The Real Cost of Prisons Weblog

The Virginia State Crime Commission met inside the prison yesterday for a briefing on a report written by MGT of America Inc. for the Department of Corrections.

The report found that Lawrenceville, despite its contraband problems, overall was a well-run, clean and safe facility and noted that any prison can have serious security breaches. "In this case those breaches resulted in the high incidence of drugs and cell phones being introduced inside the prison," the report said.

In March, The Times-Dispatch, using state figures, reported that more than twice as many inmates were caught with drugs at Lawrenceville as in all other Virginia prisons combined, and that one in five cell phones confiscated in prisons in Virginia were seized there.

Later, however, the Department of Corrections said those figures were incomplete and gave a misleading picture of the contraband problem at Lawrenceville.

This year, two former Lawrenceville officers caught with 14.6 grams of cocaine pleaded guilty to federal charges of conspiring to deliver drugs to inmates, and a former lieutenant is facing a bribery charge for allegedly taking $2,000 from an inmate there.

Lawrenceville is operated by GEO Group Inc. under a five-year, $95 million state contract. The medium-security prison holds more than 1,576 male inmates.

Yesterday, Kenneth McGinnis of MGT told the crime commission that the number of inmates testing positive for drugs at Lawrenceville could not be properly compared with figures from state prisons.

That is because until December, Lawrenceville had been targeting inmates suspected of using drugs for testing to a larger extent than in state prisons, where there is more of an emphasis on random testing.

MGT found that in 2006, Lawrenceville inmates tested positive for drugs more than 19 percent of the time, four times the highest rate in six nearby state-run prisons and more than 20 times higher than at the state's Brunswick Correctional Center next door.

Also, Lawrenceville had not been conducting as many tests as required under its contract. It should have been randomly testing 5 percent of the inmate population each month, but in 2006, it tested an average of 2.9 percent.

State Sen. Kenneth W. Stolle, R-Virginia Beach and vice chairman of the commission, said adequate random testing is needed to determine the extent of a prison's contraband problem.

John M. Hurley, a GEO vice president, agreed and conceded that "we let our guard down. . . . We weren't complying."

Officials said that in March, after more extensive random testing began, of 107 inmates tested, just two were positive.

No figures on cell-phone seizures at Lawrenceville or state prisons were available in the 34-page report. However, the report said prison investigators said that some inmates who got cell phones inside the prison rented them to other inmates.

The report offered 50 recommendations for improving security. MGT also said there were staffing problems at the private prison, where the employees are paid less than their state counterparts.

In 2006, 112 staff members at Lawrenceville resigned or were fired out of 341 positions. At the time of the study, the security staff had a 15 percent vacancy rate and nearly 30 percent of the security staff had less than a year of experience.

"Given the present problems of contraband within the institution, the present number of vacancies with the security staff . . . contributes to the present security problem," said the MGT report.

The most frequently cited reasons former employees gave for leaving Lawrenceville included the pay and benefits. It was noted that the Geo Group Inc. authorized a $1 an hour pay increase for security staff in Lawrenceville in April.

Hurley said there are now no staff vacancies; a drug-detecting dog has been acquired and two more are on the way; 10 percent of the inmate population is being randomly tested for drugs each month; and other improvements are under way.

There are a lot of ways to get contraband into prisons, Hurley said. Just recently, a search turned up a suspicious softball in an outside recreation yard. Inside was a cell phone.
Contact Frank Green at (804) 649-6340 or fgreen@timesdispatch.com.
http://www.inrich.com/cva/ric/news.PrintView.-content-articles-RTD-2007-09-12-0124.html