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January 28, 2008

Toni Morrison Endorses Obama for President

Jan 28, 12:39 PM EST
Morrison Endorses Obama for President
By NEDRA PICKLER
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The woman who famously labeled Bill Clinton as the "first black president" is backing Barack Obama to be the second.

Author Toni Morrison said her endorsement of the Democratic presidential candidate has little to do with Obama's race - he is the son of a black father from Kenya and a white mother from Kansas - but rather his personal gifts.

Writing with the touch of a poet in a letter to the Illinois senator, Morrison explained why she chose Obama over Hillary Rodham Clinton for her first public presidential endorsement.

Morrison, whose acclaimed novels usually concentrate on the lives of black women, said she has admired Clinton for years because of her knowledge and mastery of politics, but then dismissed that experience in favor of Obama's vision.

"In addition to keen intelligence, integrity and a rare authenticity, you exhibit something that has nothing to do with age, experience, race or gender and something I don't see in other candidates," Morrison wrote. "That something is a creative imagination which coupled with brilliance equals wisdom. It is too bad if we associate it only with gray hair and old age. Or if we call searing vision naivete. Or if we believe cunning is insight. Or if we settle for finessing cures tailored for each ravaged tree in the forest while ignoring the poisonous landscape that feeds and surrounds it.

"Wisdom is a gift; you can't train for it, inherit it, learn it in a class, or earn it in the workplace - that access can foster the acquisition of knowledge, but not wisdom," Morrison wrote.

In 1998, Morrison wrote a column for the New Yorker magazine in which she wrote of Bill Clinton: "White skin notwithstanding, this is our first black president. Blacker than any actual black person who could ever be elected in our children's lifetime. After all, Clinton displays almost every trope of blackness: single-parent household, born poor, working-class, saxophone-playing, McDonald's-and-junk-food-loving boy from Arkansas."

Obama responded to Morrison's endorsement with a written statement: "Toni Morrison has touched a nation with the grace and beauty of her words, and I was deeply moved and honored by the letter she wrote and the support she is giving our campaign."

Posted by lois at 05:28 PM | Comments (0)

January 27, 2008

MA: Marijuana measures head to voters, Hill

Marijuana measures head to voters, Hill
Penalties for possession would be reduced
By Laura Crimaldi | Sunday, January 27, 2008 |

A showdown over whether to relax penalties for having small quantities of pot is advancing to Beacon Hill on two joint fronts as the state’s top prosecutors and anti-drug activists vow a fight in the latest marijuana slugfest.

The push to introduce a civil penalty system for pot possession is coming in the form of a ballot initiative almost entirely bankrolled by billionaire Democratic heavyweight George Soros and a Senate bill that has languished in the Legislature for years.

“The voters of Massachusetts are for this,” said Whitney A. Taylor, chairwoman of the Committee for Sensible Marijuana Policy, which is sponsoring the ballot effort to decriminalize the possession of less than an ounce of pot.

Soros, a frequent contributor to marijuana legalization and decriminalization efforts nationwide, is the biggest contributor to the committee, according to records from the state Office of Campaign and Political Finance. The ballot campaign raised $429,000 in 2007, most of which came from a $400,000 donation that Soros made in June, records show.

“We’re opposed to it in any form because it’s just an inappropriate message to be sending, particularly to young people,” said Cape and Islands District Attorney Michael O’Keefe, who will lead an opposition effort as president of the Massachusetts District Attorneys Association.

Supporters of a civil penalty system say that criminal prosecution for minor amounts of grass wastes millions in law enforcement dollars, has minimal impact on drug use and creates a criminal record that could affect an offender’s housing, employment and borrowing opportunities for life.

Civil penalty opponents assert that lessening the consequences for pot possession sends the wrong message to young people, gives an advantage to drug dealers and poses a public health risk.

A conviction for marijuana possession comes with a maximum prison sentence of six months, fines up to $500 and up to a year’s loss of a driver’s license.

Several studies by a Harvard professor, Jeffrey A. Miron, whose work is partly funded by marijuana decriminalization backers, show prosecutions and jailings for small-scale pot cases cost the state about $130 million a year.

The ballot committee proposal would create a civil penalty system that includes a $100 fine, enrollment in a drug awareness program and parental notification for offenders under age 18. A similar bill sponsored by state Sen. Patricia D. Jehlen (D-Somerville) calls for a $250 civil fine.

The ballot committee cleared its first hurdle toward getting before voters in November last month by submitting more than 81,000 voter signatures to Secretary of State William Galvin, Taylor said. They needed to submit a minimum of 66,593 signatures.

Lawmakers now have until May 6 to act on the measure. If they don’t, another 11,099 voter signatures must be gathered by June 18 for the proposal to make the November ballot.

“Since the ’60s, this is something that I’ve paid attention to. The approach of the laws has been ever more draconian and that just defies common sense,” said attorney Thomas R. Kiley, who drafted the ballot proposal.

William Breault, chairman of the Main South Alliance for Public Safety in Worcester, said he will be writing to lawmakers and police chiefs to defeat the effort.

“It’s a bad idea,” Breault said. “It affects people from blue collar neighborhoods to places like Weston. It has ramifications. I don’t think we should send out the message that it’s acceptable.”

Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/regional/general/view.bg?articleid=1069232

Posted by lois at 04:14 PM | Comments (0)

NY: Plan to Close Prisons Stirs Anxiety in Towns That Depend on Them

“What we’ve seen in New York and other states is that one prison led to another prison and led to another prison, creating the notion that there’s no other economic development option than to build prisons to foster stability in rural areas,” said Tracy Huling, an independent consultant in New York who has done extensive research on the role of prisons."
January 27, 2008

Plan to Close Prisons Stirs Anxiety in Towns That Depend on Them
By FERNANDA SANTOS
NY Times

GABRIELS, N.Y. — After 17 years of marriage, Joy and Richard Gonyea managed to save enough to trade their trailer in November for a cozy prefabricated home with a room for each of their two children and a pool in the backyard. The home overlooks the pine trees on the edge of their two-acre property in rural Vermontville, eight miles from the secluded state prison where Mrs. Gonyea works.
s in rural economies.

“This home is all we’ve ever dreamed of,” said Mrs. Gonyea, 43, a registered nurse who runs the medical department at the prison, Camp Gabriels, a minimum-security facility in this minuscule hamlet in Franklin County, at the northern end of Adirondack Park.

“This,” she said, “is the place we always wanted to have for our kids.”

Then she began to cry.

On Jan. 11, the Spitzer administration announced plans to close Camp Gabriels, two other corrections camps and a medium-security prison, all of which have been operating below capacity since 1996 because of a decline in the number of nonviolent felons, the state’s corrections commissioner, Brian Fischer, said.

Closing those prisons, Mr. Fischer said, would save the state millions of dollars, free up money for the treatment of sex offenders and mentally ill inmates, and finance programs like anger management and vocational training, meant to prepare prisoners for their release.

But for Mrs. Gonyea, her neighbors and co-workers, the prospect of losing Camp Gabriels has stoked fear and doubt — about their future and about the future of their communities, which have come to depend on the prison over the years to survive.

As rural economies across the country crumbled in the 1980s and the population of prison inmates swelled, largely because of tougher drug laws, states pushed prison construction as an economic escape route of sorts. Throughout the 1960s and ’70s, an average of four prisons were built each year in rural America; the rate quadrupled in the 1980s and reached 24 a year in the 1990s, according to the federal Agriculture Department’s economic research service.

The boom, experts say, provided employment, but it also fostered a cycle of dependency. Depressed rural communities came to rely on the prisons as a source of jobs, economic sustenance and services, with little effort devoted to attracting other viable businesses.

“What we’ve seen in New York and other states is that one prison led to another prison and led to another prison, creating the notion that there’s no other economic development option than to build prisons to foster stability in rural areas,” said Tracy Huling, an independent consultant in New York who has done extensive research on the role of prisons in rural economies.

None of the 584 workers at Camp Gabriels and the other prisons slated to close — Camp McGregor in Saratoga County, Camp Pharsalia in Chenango County and the Hudson Correctional Facility in Columbia County — are expected to lose their jobs; state and union officials have said the workers will be able to transfer to other prisons.

But when that will happen, where the new jobs will be or even whether there will be jobs for everyone, are bound to remain open questions for months to come.

The uncertainty has gnawed on residents here and in several other communities in this remote, challenging region where below-zero temperatures are the norm this time of year. The correction industry is big business in Franklin County, which has five state prisons and one federal prison in its 1,678 sparsely populated square miles. In the town of Brighton, which encompasses Gabriels and five other hamlets, the prison is perhaps the only place where someone with a high school diploma can earn a decent wage and benefits.

“There ain’t much else the local people could do for gainful employment,” said Peter Martin, 48, the town’s supervisor and a corrections officer at Camp Gabriels for 22 years.

The camp employs 136 people, including 85 corrections officers.

The reliance on Camp Gabriels extends well beyond jobs. Small businesses have staked their survival on the prison workers who patronize their stores. Local governments and charities, meanwhile, have come to depend on inmate work crews to clear snow from fire hydrants, maintain parks and hiking trails, mow the lawns at cemeteries and unload trucks at food pantries.

Every winter, the crews help build an ice palace in the nearby village of Saranac Lake, cutting thick blocks of ice that can weigh up to 700 pounds. The palace is the main attraction of the village’s Winter Carnival and attracts thousands to the area.

“All those services, when you put that into dollars, there’s no way we’d be able to hire people to perform them,” said Mary Ellen Keith, supervisor of the town of Franklin, which relies on the crews to cut overgrown brush from the sides of 67 miles of local roads, among other tasks. (Franklin is just south of Brighton and another of the 19 towns that make up Franklin County.)

Four of Mrs. Keith’s nine children work in state prisons, she said, including a son and a daughter at Camp Gabriels.

“Everyone around here either works in the prisons, or has a relative who works in the prisons, or knows someone who works in the prisons,” said Mrs. Keith, 78. “My kids were able to build their homes and raise their families here because of the prisons. If it weren’t for the prisons, they would have had to leave the area.”

Prisons are also a valuable political tool, because inmates are counted as local residents, allowing communities to receive more state and federal aid for emergency services. Mr. Martin said that he was not yet sure how the town of Brighton stood to lose if Camp Gabriels closed, but he added, “We’re concerned about losing any kind of aid here.”

Inmate-inclusive population counts are also used when drawing legislative and Congressional district lines.

Franklin County has struggled to find its economic footing. The terrain is carved by mountains, streams and lakes, with limited farmland. Much of it falls inside Adirondack Park, so development must abide by strict rules. Tourism is strong, but concentrated in a few areas. Winters are long and the wind so cold it seems to slice the skin, like tiny razor blades. The soil is frozen for most of the year; the growing season lasts from May through September, yielding potatoes and some grain crops, but little else.

In Gabriels, which has about 800 residents, including the prison’s 186 inmates, the closest thing to Main Street is a half-mile stretch of state highway, Route 86. It has two mini-markets, two farms, a general store, a cafe, a temporary post office (the permanent one burned last winter) and a few dozen homes. Camp Gabriels is set back from the highway, shrouded by tall pines.

The camp opened in 1982, in a building once occupied by a sanitarium. It has no fences; trees delimit its perimeter. At its peak, it held 336 inmates.

“There’s no doubt that closing prisons could bring short-term economic distress to some areas, but the question is, is that a justification for refusing to make changes? The answer should be no,” said Edmund J. McMahon, director of the Empire Center for New York State Policy, a conservative group. “There should be other ways of improving the economic situation in upstate New York that doesn’t involve filling upstate New York with prisons.”

Gov. George E. Pataki tried to close prisons in New York each fiscal year from 2002 to 2006, but he faced intense pressure from upstate legislators and union leaders, who are already objecting to Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s proposal.

This is Mr. Spitzer’s first try to close prisons and, officials say, it is a necessary step to help the state bridge a projected $4.4 billion budget gap and adapt its corrections system to the number and types of inmates it now serves. The closings, scheduled for January 2009, would save the state more than $40 million in operating costs over the next two years and $30 million over five years in repair costs.

