Legal Guides

The site most people find first is no longer the sheriff's. Here are the real rules for the Hampden County Correctional Center and the women's center in Chicopee, including why your visiting day depends on a last name.

Essex County women are held a hundred miles away in Bourne, Middleton visiting rotates by housing unit, and the appointment line is open three hours a day. What to confirm before you drive to 20 Manning Avenue.

The only county in Massachusetts with an online inmate search, and the lookup does something most families never discover: it shows that person's own visiting schedule.

Every "Massachusetts inmate search" result failed you for the same reason: no statewide locator exists. Here is which system actually holds someone, and what to do in the first twelve hours.

Where is he, can I see him, and how do I get him money. The verified answers for both Suffolk County facilities, including the rules that get visits refused and mail returned.

A DCF worker is at the door and a deadline is already running. What the agency can require, what it cannot, why the standard for a finding is so low, and the thirty-day window most people miss.

A hearing most people have never heard of decides whether a criminal charge is ever filed. It happens in private, before someone who is not a judge, and the secrecy belongs to the accused, which means it can be waived.

MSP's colonel said every case Proctor worked needs review. In Dedham this week, that stopped being an abstraction, and the legal standard for dismissal is harder than the headlines suggest.

Two sections of a June act swap a pair of numbers in the PFML statute, moving the mandatory employer contribution from medical leave to family leave. A third section says the overall balance is supposed to stay the same.

Parts took effect the day it was signed, including a 48-hour notice duty every employer now owes its workers. Other parts switch on in September and November. Here are the dates and what each one requires.