By Brian Lyman | Editor

The public should know everything. The really sad thing is nothing has changed. Nothing. The same thing is still happening every single day in every single one of these facilities.- Cindy Hamilton, whose son is incarcerated in an Alabama prison, on new court filing on prison violence. 

Barbed wire seen behind a fence at an Alabama prison. (Brian Lyman/Alabama Reflector)

CRIMINAL JUSTICE

By Ralph Chapoco

In a 260-page filing on Wednesday, federal prosecutors asked a federal court to deliver a judgment that Alabama’s prisons violate inmates’ Eighth Amendment protections against cruel and unusual punishment. The filing, coming about two months before a scheduled trial in November, includes evidence and testimony from people incarcerated in the state’s prisons and from former and current Corrections officials.

ELECTIONS 2026

By Andrea Tinker

Alabama Democratic gubernatorial nominee Doug Jones raised $1.1 million in August to Republican gubernatorial nominee Tommy Tuberville’s $848,000 in the last month before the kickoff of the fall campaign. However, Tuberville retains a major fundraising edge over Jones and spent more than him last month. In other statewide races, Democrats and Republicans sometimes kept pace, though the GOP retains an edge.

U.S. Sen. and Republican gubernatorial nominee Tommy Tuberville speaking at the Alabama Republican Party's Summer Dinner on July 31, 2026, at the Renaissance Hotel in Montgomery, Alabama. (Anna Barrett/Alabama Reflector)

ELECTIONS 2026

By Anna Barrett

Attorneys for two plaintiffs challenging Republican gubernatorial nominee Tommy Tuberville’s eligibility to run for governor said he is “constitutionally ineligible” to run and accused Tuberville, the Alabama attorney general and the Alabama Republican Party of ignoring a seven-year residency requirement for governor in the state constitution. The Alabama Supreme Court will decide whether a lower court can hear arguments in the suit.

ICYMI

Thanks for reading First Look. Did you know our weekend digest is also free? Sign up here. And if you enjoyed today’s edition, please forward to a friend. Increasing our readership helps us cover more news.