“This is as much a budget issue as it is a management issue,” Mr. Fischer, the corrections commissioner, said in an interview. “I’ve got a finite budget and I’ve got a finite work force, and I have to use them where my needs are, and that’s in the larger facilities.”

The number of inmates housed in the state’s maximum-security prisons increased by 18 percent from 1996 to 2007, while the inmate population in medium-security prisons declined by the same rate. During that period, the number of prisoners in minimum-security facilities — most convicted of larceny, burglary, minor drug possession and other nonviolent crimes — decreased by 47 percent, officials said.

Six months before closing Camp Gabriels and the other prisons, the state must detail what it plans to do with the emptied facilities. Mr. Fischer said that it was too early to tell what those plans would be, but that the state would consider public and private uses for the properties.

Union leaders and many Camp Gabriels workers said they would not give in easily, though. They organized a rally in Saranac Lake on Thursday and a letter-writing campaign, hoping to convince state legislators that the prison was worth saving.

“I told my wife we should hang in there,” said Mr. Gonyea, 44, who retired in 2005 after working for 23 years as a corrections officer, 17 of those at Camp Gabriels. “The anxiety, all this doubt, it’s killing us. But it’s not over yet.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/27/nyregion/27prison.html?ei=5070&en=177a187d81dcfe12&ex=1202101200&pagewanted=print

Posted by lois at 10:48 AM | Comments (0)

OK: Legislature seeks ways of fixing state’s deteriorating prisons

Legislature seeks ways of fixing state’s deteriorating prisons
Staff and wire reports
Enid, OK

— Inmates stretch their tattooed arms between the thick iron bars of their cell doors at Oklahoma State Penitentiary’s F Cell House, tilting small plastic mirrors they hold in their hands to get a glimpse of their neighbors and the correctional officers who patrol the maximum security cell block.
Chatter among the inmates gets louder when they spot warden’s as-sistant Terry Cren-shaw as he makes his way along a narrow walkway that divides two rows of inmate cells and gives prison staff their only clear view inside them.

“Crenshaw, we got no hot water up here,” one inmate shouts.
“When are we going to stop this madness?” another asks rhetorically.
It’s a walk Crenshaw and other correctional workers take daily at Oklahoma’s 100-year-old maximum-security prison. And it’s one that puts them in constant danger.
Unlike contemporary prisons where inmates are locked behind solid metal doors, inmates in the outdated F Cell House at McAlester, built in the 1930s, can reach through the bars of their cells, throw things at prison staffers and even attack them.
Problems like these are not unique to just OSP, though, said Rep. Mike Jackson, R-Enid. Jackson said there is a need for more money for more beds and better corrections facilities statewide.
“I think throughout the legislative session last year we did a lot of research addressing the Department of Corrections,” Jackson said.

‘Is it a crisis? Yes.’

Inadequate funding has prevented the Department of Corrections from updating facilities.
That is apparent is places like F Cell House, parts of which are deteriorating due to neglect.
“You’re looking at facilities that can’t necessarily be repaired. They have to be torn down and replaced,” Crenshaw said
But the prison — site of Oklahoma’s death row — is the only barrier between the public and the inmates housed inside.
“We pretty much secure Oklahoma’s orneriest inmates,” Crenshaw said. “This is a very dangerous institution. It’s very stressful.
“Is it a crisis? Yes.”
How to solve Oklahoma’s prison crisis is one of the toughest issues facing state lawmakers as they prepare to convene the 2008 Legislature Feb. 4. But how much can be accomplished before lawmakers adjourn in May and whether they have the political will to spend millions of tax dollars to improve state prisons remain unanswered.
“It’s taken years and years to get us in this situation. It’ll take time to get us out,” said Sen. Owen Laughlin, R-Woodward, Republican floor leader.
“We’re going to have to put some dollars into corrections. We have some facilities that are woefully inadequate and, in fact, dangerous.”

Public safety a priority

Laughlin and other lawmakers said public safety is the key issue in the upcoming prison debate. Underfunding and understaffing puts the public as well as correctional officers and inmates at risk.
“We have to equip them with the tools, the manpower they have to have to perform their mission,” said Rep. Rex Duncan, R-Sand Springs, chairman of House Judiciary and Public Safety Committee.
“The number one job of government has got to be keeping the thugs off the street,” Laughlin said.
Lawmakers said they will be guided by the findings of a comprehensive performance audit of state prisons made public earlier this month.
“Our leaders in the Department of Corrections have worked and are working with all parties involved to come up with a bipartisan solution,” Jackson said.
The audit said Oklahoma prisons are antiquated and underfunded. It recommended the Legislature immediately appropriate more than $25 million to secure 660 maximum-security cells at a private prison in Davis and hire additional correctional and pardon and parole officers.
In addition, the audit recommends a $30 million increase in the agency’s budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1. The state prison budget this year is about $477 million, about 7 percent of the total state budget.

Age-old problems

Many of the problems auditors found in state prisons are abundant at Oklahoma State Penitentiary, built in part by inmate labor and opened in 1908.
In F Cell House, which houses 390 inmates, exposed metal sprinkler pipes crisscross the ceiling of a walkway that divides inmate cells — pipes that would become formidable weapons in an inmate’s hands.
The prison’s towering rotunda, which serves as a gateway to the cell house and other parts of the prison, is not air-conditioned, and prison staffers who work there must endure the heat of Oklahoma summers and the chill of its winters.
“There’s no heating. There’s no cooling,” Crenshaw said. And when it rains, guards put out “Wet Floor” signs in the rotunda because the roof leaks.
“I don’t think we’ve got a building that doesn’t leak,” he said.
Stress cracks stretch along the rotunda’s floor, which still bears remnants of asbestos tile removed years earlier.
Cells in the prison’s original East and West cell houses have not been used since a federal judge ordered them closed. But parts of the cell houses still are used for temporary inmate housing and as a pathway to a recreation yard. Above the pathway, layers of paint — some of it lead-based — peel from the cell house’s masonry ceiling.
Throughout the facility, reinforced glass panels and windows are cracked and shattered.
“Is this a security risk? Yes, it is,” Crenshaw said. “We don’t have funds to replace stuff like this.”

Looking for creative solutions

Oklahoma is 41st in the nation in the amount it spends to incarcerate inmates, the audit found. Auditors found no waste within the prison system and concluded it was cost-effective.
Duncan said he hopes to implement some of the audit’s 141 recommendations this year. Among them are taking the governor out of the parole process, a move the audit said would increase inmate releases and reduce Oklahoma’s prison population, which stood at 25,100 Jan. 22.
Jackson believes electronic monitoring devices for paroles might help reduce the overcrowding issue. He also said government leaders may want to look into more treatment options for drug abuse offenders and less prison terms.
“In the recidivism rate (of drug abuse offenders) there is shining example of things that work,” Jackson said speaking of treatment. “It is amazing what they have been able to accomplish.”
Jackson said one major concern he has about abuse offenders is what they might learn while in prison.
“We do not want to put minor offenders in with the main population,” he said. “This could further their criminal career.”

Parole factor

Auditors said Oklahoma parole rates are significantly lower than other states. Oklahoma is the only state in the nation in which the governor must sign off on every inmate parole request.
The audit predicted Oklahoma’s inmate population will rise to almost 29,000 by 2016 and said policies requiring certain felons to serve 85 percent of their sentences are driving the increase.
But lawmakers said there is no consensus in the Legislature for rolling back the 85 percent rule.
Since 1999, lawmakers have adopted sentencing policies that emphasize the so-called “deadly sins,” a list of 19 violent offenses that require those convicted of them to serve at least 85 percent of their sentence. The offenses include murder, rape and some forms of robbery, burglary, arson and child molestation.
“The public has a right to expect people sentenced to an 85 percent crime to actually serve that,” Duncan said.
Jackson said the house is in pre-session, and this week members will discuss DOCfunding.
“The DOC audit focuses on stellar progress and recognizes the things that worked,” Jackson said, “but, it is not an overall fix.”

Staff writer Tony Waggoner contributed to this Associated Press report.
http://www.enidnews.com/localnews/local_story_027005637.html

Copyright © 1999-2006 cnhi, inc.

Posted by lois at 10:44 AM | Comments (0)

January 26, 2008

OH: Prisoners accuse prison of lying about asbestos

Inmates accuse prison officials of lying about asbestos
Tuesday Jan 22, 2008
Columbus Dispatch
A federal lawsuit filed by 33 inmates at a state prison accuses officials of lying about removing asbestos from the facility.

Lab tests on a powdery substance collected by the inmates at the Chillicothe Correctional Institution show the presence of the cancer-causing substance, said Jeffrey Donnellon, a Columbus lawyer who represents the inmates. Donnellon said he sent the samples to the lab.

The lawsuit, filed Jan. 4 in U.S. District Court on behalf of the inmates and four former inmates, accuses the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction of deliberate indifference to a known health risk.

The samples collected by inmates came from a dorm floor and from snipped pieces of insulation from steam pipes, Donnellon said.

"Many clients believe they have lung problems attributable to asbestos," Donnellon said

A message seeking comment was left Tuesday with a spokeswoman for the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction. In a state inspection report of the facility filed in 2007, prison officials stated that the "last asbestos in a (prison) housing unit was removed ... two years ago."

The lawsuit also asks a judge to order an independent investigation and to close the prison if asbestos can't be safely or promptly removed.

The prison, about 45 miles south of Columbus, houses 2,850 inmates and has 587 staff members.

http://www.ohio.com/news/ap?articleID=351811&c=y

Posted by lois at 12:01 PM | Comments (0)

ID: two articles about prison building: After two-year delay, ID Senate panel approves new drug prison

After two-year delay, ID Senate panel approves new drug prison

By JOHN MILLER
January 26, 2008 http://www.magicvalley.com/articles/2008/01/25/ap-state-id/d8ud9rmo0.txt

BOISE, Idaho - Lawmakers voted Friday to kick-start a drug treatment
prison planned south of Boise that's been plagued by two years of
delays.

The Senate Judiciary and Rules Committee unanimously approved a lease-
purchase agreement in which Idaho will pay $50.4 million over 20
years to a Utah-based company to build the 400-bed facility. After
two decades, Idaho will own the building.

If the full Senate approves, the measure will go the House. If it
gets a final OK, the building should be completed in about 22 months
on land near existing state prison facilities, officials said.

The plan for a so-called Correctional Alternative Placement Program
facility was hatched in the 2006 Legislature, as lawmakers sought to
provide an alternative so those convicted of drug- and alcohol-
related crimes could avoid time in a traditional prison and get
treatment instead. Since then, however, it's been delayed by
ambiguity in the state's competitive bidding process that provoked
complaints from companies vying to build and run the facility.

That's finally been worked out. Late last year, Management & Training
Corp., based in Centerville, Utah, won the contract to build and
operate the prison. Now, lawmakers need to sign off on the details of
the lease-purchase pact.

"It's going to be a key component in slowing the flow" of drug
offenders into Idaho prisons, Department of Correction Director Brent
Reinke told the Senate panel. "I think we're going to see some
incredible returns on it."

This prison is just part of Reinke's agency's push to add beds to
manage a population of 7,400 offenders incarcerated largely due to
drug offenses in a prison system so crowded that it's sent 500
inmates to Texas and Oklahoma.

Separately, Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter this week began efforts to
convince lawmakers of the merits of his plan to let a private company
construct and own a new $250 million, 2,100-bed private prison.

Lawmakers last year had set aside about $4 million to run the new
drug prison, on the expectation it would be completed. Since it's
not, that money will revert to Idaho's general fund and lawmakers
will have to approve an additional appropriation in the 2009
Legislature for operation.

At the new drug prison, Management & Training Corp. plans to offer
programs to help addicted inmates re-enter society. Its operations
contract is for 10 years, but the state could renew for two five-year
periods, Reinke said.

Some senators were concerned that Idaho might be locked into
contracting with the Utah private prison company for the duration of
the 20 years it takes to complete the lease-purchase transaction.

"How do you address an inadequate operator that owns your building?"
asked Sen. Bart Davis, R-Idaho Falls.

