US frees 500 more prisoners from Abu Ghraib News
US frees 500 more prisoners from Abu Ghraib

[JURIST] The US military released 500 prisoners Tuesday from the Abu Ghraib prison [JURIST news archive] in observance of Eid ul-Fitr [Wikipedia backgrounder], the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan [Wikipedia backgrounder]. The 500 prisoners, like the 1,000 prisoners released at the beginning of October [JURIST report] at the start of Ramadan, were given a copy of the Koran, $25 and a traditional white shirt. Before the anticipated release [JURIST report], which was requested by the Iraqi government and attended by Deputy Prime Minister Abed Mutlak al-Jibouri and other ministers, an Iraqi-led review board heard the cases of all 1,500 detainees and held that they had not commited serious or violent crimes. According to the US military, the prisoners “confessed to their crimes, renounced violence and pledged to be good citizens of Iraq.” Reuters has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Georgia became first US state to ban lynching

On December 20, 1893, Georgia became the first state in the Union to pass a law against lynching, making the act punishable by four years in prison. The statute was not particularly effective—read the text of the 1899 pamphlet Lynch Law in Georgia by anti-lynching activist Ida Wells-Barnett.