for informed reform that will permit students, scholars and experts to "conduct extensive research and investigation on issues related to criminal justice, and then generate evidence-based data to help inform and assist litigation, legal scholarship and public policy."

Despite the fact that we welcome the University of Virginia's response we state that it is inadequate in its scope, formulations, and grasp of this present stage of the justice system and it's exposed contradictions. Without going all into a comprehensive scrutiny of UVA's anticipation we can't help but notice glaring omissions       Where are the prisoner, where are the prisoner families, where are the victims of alleged crimes of the prisoner, and their experiential perspective which is germane to justice reform and accountability?

Prison and the imprisonment is that reality of the social - contract laid naked as a specific set of contradictions on a reactionary bed of suppositions and to speak of evidence-based data undermines any intent of holding the state via the prison official accountable.

Prison official's malfeasance does not exist in itself, it has a for itself mechanics of preying on the prisoner. It has a locus that corruption dynamic of the prison official operating above the law, reanimating all that is regressive in human relations, the same regressive human activity that on one level creates the prisoner.

We at VAPAC stand against and oppose that idealistic narrative. That wink and a nod apology for extrajudicial viz unlawful behavior of the prison official that the sadism and barbarity of the behavior is beyond reproach and not pathologically deviant.

What we do understand is prison official malfeasance exists because society and in particular institutions of schools of law have turned a blind eye to it.

• University of Virginia School of Law
• University of North Carolina School of Law
• University of South Carolina School of Law
• West Virginia University College of Law
• College of William and Mary School of Law
• Clemson University School of Law
• Duke University School of Law

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