Rod Leonard, who led the bidding development team for Idaho, said the
contract includes provisions for the state to cancel its relationship
at any time if there is failure to live up to state expectations.

Leonard said the state opted for the lease-purchase agreement,
instead of letting the Utah company own the facility, because it
allows for about $8.7 million worth of federal tax benefits over the
next 20 years. Management & Training has agreed to pass that benefit
on to Idaho in the form of reduced annual payments.

The facility will include 100 beds for offenders sentenced to drug-
or alcohol-treatment programs that must be completed in order for
them to avoid longer prison terms.

Other beds will be filled by offenders who run afoul of terms of
their parole or probation, but get sent to this facility for
treatment, in lieu of a judge returning them to one of Idaho's
penitentiaries.

"We're going to be using it for tuneups," Reinke said. "We'll run
them through it, get them tuned up."

Otter selling private prison plan; skeptics fear loss of control

By JOHN MILLER
Wednesday, January 23, 2008 http://www.magicvalley.com/articles/2008/01/23/ap-state-id/d8ubujv80.txt

BOISE, Idaho - Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter Wednesday began selling a plan
to lawmakers to let prison companies own and operate for-profit
lockups in Idaho, arguing it's better for corporations to pay upfront
costs of housing a growing inmate population than it is for the state
to sell bonds for such projects, like it's done in the past.

Currently, Idaho law prevents corporations from building for-profit
prisons here.

For instance, although Corrections Corporation of America, based in
Tennessee, built the Idaho Correctional Center south of Boise in 2000
and now runs it, the state owns the facility.

Under Otter's proposal, companies could own their own facilities,
although only after the state issues a permit for a new facility.
Inmates from elsewhere could be brought here, but Idaho prisoners
would have priority and could "bump" inmates from other states to
make room for them.

And while sex offenders would likely be allowed, violent sexual
predators would be forbidden.

The Department of Correction predicts Idaho will have nearly 9,400
inmates in its system by 2012, up from about 7,400 now. The agency
has prison beds for just 6,300 inmates, so it's shipped about 500 to
Texas and Oklahoma, with others housed in county jails across Idaho.

Otter, a former businessman who touts free-market solutions, aims to
let firms like Corrections Corporation of America and Florida's The
GEO Group, build a $250 million, 2,100-bed prison, starting as soon
as possible. The companies are building tens of thousands of private
prison beds across America.

"The governor thinks there is a huge benefit to having a private
entity fund the construction of the facility and then operate the
facility," said David Hensley, Otter's staff attorney, adding Idaho
still owes $71 million in bond payments for its last prison. "The
governor is concerned taking on another $250 million in bond payments
is quite an undertaking."

Senate President Pro Tem Robert Geddes, R-Soda Springs, agreed Idaho
needs a new prison.

Still, the system where ownership has remained in state hands has
worked well, he said. If things change, Geddes raised concerns about
repeating problems in Texas, where one Idaho inmate killed himself in
March and where prisoners have been moved several times after alleged
abuse by guards.

"If you allow a private prison to develop...they're obviously looking
to maximize their profits," Geddes said. "Does that mean we're going
to become what we have utilized Texas for?"

In addition, members of the majority GOP are raising questions over
financial estimates Otter aides are using to tout cost advantages of
a privately owned prison.

In documents obtained by The Associated Press, officials estimated
that a state-owned prison built in 2012 would initially be more
expensive than a privately owned prison. But the state-owned option
would become cheaper by year 2019 due to projected rising payments
Idaho would have to make to a company to cover its costs of building
the privately owned prison, according to the documents.

But Otter and members of his administration were dissatisfied with
those figures, and demanded revisions.

New estimates emerged Tuesday, concluding this time that a privately
owned prison would actually be less expensive than a state-owned
prison until at least 2042. The big difference: The new estimates
assume a private company won't ever demand that Idaho increase its
annual payments to cover construction costs.

Hensley acknowledges there are no guarantees, but that Idaho could
request such a freeze in an eventual contract.

However, Sen. Dean Cameron, R-Rupert and co-chairman of the Joint
Finance-Appropriations Committee, said it's unlikely an investor-
owned company like GEO or Corrections Corporation of America would be
satisfied with leaving payments to cover construction static for
decades.

"What the analysis fails to take into account are potential increases
in the cost of money over time," Cameron said.

Meanwhile, Rep. Maxine Bell, R-Jerome and the other co-chairwoman of
the budget-writing panel, said allowing a private company to own such
a facility could leave Idaho without adequate control.

She cites an example in which Corrections Corporation of America
earlier this month asked Colorado to approve a 5 percent payment hike
in each of the next five years _ or else it would move Colorado
inmates out of one of its private prisons and bring in prisoners from
California. A Colorado prison spokeswoman confirmed to the AP such a
request had been made.

"We have a good relationship with Corrections Corporation of America
at the Idaho Correctional Center for the simple reason that we own
the facility," Bell said

Hensley countered Otter's legislation will include the appropriate
"sideboards" to avoid the situation Colorado now faces.

"We have the huge benefit that we can learn from lessons of Colorado
and other states," he said.

Both Corrections Corporation of America and GEO have hired lobbyists
in Idaho to push for Otter's changes.

In addition, the companies have given at least $40,000 in campaign
contributions to Idaho lawmakers in recent elections, including at
least $15,000 to Otter's 2006 gubernatorial race.

Few lawmakers have seen details of Otter's plan, but at least some
are warming to it.

"I tend to think there are very few things that government can
provide more efficiently than the private sector," said Rep. Mark
Snodgrass, R-Meridian.

Posted by lois at 11:43 AM | Comments (0)

Sweden: A world of criminal justice a world away from this one. Killer Expelled From Swedish Med School

January 25, 2008
Killer Expelled From Swedish Med School
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
New York Times

STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) -- A medical student convicted in a 1999 murder with neo-Nazi links has been expelled from Sweden's leading medical school in a case that sparked debate over whether a killer can become a doctor after having paid his debt to society.

The Karolinska institute, known for awarding the Nobel Prize in medicine, revoked Karl Svensson's admission to its prestigious medical program this week after an investigation into his background, the university president said Friday.

Svensson, 31, was admitted last fall after his application to the program was approved, President Harriet Wallberg-Henriksson told The Associated Press.

However, the university knew nothing about his dark past until getting two anonymous tips that Svensson's original identity was Hampus Hellekant, an alleged neo-Nazi sympathizer who had served seven years in prison for the murder of a labor union activist, Wallberg-Henriksson said.

He was convicted along with two other men in 2000 in the fatal shooting of a member of a far-left union, Bjorn Soderberg. Prosecutors said the killing was revenge for the Soderberg's public denouncement of a co-worker who belonged to a neo-Nazi organization.

''He had been enrolled for four months when this was revealed,'' she said.

The discovery put Karolinska in a difficult position because the legal framework is unclear on ''whether you should be able to receive a doctor's education with this type of background,'' she said.

In the end, Karolinska never had to address Svensson's criminal record because the background check found irregularities in the high school grades he submitted with his application, which was grounds to expel him.

The case triggered an emotional debate among faculty and students at the Karolinska institute. After local media started reporting on the case, Svensson told his 130 classmates about his background, Wallberg-Henriksson said.

''He said he was very interested in becoming a doctor and was determined to pursue the education and that he was not the same person today as he was then,'' she said.

''There was a lot of discussion. The course was divided in two camps. One camp thought he had paid for his crime, others felt uncomfortable,'' she said.

Karolinska students said that there had been mixed feelings about Svensson on campus.

''We talked about it when it emerged and it was in the paper,'' said Elin, 21, a biomedicine student who did not want her last name used because the topic was sensitive on campus.

''People felt it was strange that he should be allowed to become a doctor,'' she said. ''On the other hand, people change. Maybe he's become a better person.''

Wallberg-Henriksson said Svensson's only response to the expulsion was a letter to Karolinska in which he said he was dropping out of the program.

Svensson could not be reached for comment.

The National Agency for Services to Universities and University Colleges filed a police complaint in the case on Thursday. Stockholm police said Friday they had received the complaint and were likely to start a forgery investigation next week.

Education Minister Lars Leijonborg said in a statement on Friday that Svensson's case had prompted his ministry to ''discuss whether there is a need to change the regulations surrounding students who have committed crimes.''

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Sweden-Killer-Doctor.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=Medical+School&st=nyt&oref=slogin

Posted by lois at 11:39 AM | Comments (0)

January 23, 2008

CT: Major changes to criminal justice system proposed

Tuesday, January 22, 2008 2:25 PM EST
Major changes to criminal justice system proposed

The legislature's Democratic majority proposed a package of comprehensive changes to the criminal justice system in Connecticut today.

The crime bill is a response to last summer's triple homicide and home invasion in Cheshire. Lawmakers are meeting in special session today to consider the legislation.

After opening the special session, Democrats and Republicans in the House of Representatives and Senate have been in caucus since the late morning.

The Democratic legislation includes the following provisions:

Creates a new crime of home invasion.

Revises the burglary statute.

Reworks the persistent offender statute.

Reconfigures the Board of Pardons and Parole.

Expands the rights of crime victims and their immediate families.

Mandates secure video connections at state prisons for parole hearings.

Requires the court and prison systems provide 270 additional beds for diversionary and prison re-entry programs.

Commands the court and prison systems provide 24 beds in secured treatment centers for sex offenders.

Directs the court system to create an Internet registry for outstanding arrest warrants for violation of probation.

Requires the prison system to monitor 300 more inmates by global positioning satellite technology.

Makes juvenile court records available to Board of Pardons and Parole and the Department of Correction.

Requires the court system establish a statewide automated victim information and notification system.

Establishes a committee to propose incentives for municipalities to host transitional housing for released offenders.

Orders the court, prison and parole systems to devise how to assess the risks of offenders of re-offending.

Requires annual reporting to the legislature on developments in the criminal justice system.

Mandates the development of a centralized, integrated criminal justice tracking and information database.

Sets up a diversionary program for persons with psychiatric disabilities accused of crimes or motor vehicle violations.

Authorizes $19 million in transfers in the state's two-year, $36 billion budget to finance some initiatives.

http://www.rep-am.com/articles/2008/01/22/newsblog/doc479642c5353dc173185496
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Posted by lois at 05:07 PM | Comments (0)

Center for Public Integrity: Web Site Assembles U.S. Prewar Claims

January 23, 2008
Web Site Assembles U.S. Prewar Claims
By JOHN H. CUSHMAN Jr.
NY Times

WASHINGTON — Students of how the Bush administration led the nation into the Iraq war can now go online to browse a comprehensive database of top officials’ statements before the invasion, connecting the dots between hundreds of claims, mostly discredited since then, linking Saddam Hussein to Al Qaeda or warning that he possessed forbidden weapons.

The Center for Public Integrity, a research group that focuses on ethics in government and public policy, designed the new Web site to allow simple searches for specific phrases, such as “mushroom cloud” or “yellowcake uranium,” in transcripts and documents totaling some 380,000 words, including remarks by President Bush and most of his top advisers in the two years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Warnings about the need to confront Iraq, by President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, the national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, and two White House press secretaries, among others, can be combed line by line, and reviewed alongside detailed critiques published after the fact by official panels, historians, journalists and independent experts.

There is no startling new information in the archive, because all the documents have been published previously. But the new computer tool is remarkable for its scope, and its replay of the crescendo of statements that led to the war. Muckrakers may find browsing the site reminiscent of what Richard M. Nixon used to dismissively call “wallowing in Watergate.”

The database is online at www.publicintegrity.org.

Charles Lewis and Mark Reading-Smith of the research center say their work has documented “at least 935 false statements” on hundreds of occasions, particularly that Iraq had unconventional weapons, links to Al Qaeda, or both.

The database shows how even after the invasion, when a consensus emerged that the prewar intelligence assessments were flawed, administration officials occasionally suggested that the weapons might still be found.

The officials have defended many of their prewar statements as having been based on the intelligence that was available at the time — although there is now evidence that some statements contradicted even the sketchy intelligence of the time.

President Bush said in 2005 that “much of the intelligence turned out to be wrong” but that “it was right to remove Saddam Hussein from power.”

Posted by lois at 05:01 PM | Comments (0)

MO: Federal Appeals Panel Rules that the State Must Provide Transportation to Prisoners Wanting Abortions

State prisons must transport inmates for abortions
Associated Press
ST. LOUIS, MO (2008-01-22) A federal appeals court panel rules today that the state of Missouri must provide transportation to abortion clinics for inmates who want to undergo the procedure.
The state in 2005 tried to end the practice of driving prisoners to clinics for elective abortions. An inmate at the prison in Vandalia filed a class-action suit.
A three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with a lower court ruling in favor of the inmate.
It isn't clear if the state will appeal. Calls seeking comment from Attorney General Jay Nixon and Governor Blunt were not returned. The ruling comes on the 35th anniversary of the Supreme Court's Roe versus Wade decision, which established a nationwide right to abortion.

© Copyright 2008, KWMU

http://publicbroadcasting.net/kwmu/news.newsmain?action=printarticle&ARTICLE_ID=1215538

Posted by lois at 11:16 AM | Comments (0)

Supreme Court Rules Against Muslim Prisoner

Court Rules Against Muslim Inmate
January 23, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court said Tuesday that a Muslim inmate cannot sue the government over the disappearance of the prisoner's copies of the Quran and a prayer rug.

In a 5-4 ruling, the justices said the federal law the inmate relied on prohibits lawsuits against federal corrections officers.

Abdus-Shahid M.S. Ali says the missing books and rug reflect widespread harassment against Muslim inmates in federal, state and local prisons stemming from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

"Reports from all over the country have come in" on Muslims' religious property that "has been destroyed, confiscated, looted, lost, stolen or taken without cause," Ali said in the lawsuit he filed in federal court. Ali is serving a sentence of 20 years to life in prison for committing first-degree murder in the District of Columbia.

The issue in the case was whether federal prison guards are immune from suit under the Federal Tort Claims Act.

The law blocks lawsuits against the government over goods detained by customs and excise officers or "any other law enforcement officer." Two lower federal courts said Ali cannot sue because prison officials are law enforcement officers.

Justice Clarence Thomas, writing for a majority that cut across ideological grounds, agreed with the lower courts. The law "forecloses lawsuits against the United States for the unlawful detention of property by 'any,' not just 'some,' law enforcement officers," Thomas said. Tuesday's ruling was the first 5-4 split of the term, following a term in which the margin in 24 cases was a single vote.

Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Antonin Scalia joined Thomas. The dissenters were Justices Stephen Breyer, Anthony Kennedy, David Souter and John Paul Stevens.

"The seizure of property by an officer raises serious concerns for the liberty of our people and the act should not be read to permit appropriation of property without a remedy," Kennedy said.

Besides the two copies of the Quran and the prayer rug, Ali is missing stamps and other personal items worth $177 that he says never showed up after his transfer from a federal penitentiary in Atlanta to Big Sandy penitentiary at Inez, Ky., in 2003. He said the last time he saw the now-missing items was when he turned them over to a prison supervisor in Atlanta.

Muslim inmates have been subjected to "very hard times and bad treatment" at the hands of federal, state and local prison employees, Ali said in court papers.

It seems as though "the many prison employees think that they can hurt you best taking your personally owned property," Ali wrote.

He added that because he has "practiced his faith to the fullest" he has been subjected to prison officials repeatedly confiscating and destroying his legal and religious property.

Ali said he has been harassed for his religious beliefs "year after year" in both the District of Columbia Department of Corrections and the U.S. Bureau of Prisons.
The case is Ali v. Federal Bureau of Prisons, 06-9130.
On the Net:
* Supreme Court: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/

Posted by lois at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)

January 22, 2008

Justice Policy Institute: The Substance Abuse Treatment and Public Safety Brief

Justice Policy Institute (JPI).
The Substance Abuse Treatment and Public Safety Brief: http://www.justicepolicy.org/images/upload/08_01_REP_DrugTx_AC-PS.pdf found that the sooner substance abuse is treated, the bigger the long-term cost savings and increases in public safety.
The policy brief found that:
Increases in admissions to substance abuse treatment are associated with reductions in crime rates.
Admissions to drug treatment increased 37.4 percent and federal spending on drug treatment increased 14.6 percent from 1995 to 2005. During the same period, violent crime fell 31.5 percent. In California, where Proposition 36 diverted thousands of people from prison and jail to treatment, violent crime fell at a rate that exceeded the national average.
In Maryland, where policymakers have been working to implement various approaches to diverting prison-bound people to treatment, the counties that relied on drug treatment were more likely to achieve significant crime rate reductions than those that relied on drug imprisonment.
Increased admissions to drug treatment are associated with reduced incarceration rates.
Substance abuse treatment prior to contact with the justice system yields public safety benefits early on.
Substance abuse treatment helps individuals transition successfully from the criminal justice system to the community. Community-based drug treatment programs reduce the chance that a person will become involved in the criminal justice system after release from prison.
Substance abuse treatment is more cost-effective than prison or other punitive measures. The Washington State Institute for Public Policy (WSIPP) found that community-based drug treatment is extremely beneficial in terms of cost, especially compared to prison. Every dollar spent on drug treatment in the community is estimated to return $18.52 in benefits to society in terms of reduced incarceration rates and associated crime costs to taxpayers.

Posted by lois at 09:58 PM | Comments (0)

New Haven: MLK Day commemorated with protests against parole ban and prison conditions and sentencing

City residents protest Rell’s parole ban
Battling bitter cold, more than 60 gather for vigil led by the People Against Injustice coalition
Aaron Bray
Yale Daily News: Staff Reporter
Published Tuesday, January 22, 2008

More than five dozen New Haven residents came together for a candlelight vigil Monday, invoking Martin Luther King Jr.’s dreams as they called for a more humane criminal justice system.

“We are here to give hope to all those behind bars — to give voice to those who are invisible in our community,” shouted Barbara Fair, a member of the People Against Injustice coalition, which led the protest.

As Connecticut legislators hashed out compromises in Hartford ahead of today’s special session devoted to criminal justice reform, residents outside the Whalley Avenue jail protested Gov. Jodi Rell’s parole ban and some of her proposals to fix what most agree is a broken system.

Both the ban and the proposed reform were prompted by the triple murder of a mother and her two daughters last summer in Cheshire. Two men on parole have been charged with the crime.

While decrying the horror of the Cheshire killings — which took place in the suburbs — speakers asked why prior murders, in cities such as New Haven, had not prompted the same outrage and calls for reform. And they said they rejected two of Rell’s proposed solutions, which have also found vocal opposition among state Democrats.

One would mandate life imprisonment with parole possible after 30 years for anyone convicted of three violent felonies, a so-called “three-strikes” law. The other would make the invasion of an occupied home a violent felony, regardless of whether the perpetrator thought anyone was home.

Chris Cooper, a spokesman for Gov. Rell, said the governor’s set of 18 proposals, including the two over which there is contention, is a “very straightforward public safety issue.” He said there is no time table on the parole suspension and that Rell will lift it once she has confidence that reforms to protect the public have been put in place.

Cooper explained that the home invasion provision is necessary to ensure that every intruder does not simply claim to the prosecutor that he or she did not know anyone was home in order to avoid the tougher penalties. Among other things, Rell’s proposal also calls for minimum five-year terms for burglaries committed with a firearm or at night.

But speakers at last night’s vigil said the parole ban and the governor’s proposals only exacerbated an overcrowded prison system. Prison-guard unions in Connecticut have said they are severely understaffed, the Associated Press reports, though protestors noted with some irony that conditions are much worse for inmates than guards.

One speaker noted that a new inmate with tuberculosis was brought in by guards with masks and then promptly dumped in a crowded cell. Shelton Tucker, a member of the PAI coalition, told those gathered outside the correction center walls that he’d heard of maggots crawling out of drains in the bathrooms.

Vigil attendees argued that prison reform should focus on reducing the populations in prison, whose conditions many described as unconscionable — and not on building new ones.

But, added Tucker — who said he has spent time in prison — the community needs to do its part as well: “[Prison] cannot be seen as a rite of passage. We have to be better parents … [and] fight like hell to stay outside.”

Khalil Iskarous, also of PAI, explained how drug laws unfairly target primarily lower-income and minority populations, who tend to live in more densely populated areas.

He said laws imposing stricter penalties for drug possession within 1,500 feet of a school are effective everywhere within the New Haven city limits — except the Yale Bowl. Suburban residents, where the schools are spread further apart, do not need to worry about these laws, he said.

Representative Mike Lawlor (D-99), who has publicly recounted the poor and overcrowded prison conditions he has witnessed on tour at the Whalley Avenue jail, said the goal of the special session would be to find ways of taking nonviolent offenders out of the prison system.

“There’s a lot in [the proposed bills] on diversion, reentry and treatment. All of those things are certainly cheaper than prisons, and more effective, for some people, so we can focus prison resources on the dangerous ones,” Lawlor said. “Many convicts are mentally ill or homeless, so you can’t just push them out the door.”

Rell has asked that any proposals “carrying a price tag” be delayed until a Feb. 6 budget session, her spokesman said, and that tomorrow’s session focus solely on changes to the penal code, the Board of Pardons and Paroles and protesting victims’ rights.

But Lawlor disagrees: “We have to get these resources out there immediately.”

Still, he said, there is bipartisan consensus on at least 85 percent of the proposed changes.

Back outside the jail though, the concerns of the protestors, some of whom had friends or family inside, were closer to home and on a system they said had failed them. Some wondered aloud about the injustice they said they face each day: how the color of their skin makes them targets for drug or weapon searches, or how their children were in jail on minor drug charges even as Yale students receive a free pass.

In closing the hour-long vigil, many also asked why more people were not out on the frigid night with them. Like Dr. King’s efforts, they said, this must be a day-in and day-out struggle.

It is easy, some said, for clergy members and community supporters to take a stand from the comfortable and warm indoors.

“If our churches don’t get out here,” one protester asked, “why are we going in there?”
http://www.yaledailynews.com/articles/view/23046

Posted on Tue, Jan 22, 2008
Protesters rally outside Whalley Ave. jail
By Abram Katz, Register Staff

NEW HAVEN — About 50 protesters braved low temperatures Monday evening outside the New Haven Correctional Center on Whalley Avenue to denounce prison conditions, decry proposed stiffer criminal penalties, and invoke the name of Martin Luther King Jr. in a campaign to reduce crime in black neighborhoods.

Representatives of People Against Injustice, the Committee Against the Parole Ban, New Haven Family Alliance, and other groups, spoke through a megaphone, hoping that prisoners in the jail could hear them.

“What do we do when we’re under attack? Stand up and fight back!” the group erupted at several points in the hourlong candle-light vigil on Country Street, off Whalley Avenue.

Bundled up against the 24-degree cold, participants held candles shielded in paper cups. Only street lights illuminated the event.
Advertisement

Barbara Fair of People Against Injustice said, “We’re here to bring hope to people behind bars.” She criticized overcrowding in the jail, contending that 55 prisoners have to share a single toilet.

“It’s deplorable and inhumane. We’re here to give voice to the invisible. All of Martin Luther King’s dreams have not been fulfilled. Schools are still segregated. Housing is still segregated. The gains made in the 1960s have been lost. The reality is that this fight is for our children,” Feir said.

Nikki Brown, also of People Against Injustice, said recent revelations of allegedly criminal activity in the Police Department probably means that many people incarcerated in the jail have done nothing wrong.

Speakers did not minimize the break-in and homicides in Cheshire that spurred the three-strikes and no-parole bills in the General Assembly, but said city children are felled with little notice or response.

“Our babies are being killed on the street all of the time. The crime in Cheshire led to the ‘end of parole’ law,” Brown said.

Brown’s son, Shelton Tucker, said, “Martin Luther King’s dream was for justice and that has not been realized here. ‘Parole’ and ‘three strikes’ are horrible, horrible. We must fight, fight and keep fighting.”

Tucker said that if drugs and guns were eliminated from New Haven’s streets, so would most crime.

Brown said, “This is not about ‘one day.’ We’re not going to let Dr. King’s dream die.”

http://www.nhregister.com/WebApp/appmanager/JRC/BigDaily;jsessionid=MvJ5HVyLnhyvLzTG7Mp7rTfygJL7yjhTdwL8nsscq32LXnsv4625!1735560039?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=pg_article&r21.pgpath=%2FNHR%2FHome&r21.content=%2FNHR%2FHome%2FTopStoryList_Story_1454188

Posted by lois at 10:37 AM | Comments (0)

January 21, 2008

CT: Prisons adjust to increase in prisoners

Prisons adjust to increase in inmates
By Zach Lowe
Staff Writer

January 20, 2008

The state Department of Correction has taken prison officers off nonessential posts to guard the increased number of inmates without increasing overtime spending, according to officials and department records.

The adjustments came after the number of inmates in state prisons and jails jumped by nearly 1,000 after the summer crackdown on parole. The number of inmates rose to more than 19,800, prompting correction workers and advocates for inmate safety to complain about overcrowding.

The union complained that the overtime figures show the department has not responded to the crowding aggressively, but state officials said the prisons remain safe.

Gov. M. Jodi Rell ordered a halt on paroles for violent offenders after a July triple murder in Cheshire allegedly committed by two parolees.

The Department of Correction has dealt with the inmate increase without forcing more correction officers to work overtime, state records show.

Overtime spending ranged from $2 million to $2.7 million every two weeks in the four months after the Cheshire killings - the same range as in 2006, state figures show.

The department spent $54.9 million in overtime in 2006 and $55.1 million in 2007, records show.

Many state correction departments spend more on overtime when the inmate population surges, experts said. But state officials said they can adjust the assignments of prison guards to deal with an increase in prisoners.

"We do it all the time," department spokesman Brian Garnett said.

It has added 53 new posts in the state's 18 facilities since the Cheshire killings. The new posts are in dormitories, cell blocks and other priority areas crowded with prisoners, Garnett said.

To staff those posts, the department leaves less essential ones vacant on a day-to-day basis, he said. Those might include posts in a laundry room or school classrooms. Those programs, including educational lessons, are shut down for the day if no is guard present, Garnett said.

"Our facilities are adequately staffed to ensure they are safe," he said.

Luke Leone, president of Local 1565 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, said all posts should be staffed regularly. He said the department also has pulled guards off so-called roving posts, which involve walking the facilities and being prepared to respond to any emergency.

"They are on a wing and a prayer hoping nothing serious happens," Leone said. "We are way understaffed."

"It just doesn't add up that inmate numbers go up and overtime goes down," he added.

Leone and Larry Dorman, a union spokesman, said the department should spend more on overtime when prisons are overcrowded.

"They are keeping the overtime figures low at the expense of proper staffing," Dorman said.

But Garnett said the department prefers not to force officers to work overtime, a practice common when local police departments find themselves short-staffed.

Forced overtime is not good for morale or safety, since officers get tired if they work 16 hours in a row, Garnett said.

Mandated overtime accounts for about 16 percent of the department's overtime spending, Garnett said. That figure has decreased in recent months, he said.

Leone said the department will assign officers to work only part of the night shift on overtime and send them home while inmates are sleeping.

Garnett would not comment on specific shift-by-shift staffing patterns.

Leone and Dorman said the state needs more officers.

The union pointed to a 2003 state report that recommended hiring 700 additional correction officers to staff state prisons. The state had 4,136 officers at the end of 2007, a tick up from the 4,115 working at the end of 2003 but about 200 more than the number of full-time officers in 2006, statistics show.

"We are very adept at handling the increase and decreases in our population," Garnett said.
http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/local/scn-sa-doc1jan20,0,3013444.story?coll=stam-news-local-headlines
Copyright © 2008, Southern Connecticut Newspapers, Inc.

Posted by lois at 10:15 AM | Comments (0)

CT: Lawmakers Tangle On Justice Reform Laws, Crowding In Jails Key Issues

Courant.com
Lawmakers Tangle On Justice Reform Laws, Crowding In Jails Key Issues

By CHRISTOPHER KEATING
Capitol Bureau Chief
January 21, 2008

As state legislators prepare for Tuesday's special session on criminal justice reforms, Republicans and Democrats are still battling over a "three strikes" law and struggling over how to create a new law against home invasions.

The two sides have been clashing despite a show of bipartisan unity two weeks ago as they stood together in a joint appearance with Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell to call for reforms in the aftermath of the triple slayings last summer in Cheshire.

House Speaker James Amann said the two sides had agreed on 95 percent of the items, and the Republicans interpreted that statement to mean that the other 5 percent was the "three strikes and you're out" proposal. Republicans have been calling for an automatic sentence of life imprisonment for any criminal who is convicted of three violent felonies, but some Democrats have rejected that concept as an overly simplistic solution that would take sentencing discretion away from judges.

Besides failing to agree on the details of a three strikes law, Republicans and Democrats also cannot agree on whether a strengthened law would lead to a minor or major increase in the state's prison population, which has been nearing all-time highs for months.

House Republican leader Lawrence Cafero of Norwalk said he wants to avoid a false impression that lawmakers agree on all aspects of the crime legislation.

"I've heard a lot of talk on the radio from Democrats that this was going to be a Kumbaya thing," Cafero said. "We're going to [offer] a three strikes amendment. It depends which one."

Cafero and Senate Republican leader John McKinney of Fairfield are both concerned about a loophole in a 34-page draft bill concerning the wording of the proposed home-invasion law. Currently, the invasion of an occupied home is not considered a violent crime, and lawmakers in both parties want to change that. The Republicans say a loophole in the draft bill would prevent prosecutors from pursuing a charge of home invasion if the criminal claimed that he did not know the house was occupied.

Derek Slap, a spokesman for Senate President Pro Tem Donald Williams, D-Brooklyn, said Williams agrees with Republicans that wording in the draft bill should be changed.

"The Senate president feels strongly that if you break into somebody's home, and they are home, it's home invasion," Slap said. "In addition, he doesn't have a problem with the governor's proposal that if you break into somebody's home at night — whether they are home or not — that's home invasion."

Concerning the disagreements over whether to enact a stronger "three strikes" law, Slap said that is "part of the negotiations."

Adam Liegeot, a spokesman for the governor, said Rell still supports the three strikes law and is "optimistic that an agreement can be reached" on the overall bill by Tuesday.

The review of criminal laws was prompted by the July 23 killings of Jennifer Hawke-Petit, 48, and her daughters, Hayley, 17, and Michaela, 11, during a break-in and arson at their home. Two longtime criminals who were out on parole at the time — Steven Hayes and Joshua Komisarjevsky — were charged with six counts of capital felony in the homicides and could face the death penalty.

Wednesday will mark the six-month anniversary of the slayings, and some legislators have complained that the General Assembly has not moved quickly enough to enact new laws designed to prevent similar tragedies.

Rell called upon legislators to sharply limit their scope during the special session to strengthening criminal laws and then wait until after the regular session starts on Feb. 6 to tackle the many prison issues that require spending state money.

The draft bill on the response to the Cheshire tragedy calls for spending $6.2 million in the current fiscal year and $17.69 million during the fiscal year that begins in July. The money would cover a variety of items, including residential treatment centers for sex offenders, expanded global positioning system [GPS] monitoring of parolees, improved computers, and the creation of five full-time positions for the Board of Pardons and Paroles.

Crowded Conditions

As legislators prepare for the session, the state is facing an overflowing prison population that is near an all-time high. The state's 18 prisons and jails are filled to capacity overall, but conditions are worse at some facilities, according to the guards who patrol the prisons.

As of Friday, the state's prison population was 19,736 — up from about 5,400 in 1985, before the state built more than 10 new prisons.

As a backdrop for the Cheshire debate, a long-running issue between the Department of Correction and the unions representing correction officers continues over crowding in the prisons.

"We have over 800 inmates sleeping in unconventional areas — dorms, closets, bigger utility closets with three or four people sleeping on the floor," said David Testa, president of Local 387 of the correction officers' union. "We think 800 inmates sleeping on the floor is an emergency. ... The system we have presently isn't working."

Testa concedes that the union and prison officials often disagree about the statistics, but he added, "800 or 600 — it's still too many."

In the nomenclature of the Department of Correction, the inmates in "nontraditional housing" are considered as the "overflow" of prisoners who do not have traditional beds. To the union, that means criminals sleeping in plastic sleds on gymnasium floors and in converted closets.

Brian Garnett, a spokesman for the correction department, says the statements by the union are inaccurate.

"It's not true. No one sleeps on the floor," Garnett said. "They are in a temporary bed — a sled. No one is sleeping in a closet. No one is sleeping in the kitchen. It could be a gymnasium. It could be a chow hall."

By law, the state's 15 prisons and three county jails must accept all criminals who are sent by the state's judges. Though the situation in state prisons has gained more publicity in the aftermath of the Cheshire slayings, Garnett says it is not unusual for the prisons to be reaching overflow status.

"We are very adept at this. We've done it for years," Garnett said. "[The prisoners] remain safe. They remain secure. They remain humane."

As of Friday, Garnett said, the state had 19,940 fixed beds and 785 overflow beds — compared with an overflow figure by the union of about 1,000. A September order by Rell to suspend parole for violent criminals caused the state's prison population to increase, and more than 50 new staff members were authorized by the governor to deal with the overflow, officials said.

Rep. Michael P. Lawlor, an East Haven Democrat who is co-chairman of the legislature's influential judiciary committee, tells another story. He says there is only one sink for a group of 55 prisoners at the Whalley Avenue jail in New Haven. Inmates in that group use it to wash their hands and their clothes, Lawlor says.

The same 55 criminals, he says, regularly stand in line to use one toilet — in a jail that is sometimes hot and stifling with a powerful stench.

That was the scene Lawlor saw two months ago during a tour of the jail that houses prisoners who are awaiting trials on criminal charges ranging from shoplifting to murder. The restive inmates can be ornery, and the crowded conditions make matters worse, Lawlor says.

"Some are mentally ill," Lawlor said. "Some are HIV positive. Some have tuberculosis. Everybody's mad and angry. No privacy. No quiet."

The 55 inmates sleep on the gymnasium floor in plastic sleds resembling those used to carry injured hikers down a mountainside. The rows of sleds are lined up, almost touching each other, he said.

"That's what's going on," said Lawlor, an attorney and legislator for 22 years. "The sink is the size of a dinner plate. They wash their clothes in there."

Garnett said he was on the same tour as Lawlor and saw it differently. The inmates can always use the facilities in another section of the jail.

"Those guys in the gym do not have only one toilet and one urinal," Garnett said. "They are always provided access" to other areas.

Larry Dorman, a spokesman for AFSCME Council 4, which represents nearly 5,000 correction employees, said it isn't right that inmates are living in gymnasiums, closets and former office space.

"It's not how inmates should be housed," Dorman said. "It makes the situation more volatile. Something's got to give here. It's an unacceptable situation."

courant.com/news/custom/topnews/hc-cheshire0121.artjan21,0,255506.story?coll=hc_tab01_layout

Copyright © 2008, The Hartford Courant

Posted by lois at 10:10 AM | Comments (0)

January 20, 2008

NY Daily News: Errol Louis: Shame on prison-protecting pols

Shame on prison-protecting pols
NY Daily News Opinion: Errol Louis
Sunday, January 20th 2008

With startling clarity, an attempt by Gov. Spitzer to close unneeded prisons has laid bare the workings of New York's prison industrial complex and the fact that some people - and even whole communities - have a perverse financial stake in keeping penal institutions open and filled.

Where many of us see prisons as places of sadness and misery - and yes, justice - a handful of special interest groups and upstate politicians see them as a source of jobs and the extra political clout that comes from adding thousands of "residents" to an otherwise sparsely populated area.

Spitzer and his Correctional Services commissioner, Brian Fischer, are trying to save state money - an estimated $44 million over the next two years, plus another $30 million in construction and repair costs - by shutting down four medium- and minimum-security prisons.

The prisons aren't needed - many are half-empty - because New York's inmate count has dropped by 13% over the last eight years, from 71,600 in 1999 to less than 62,500 today.

That should be good news - a sign, perhaps, that years of investing billions of tax dollars in fighting crime, social programs and education have finally paid off, and some of that money can be spent on other critical needs.

But not everyone sees it that way.

On Thursday, a rally at Harrietstown Town Hall in Saranac Lake has been planned to demand that Spitzer come up with funding to stop the closing of Camp Gabriels, a minimum-security facility that Fischer says is half empty with 187 inmates.

"We hope to send a message to the governor and get the money put back in the budget," said Chris Hansen, whose title is "northern region business agent" for the New York State Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Association, which represents prison guards.

Jeff Leavitt, a member of the Brighton Town Council, told PressRepublican.com, a local news organization, that a study showed prison work crews put in 104,525 hours worth of "community service" cleaning and repairing upstate roads. That spared Brighton and other towns roughly $855,204 worth of minimum wages, according to Leavitt - roughly twice the $478,000 Brighton spends on its general and highway funds.

"And that's just labor," Leavitt said. "A lot of these jobs won't get done, because the towns can't afford to do it."

In another local perk, the prison's 187 inmates, counted as area residents, allow Brighton to get extra emergency-service money from state and federal sources. They also count for the purposes of drawing state and federal district lines. No, 187 people alone may not sound like that many people - but the numbers add up, so the prison is politically valuable.

This madness must end.

I'm terribly sad that Brighton might have to clean its own roads instead of having prisoners do the work for them.

I understand why upstate pols might enjoy the luxury of having a state-funded captive population of people who bring extra emergency funds but can't vote on how a nickel of it gets spent.

And I get why a prison union's business agent would fight to keep what amounts to make-work jobs at a mostly empty facility.

But none of that is a reason to keep a prison open.

This game has been going on for years. "We've got a little history on our side," Hansen told the Adirondack Enterprise newspaper. "We have successfully staved off the closing of correctional facilities in other areas of the state."

Enough. Downstate advocates of prison reentry - a policy of redirecting public resources to schools, housing, jobs and recreation programs instead of prison - need to get fired up and jump into this debate.

Above all, Spitzer and Fischer need to hold firm and make clear that the last thing upstate's ailing economy needs is a fiscally and morally bankrupt policy of keeping prisons open when they aren't needed.

elouis@nydailynews.com
http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2008/01/20/2008-01-20_shame_on_prisonprotecting_pols.html

Posted by lois at 06:26 PM | Comments (0)

Texas prisons leave humanity in shackles

Texas prisons leave humanity in shackles
Austin American-Statesman
By The Editorial Board | Saturday, January 19, 2008,
It should be of great concern that inmates die in agony, their injuries ignored. But it isn’t.

Medical care in Texas prisons seems as much as ever to be an oxymoron. For many years, the medicine practiced behind prison walls too often has been afflicted by a lack of care.

There are many reasons for that - too little money, a shortage of professionals, decrepit equipment, an aging inmate population. These problems have plagued the sprawling Texas prison system for decades.

It appears that a widespread disregard for the inmates’ health and well-being permeates the prison system. Not in every prison and not with every inmate. But nearly 2,000 inmates died over a recent four-year span, the most in any state in the country - even California, with its larger prison population.

It should be of great concern across Texas that, as the American-Statesman’s Mike Ward has reported, prison inmates die in agony, their injuries ignored. Or hang themselves with guards watching and die because attempts at resuscitation were delayed. But it isn’t. In both of those cases reported by Ward, no one was punished.

Beyond the inmates and their families, too few people are outraged at the wanting medical care in Texas prisons. Because inmates are convicted criminals, and often unpleasant ones at that, sympathy is in short supply.

It should matter, though. We are distinguished as a people and as a state by the way we treat the least among us, including those who have broken the law.

Texas prison inmates are still human, and how we regard them determines the content of our character.

We ignore prisons and inmate care at our peril, both moral and physical. Those prisoners are fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, brothers and sisters. We should care enough about them to guarantee decent treatment no matter what their crimes.

And the vast majority of them will walk among us again, will return to their hometowns and the big cities. Their attitudes will depend in no small part on how they were treated in prison.

When Texas contracted with two university medical schools to provide health care to prisoners, it was praised as an inexpensive way to provide quality care. But even under care of the University of Texas Medical Branch and Texas Tech University, inmate health care has been spotty, even dismal at times.

Some Texas lawmakers have shown concern because so many deaths could be signs of deeper troubles. And lawmakers want to avoid another court ruling that the prison system is unconstitutional. That could be cumbersome and costly.

State Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, chairman of the Senate Criminal Justice committee, has scheduled a committee hearing this week to examine prison health care. Shining a bright light on the problems that have surfaced could be the beginning of better health care. Punishing neglect helps avoid similar problems in the future.

In the end, though, proper medical care in state prisons is a matter of our own self-respect. Arizona Sen. John McCain, a former prisoner of war and now Republican presidential hopeful, said it best when discussing torture: It’s not about them, it’s about us.
http://www.statesman.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/austin/editorial/entries/2008/01/19/texas_prisons_leave_humanity_i.html

Posted by lois at 10:23 AM | Comments (0)

January 19, 2008

NY: Town assesses impact of prison closure

Published January 18, 2008 12:01 pm - Brighton Town Council plans strategy to fight closure of Camp Gabriels or deal with fallout if it happens.

Town assesses impact of prison closure

By KIM SMITH DEDAM
Staff Writer

BRIGHTON — The Brighton Town Council held a special meeting Thursday night to get a grip on potential impacts should Camp Gabriels close next year.

The New York State Department of Corrections announced last week the minimum-security prison was one of four state facilities slated for shutdown in January 2009.

In addition to the total 131 local jobs either displaced or eliminated, Camp Gabriels provides a critical water supply for firefighters in the hamlet, councilors said.

Without it, the Fire Department would have to get water from a pond off Hull Road, about three miles away, said Councilor Steve Tucker.

The facility is also an integral part of the town’s disaster-response plan.

Camp Gabriels meeting hall, called the QWL, is the town’s official Red Cross emergency shelter.

“We set up a shelter in the (Camp Gabriels) gym during the (1998) Ice Storm,” said resident Keith Smith, a maintenance worker at the prison who attended the meeting.

“You could probably fit the whole town in there.”

Councilors drafted a resolution opposing closure of Camp Gabriels and slowly began to sort through what it might mean.

“What was the basis of their review?” asked Councilor Jeff Leavitt.

Brighton Supervisor Peter Martin Sr., who also works as a correction officer at the prison, recused himself from voting.

Martin said state lawmakers have begun asking DOCS for more information.

“The senator (Betty Little) doesn’t know. The bosses don’t know. They (the state) are not really telling us a whole lot,” he said.

In a phone call to DOCS in Albany, the Press-Republican was told there is no published study available to the public and that data driving the decision was generated in an internal review process.

DOCS said in a statement last week that closing the three minimum-security camps and one medium-security prison would allow them to save about $44 million in operating costs to offset the $91 million it will cost to create new programs for treatment of mentally ill inmates and incarcerated sex offenders mandated by the State Legislature.

DOCS also said the number of inmates at minimum-security prisons dropped 47 percent in the past decade.

Martin said the community should create an inventory to gauge what the larger impact closure would be on area businesses, including local fuel companies, food service, hospitals, contractors, the postal service, UPS, fire and rescue services and part-time teachers.

The 187 inmates are also considered residents of the town, adding population used to calculate emergency-service rates.

“It’s a big fallout for everybody,” Martin said.

Leavitt, who is also a member of the Saranac Lake Winter Carnival Committee, said that group tallied some approximate numbers Wednesday, counting 104,525 hours of community service done regionally by inmates in 2007 between January and the end of November.

They estimated the work crews spared towns roughly $855,204 worth of minimum wages.

“And that’s just labor,” Leavitt said. “A lot of these jobs won’t get done, because the towns can’t afford to do it.”

The total general and highway funds in Brighton were about half that at $478,000 last year.

Councilors decided to ask DOCS for a tour of the facility to take stock.

“If it (closure) does happen, what are we going to do?” said Councilor Sheila Delarm. “We should start putting wheels in motion. We may only have a year here.”

Martin said Saranac Lake Area Chamber of Commerce Director Sylvie Nelson had contacted him looking to form an economic redevelopment committee to help work toward solutions.

“But the property is state-owned until they tell us what they’re going to do with it.”

Delarm said the redevelopment process should parallel efforts at this point to keep the prison open.

In a first brainstorming session, councilors came up with several scenarios for reuse, including a veterans’ rehabilitation facility for disabled soldiers; an expansion site for Paul Smith’s College or Trudeau Institute; a campus for the Adirondack Leadership Program, which also has a wilderness base in nearby Onchiota; or DOCS programs for elderly inmates or shock-treatment programs.

Smith told the Town Council that members of the three unions involved in the closing met earlier this week to develop a plan to lobby DOCS to keep the prison open.

Unions created a Web site for public information at www.savegabriels.org and organized a rally to be held at 3 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 24, in the Harrietstown Town Hall.
http://www.pressrepublican.com/midday/local_story_018120138.html?start:int=0

Posted by lois at 05:11 PM | Comments (0)

WVA: Senate leader wants to re-examine sentencing practices

“Prisons are meant to lock up people that pose a danger to society, not necessarily people that have done stupid things or made you mad.”
Senate Judiciary Chairman Jeffrey Kessler

Senate leader wants to re-examine sentencing practices
By Mannix Porterfield
Register-Herald reporter

— CHARLESTON — As prisons near the saturation point and counties struggle to pay regional jail costs, lawmakers are having second thoughts about putting every kind of criminal behind bars.
Being tough on crime simply doesn’t hold the same appeal it did a few years ago, now that the chickens are coming home to roost in the form of rising costs, Senate Judiciary Chairman Jeffrey Kessler, D-Marshall, says.
As the 2008 session gets clicking in earnest, Kessler expects much time to be spent in his committee on sentencing.
Within the past six years, a finance panel learned, the prison population has gone up by one-third. By 2011, if the trend stays unchanged, the numbers will double.

“We really need to take a hard look at what we’re doing as a Legislature when we pass legislation that requires people to be incarcerated,” Kessler said as his committee began to chart its course for the session.
“I think it’s politically popular at times to just incarcerate people just because it makes you look tough on law and order. But at the end of the day, now, I think the public is starting to feel the effects of that, particularly at the county level, where they can’t afford to pay the regional jail fees.
“Prisons are busting at the seams, and we’re going to have to end up building a new prison at a quarter of a billion dollars or so to lock up people.”
Like others, Kessler wants to re-examine the sentencing of lawbreakers so that only the violent menaces to society are put away, not “everybody we get mad at who does something stupid and may do something harmful more to themselves many times than to society.”
“That doesn’t do anything to really keep us safer,” he said.
Kessler expects much attention to the manner in which people are committed to pulling time in prison and the crimes that send them there.
An alternative, one he favors, is the use of money and energy toward prevention of recidivism and rehabilitation of society’s miscreants.
“I think that’s probably a wiser choice of dollars,” he said.
“I’ve yet to see any studies over the last decade to indicate West Virginia has become a more violent state or a more dangerous state,” he said.
Had that been the case, he said, the prison population would be twice as large.
One area that has drawn the focus of lawmakers with regard to easing the crowded conditions in the penal system is the drunken driver.
“We’re going to be taking a look at what we can do to reduce some of the incarceration levels, rather than spend $50 a day keeping people locked up,” the chairman said.
“That money would be better spent by requiring mandatory participation in drug and alcohol treatment programs, Interlock-type programs.”
Even with this new approach, he reminded, DUI cases can still be prosecuted, but hopefully with a more positive outcome.
Kessler says it makes more sense to get the offender in a drug or alcohol treatment program, rather than merely stowing them away in a cell, only to learn at the end of the sentence the offender is addicted.
“All you’ve done is released a sober drunk,” he said. “And they’re right back to the same pattern.”
In recent years, he noted, the Legislature at times has looked into the sentencing system and fetched some meaningful data.
“But it’s like the wind goes out of the sails,” he said. “Something comes up and we pass legislation, and say, ‘we’re tough on crime again.’”
Kessler pointed to the brouhaha over the so-called “Logan’s Law,” one aimed at sexual predators and one that triggered a fight waged largely along partisan lines.
“The original version of that did nothing but double penalties for everyone across the board,” he said.
In reality, Kessler said, lawmakers should have zeroed in on early intervention with more money and time invested in protecting children from neglect and abuse, “rather than worrying about rounding up a bunch of bogeymen and throwing them in jail for the rest of their lives.”
“Statistics show there is a very, very minute subset of true and real sexual predators,” he said.
“Those folks, yes, we need to confine forever. But we don’t need to go out and build a new prison for a quarter of a billion dollars to put everybody in that may have streaked across a college campus.”
Kessler feels the new law is working in two special areas — the sexual registry and the task force in its strivings with prosecutors to prevent abuse and neglect of children.
Money could be the big motivator in reforming how West Virginia sends people to jail and prisons, he says.
After all, once the state and counties begin shopping around for new areas to tax so that offenders are kept within prisons and jails, the public could demand some change.
“Then we’ll probably see more of an outcry, ‘Hey, come to your senses, guys, we can’t afford to keep locking everybody up that may jaywalk.’
“Prisons are meant to lock up people that pose a danger to society, not necessarily people that have done stupid things or made you mad.”

http://www.register-herald.com/local/local_story_018212153.html

Posted by lois at 05:06 PM | Comments (0)

Federal Court: Death Row Prisoners Can Challenge Ban On Death Row Interviews

Federal court: Inmate can challenge ban on death row interviews
By TOM COYNE, Associated Press Writer
Jan 18, 2008 at 4:50 PM EST

SOUTH BEND (AP) — A federal appeals court has ruled an inmate can challenge a Bureau of Prisons policy prohibiting death row inmates from giving face-to-face interviews with the media.

The policy was adopted seven years ago after Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh appeared on "60 Minutes." A three-judge panel of the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago ruled Tuesday that U.S. District Judge John Tinder in Indianapolis erred when he dismissed the 2004 lawsuit by David Hammer in a summary judgment in February 2006.

Edward Himmelfarb, who argued the case for the Justice Department, said Friday he had no comment on the decision. He also said no decision has been made on how the federal government will proceed in the case.

Chad Bell, Hammer's attorney, said his client is pleased.

"He's looking forward to press this case and show that this policy was enacted for unconstitutional purposes to suppress speech and to specifically silence inmates on death row," Bell said.

Hammer is an inmate at the federal penitentiary in Terre Haute, Ind. He was facing the death penalty in 1999 when he gave three face-to-face interviews to reporters. But subsequent requests for interviews were rejected by prison officials. His death sentence has since been vacated and is being appealed.

On April 12, 2001, then-Attorney General John Ashcroft announced at a news conference about McVeigh's execution that the Bureau of Prisons instituted a new policy banning face-to-face interviews with death row convicts.

"As an American who cares about our culture, I want to restrict a mass murderer's access to a public podium," Ashcroft said.

The ban began 13 months after his interview with "60 Minutes" and two months before McVeigh was executed in June 2001.

A spokesman for then-Warden Harley Lappin said the policy changes were based on prison security and the desire to avoid "sensationalizing" executions. According to the court ruling, Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., wrote to the Bureau of Prisons director following the McVeigh interview demanding that the bureau prohibit similar dialogues with death row inmates.

Hammer filed the lawsuit, alleging the policy violated his First Amendment and equal protection rights. He contended the security rational was a guise to cover up the real reason behind the ban — anger over the McVeigh interview.

The appeals judges ruled that a reasonable jury "could conclude that the media policy was implemented and is now enforced not because of safety concerns, but rather in response to public pressure to prevent death row inmates from voicing their views publicly."

Attorneys for the federal government have until the end of February to seek a rehearing before 7th Circuit Court. They could also appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court or allow the case to return to district court without seeking any further review.

Bell said if the case is returned to district court in Indianapolis his client could seek evidence from the federal government to back his claim and would have an attorney to help him. Hammer didn't have an attorney until the appeals court appointed him counsel a year ago, Bell said.

In 2005, a federal judge vacated Hammer's death sentence for killing his federal penitentiary cellmate in Allenwood, Pa. U.S. District Judge Malcolm Muir ruled that Hammer should have a new sentencing hearing because jurors were not given evidence that might have led them to conclude the strangling was accidental.

Hammer remains on death row while federal prosecutors appeal that decision. The Terre Haute prison is the only place in the nation housing federal death row inmates and the only place where they are executed.
http://www.wsbt.com/news/indiana/13903837.html

Posted by lois at 11:19 AM | Comments (0)

San Quentin Journal: Prison Makes Way for Future, but Preserves Past

“The reliance on isolation continues in today’s “super-max” prisons, like the administrative maximum, or ADX, federal prison in Florence, Colo. “The technology is more advanced but the basic operating principles are pretty much the same,” said Prof. Craig W. Haney of the University of California, Santa Cruz, and the author of “Reforming Punishment: Psychological Limits to the Pains of Imprisonment” (American Psychological Association, 2006).”

“Should the dungeon at San Quentin ever be open to the public, even on a limited basis, it would have much to teach, said Ari Wohlfeiler, an organizer for Critical Resistance, an advocacy group that opposes prison expansion. The history of imprisonment in the U.S. has been marked by poor conditions, overcrowding and an endless cycle of construction, which continues to this day,” Mr. Wohlfeiler said. “It would be an ironic history lesson.”

January 18, 2008, NY Times
San Quentin Journal
Prison Makes Way for Future, but Preserves Past
By PATRICIA LEIGH BROWN

SAN QUENTIN, Calif. — The dank crypt for the living still wields emotional power, its peeling ocher walls and low vaulted ceilings suffused with chill and darkness.

With its oaken, iron-latticed door and two-foot-thick granite bricks, San Quentin’s dungeon looks so stereotypically medieval that it might have been dreamed up by one of Hollywood’s masters of the macabre. But as niches for wooden pegs that once secured chains and shackles attest, these gloomy catacombs bore witness to “an enormous amount of human history, pain, misery and atonement,” said Kevin Starr, the California historian.

As a federal court-ordered overhaul of California’s prison medical system begins, the storied prison overlooking San Francisco Bay is tearing down several outmoded buildings on the 432-acre property, including the original 1885 hospital built in the institutional Italianate style. A $146 million, state-of-the-art primary care health services complex will open in 2010.

Before demolition, state historians called in to survey the site discovered the significance of what had been a forgotten space used for storage. The space, a dungeon, was the original San Quentin and is believed to be the oldest surviving building constructed by the state.

The now-moldering cloister will be preserved because of its importance, while demolition proceeds above it. It was completed by prisoners in 1854, four years after statehood. “It was the state’s first public work, before the Capitol building, the roadways, the public colleges and universities,” Dr. Starr said. “Its preservation is not trivial. Like the catacombs in Rome, it’s where people suffered.”

Its history is indeed grim. Originally intended to house 45 inmates, it was built out of local rock and clay brick quarried by convicts living aboard the Waban, a prison ship anchored in San Francisco Bay.

More than 150 men were piled into the dungeon’s cells, which were sealed off with iron doors with a small slit known as a “Judas hole.” The men slept on vermin-infested straw matting. “Night buckets” for waste were left uncovered. Floggings with a rawhide strap were standard punishment, along with “shower baths” — a precursor of water-boarding — in which naked prisoners were tied to ladders and then sprayed in the face, chest and genitals with a high-pressure stream of cold water.

In 1869, a visiting physician, Alfred W. Taliaferro, wrote of the deplorable conditions: “men literally piled up on one another; this fills the room with animal heat and impure air.”

The dungeon eventually became a “hole” for solitary confinement, modeled on Pennsylvania’s Quaker-inspired system in which isolation was viewed as a path to reflection and penitence (thus the term “penitentiary”). In 1880, the last flogging was officially administered at San Quentin and 60 years later, the warden, Clinton Duffy, abolished the use of the dungeon altogether, removing the iron gates as a symbol of reform.

Federal historic preservation law requires surveying potentially historic structures on state or federally owned property and saving those deemed very significant. The Italianate facade of the 1885 hospital will be incorporated into the new medical facility. The dungeon, “a microcosm of how prisoners were treated,” in the words of Madeline R. Bowen, an architectural historian for the firm Jones & Stokes, had languished for years until it was unsealed so that historians could document it.

“There was nothing cleaned up about it,” said Gerald T. Takano, an architect who documented the dungeon for the Historic American Buildings Survey, part of the Department of the Interior. “You can still really sense how it was.”

Unlike Alcatraz, which has more than a million visitors a year, San Quentin is still an active prison where convicted killers like Scott Peterson wait out their death sentences in limbo, as the controversy over lethal injection continues. Sgt. Rudy Luna, administrative assistant to Warden Robert L. Ayers Jr., said future use of the dungeon would be determined once the building is finished and might include storage, public tours on a limited basis or “keeping it as is.”

Many of his co-workers are unaware of the dungeon’s history, Sergeant Luna added. “I think it should be preserved,” he said as he escorted a reporter around the prison yard, which retains its crenellated Gothic aura. “If you know history, then you won’t make the same mistakes.”

Although few survive intact, dungeons were a fixture of 19th-century prisons, said Norman Johnston, a professor emeritus at Arcadia University in Pennsylvania and the author of “Forms of Constraint: A History of Prison Architecture” (University of Illinois Press, 2000). The concept of solitary confinement, pioneered at the Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia in 1829 and then repeated later in the “dark cells” of San Quentin’s dungeon, was developed as a more effective means of rehabilitation.

The reliance on isolation continues in today’s “super-max” prisons, like the administrative maximum, or ADX, federal prison in Florence, Colo. “The technology is more advanced but the basic operating principles are pretty much the same,” said Prof. Craig W. Haney of the University of California, Santa Cruz, and the author of “Reforming Punishment: Psychological Limits to the Pains of Imprisonment” (American Psychological Association, 2006).

There is evidence that public fascination with prisons is growing: Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, for instance, closed to prisoners in 1971, is now a major tourist attraction that draws 110,000 visitors at Halloween, when it is converted into a haunted house. The prison’s current “Winter Adventure tours” feature “an hour-long tour of the beautiful winter cellblocks with an expert guide and a cup of hot chocolate!” the Web site says.

“People want to know what’s behind the wall,” Professor Johnston said. “There’s a certain morbid curiosity about prisons, just as there is with automobile wrecks.”

In Boston, the historic Charles Street jail has been converted into a luxury hotel, the Liberty, complete with a restaurant called Clink, where tapas-style small plates are served amid the atmospheric original cell bars.

Should the dungeon at San Quentin ever be open to the public, even on a limited basis, it would have much to teach, said Ari Wohlfeiler, an organizer for Critical Resistance, an advocacy group that opposes prison expansion.

“The history of imprisonment in the U.S. has been marked by poor conditions, overcrowding and an endless cycle of construction, which continues to this day,” Mr. Wohlfeiler said. “It would be an ironic history lesson.”

Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company

Posted by lois at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)

January 18, 2008

CA: Releasing prisoners who fight fires at $1 an hour will hurt fire camps

Inmate release proposal could hurt fire camps
Published: January 16, 2008
Maggie Beck/Union Democrat

By ALISHA WYMAN

The Union Democrat

Wiping out a portion of the state's lowest-paid firefighting force is one impact prison officials fear if the state releases thousands of inmates under Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's budget proposal.

The governor has suggested letting go 22,000 non-violent and low-level prison inmates with less than 20 months left on their sentence to help offset a state budget deficit.

"Those low-level, non-violent offenders are the inmates that we place in our fire camps," said Lt. Kevin Wise, an administrative assistant at Sierra Conservation Center.

The Jamestown-area prison trains inmates that staff 19 fire camps from central California to the Mexico border. Two of those camps include the Baseline camp near the prison and another in Vallecito.

The inmates are paid $1 an hour to fight fire, do fuel management projects and help with flood control.

"In my opinion, and in the opinion of the staff, it's the most valuable program that we operate," Wise said.

Last week, Schwarzenegger declared a fiscal emergency and introduced a proposal to address this year's $3.3 billion shortfall. He has called the Legislature to a special session to review his proposal, which includes 10 percent cuts to nearly all departments within the state's general fund.

If the inmate release is approved, it is unclear which inmates it would affect.

Sierra Conservation Center counselors would have to evaluate 1,500 low-level inmates at the prison to see if they meet a yet-undefined criteria. Those released would likely be ones incarcerated for crimes such as property offenses, narcotics and embezzlement.

It is also possible the counselors will be responsible for sorting through inmate files it trained at its 19 camps, about 22,000 prisoners, Wise said.

"We're hoping that the first ones to be released are the ones who aren't eligible to be in fire camp," he said.

Ineligible inmates include those with mental disabilities, or physical or medical issues.

Even if the inmates are taken from the mainstream population, it could still impact the prison, Wise said.

Inmate population determines staffing numbers. A reduction in inmates means a reduction in staff, he said.

This would be the most dramatic reduction in inmate population Wise can remember in his 23 years with the state department, he said. The release of such a large number of convicts could concern the public, both those with houses at risk from wildfire, and for public safety reasons.

"We're here to keep these inmates from the public as long as the courts have ordered them to be in prison," he said.

Tuolumne County Sheriff Jim Mele said a release would send a message to would-be criminals that they can get away with a light sentence.

But the proposal is not unlike the releases 58 California Sheriff's make every day due to jail overcrowding, he said.

"There has to be a punishment for the crime, and all we're doing is re-enforcing the fact that you can do crime and not have a punishment," he said.

Posted by lois at 06:14 PM | Comments (0)

WA: AT&T fined more than $300,000 for overcharging on prison calls

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
January 17, 2008
AT&T fined more than $300,000 for overcharging on prison calls

By RACHEL LA CORTE
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

OLYMPIA, Wash. -- AT&T has been fined more than $300,000 for overcharging families of prison inmates for collect phone calls from two Eastern Washington state prisons, the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission announced Thursday.

The phone company will also have to issue $67,295 in refunds to the families of the prisoners at Airway Heights Corrections Center in Spokane and the Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla.

The commission identified 29,971 violations in phone-rate charges during a four-month period in 2005 at the two prisons.

One individual had 400 separate collect calls that were overcharged by $2,110, and 22 others were overcharged $500 each, according to commission spokeswoman Marilyn Meehan.

The majority of the overcharged calls ranged from 30 cents to $1, Meehan said.

"It was purely a functional error, a billing error," said AT&T spokesman Ted Wagnon. "As soon as we became aware of it, we corrected it."

There are approximately 1.6 million collect phone calls made from the state's prisons each year.

Richard Laxton of Seattle filed a complaint with the commission in August 2005, after finding discrepancies in two collect-phone call charges made from Airway Heights.

The commission investigated all calls made from March to June 2005. During that time, AT&T had a contract with the state to provide telephone service from state prisons. The company was required to file a price list with the commission, including charges made for collect calls from pay phones at the two Washington prisons.

AT&T billed Laxton $15.75 for a 20-minute call from the state institution but Zero Plus Dialing, a billing agent for AT&T, charged $22.22 for the same telephone call.

Zero Plus Dialing was charging a $3.95 connection fee plus 89 cents-a.m.inute and a 47-cent prison surcharge for the collect call made from a pay phone at the state prison, when it was in fact only allowed to charge $3.95 for the connection fee and 59 cents a minute for the phone call, according to AT&T's price list.

AT&T will begin issuing refunds as of Feb. 1.

People can contact AT&T at 1-800-826-9923 and ask for a reimbursement form from the company. Customers will have seven months to submit their claim to AT&T, from Feb. 1 to Aug. 31.

Wagnon said AT&T would be placing notices in several newspapers around the state and in the two prisons to inform people about the refunds.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/6420ap_wa_overcharged_calls.html

Posted by lois at 11:15 AM | Comments (0)

January 17, 2008

Milton Wolff, 92, Dies; Anti-Fascist Fighter

January 17, 2008
Milton Wolff, 92, Dies; Anti-Franco Leader
By DOUGLAS MARTIN

Milton Wolff, the last commander of the American volunteers who fought against Franco in the Spanish Civil War and the longtime commander of the Veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, died Monday in Berkeley, Calif. He was 92.

The cause was congestive heart failure, said Peter N. Carroll, chairman of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives.

At first a young Communist rabble-rouser on soapboxes in New York City, Mr. Wolff was wielding a machine gun in Spain by the time he was 21. By 22, he was the ninth commander of what is commonly called the Lincoln Brigade; four of his predecessors had been killed, four wounded; none now survive, the archives confirm.

Mr. Wolff found himself holding together the remnants of North American volunteers on a counteroffensive that moved across the Ebro River to the violent Hill 666 in the Sierra Pandols. It was a last gasp by foreign troops supporting the elected leftist government of Spain against the revolt led by Gen. Francisco Franco. The Americans soon left Spain; Madrid fell in March 1939, and the war was over.

While Mr. Wolff was in Spain, he became a friend of Ernest Hemingway, who served him his first glass of Scotch; Hemingway was in Spain as a reporter and wrote fiction about the conflict as well. Later, in a pamphlet issued when sculptures of the fighters were unveiled, he called Mr. Wolff “as brave and as good a soldier as any that commanded battalions at Gettysburg.”

After the exhausted volunteers arrived in New York aboard the ocean liner Paris on Dec. 15, 1938, it was Mr. Wolff who laid a wreath outside the railing of Madison Square Park, kept out of the park for want of a permit.

Mr. Wolff never stopped defying authority. He helped lead the fight against United States support of Franco’s government and battled fiercely for civil rights and against the Vietnam War. He even offered the services of the aging veterans of the Lincoln Brigade to the North Vietnamese leader, Ho Chi Minh, who declined them.

Mr. Wolff was born in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn on Oct. 7, 1915. He dropped out of high school and joined the Civilian Conservation Corps, a New Deal program for unemployed youths. He was dropped when he protested what he considered the poor treatment of an injured friend, Mr. Carroll said.

He found a job in the garment district and joined the Young Communist League. When a leader called for volunteers to go to Spain, Mr. Wolff raised his hand. He considered himself a pacifist and planned to serve as a medic, but switched to a machine-gun company when his Washington battalion went into action at Brunete in July 1937.

The American volunteers were not actually members of a Lincoln Brigade, though that famous term was commonly used, even among veterans. Some, like Mr. Wolff, joined the Washington Battalion, others, the Lincoln Battalion. These battalions, and two others from other countries, made up the 15th International Brigade.

After the Washington Battalion suffered crushing casualties, it was merged into the Lincoln Battalion. More than 900 of the 3,000 American volunteers in these battalions were killed. It is believed that fewer than 40 are still living.

Mr. Wolff was fighting on the Aragon front in March 1938 and became commander when an artillery hit destroyed the battalion headquarters and killed several ranking officers. Then a captain, he led soldiers through perilous retreats and wandered behind enemy lines until they managed to swim across the Ebro.

One day, Robert Capa, the legendary photographer, snapped Mr. Wolff standing next to Hemingway. The photo appeared on the cover of The Forward, and for the first time his mother knew her son was in combat. He had told her he was working in a factory to free a Spanish loyalist for hazardous duty.

Mr. Wolff always said he first met Hemingway after stealing his mistress, something he told Salon in 1999 that Hemingway did not mind. Hemingway minded more when he found out that Mr. Wolff had no idea who he was. For his part, Mr. Wolff resented Hemingway’s description of villagers loyal to the Republic as having murdered fascists in “For Whom the Bell Tolls.”

Mr. Wolff is survived by his daughter, Susan Wallis of Vermont; his son, Peter, of Connecticut; four grandchildren; and nine great-grandchildren.

Mr. Wolff said he was turned down for combat duty in World War II because of concerns about his leftist politics. He later fought successfully against the “subversive” label pinned on the Lincoln veterans for decades. He personally delivered 20 ambulances to the Nicaraguan government when the Reagan administration was supporting rebels against it.

One of his battles after the civil war was leading his veterans to urge the Brooklyn Dodgers to integrate. “The guys were all Dodgers fans,” he said. “It was a way to carry on the struggle.”

Posted by lois at 05:36 PM | Comments (0)

NY: Bill limits solitary confinement. Spitzer expected to approve measure passed by Legislature removing mentally ill inmates from isolation

Bill limits solitary confinement
Spitzer expected to approve measure passed by Legislature removing mentally ill inmates from isolation

By RICK KARLIN, Capitol bureau
First published: Wednesday, January 16, 2008

ALBANY -- Lawmakers passed a long-debated measure Tuesday to remove mentally ill prison inmates from solitary confinement and at least one of the prime sponsors says he's confident Gov. Eliot Spitzer will sign it after negotiators resolved some lingering issues.

The measure passed on Tuesday would require that most inmates with serious mental illnesses be placed in treatment units rather than kept in Special Housing Units, or SHUs. Additionally, the Department of Correctional Services would have to conduct periodic mental health assessments of any inmates who are assigned to SHUs.

The bill's sponsors estimate 12 percent of the state's prison population, about 8,000 inmates, have serious mental illness.

The Senate passed a similar bill last year, but the legislation died in the Assembly after Spitzer expressed concerns about the measure as it was written and time ran out on negotiations.

This year's bill, however, is the result of negotiations that address the governor's concerns, said Assemblyman Jeffrion Aubry, D-Queens, who has pushed for the measure along with Sen. Michael Nozzolio, R-Seneca Falls.

The compromises include a clause that allows use of a SHU if an inmate presents an "overarching security concern," Aubry said.

Spitzer spokeswoman Christine Anderson declined comment on the governor's plans, but Aubry said he was confident Spitzer will sign the measure.

Many elements of the bill would not take effect until two years after the state builds residential mental health units, but no later than July 1, 2011.

This year's budget includes more than $50 million for construction and $4 million for staffing in the Office of Mental Health and Department of Correctional Services. By 2010-11, $29 million will be added to the budget to implement the program, Spitzer spokesman Matt Anderson said.

Prison reform and mental health advocates say SHUs are cruel and have led to suicides. Some prison officials and correction officers have expressed concern about safety and the extra training they should have in order to deal with some mentally ill inmates. The issue has been before the Legislature for at least five years.

"Placing prisoners in solitary confinement has been an inhumane form of punishment for those already suffering with severe psychiatric disabilities," said Leah Gitter of Mental Health Alternatives to Solitary Confinement.

Gannett News Service contributed to this report.
http://timesunion.com/AspStories/storyprint.asp?StoryID=655570

Posted by lois at 09:58 AM | Comments (0)

VT: Spend less on prisons, more on treatment?

Spend less on prisons, more on treatment?
January 17, 2008
Rutland Herald
By DANIEL BARLOW Vermont Press Bureau

MONTPELIER — Senate lawmakers unveiled a plan Wednesday to cut spending on Vermont's corrections system by closing a Waterbury prison and focusing more efforts on treating nonviolent criminals in local communities.

Four Democratic leaders of the Vermont Senate said their plan to restructure major parts of the state's prison system is still a work in progress, but that it could end up saving the state millions of dollars in a few years.

The proposal calls for the closure of Waterbury's Dale State Correctional Facility, the renovation of St. Albans' prison into a women-only facility, and using Windsor's prison as a home for low-risk offenders and those with drug or alcohol problems.

Senators said the cost savings would come from a new focus on treating nonviolent offenders with substance abuse issues in local communities, as opposed to sending them to one of the state's nine corrections facilities.

"We really need to reserve our prisons' beds for the violent offenders that we all agree need to be locked up," said Sen. Richard Sears, D-Bennington, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, during a Wednesday afternoon press conference at the Statehouse announcing the new plan.

Vermont spends more than $130 million each year on its prison system — a number that has increased by double digits as the prison population increases, despite the state's crime rate remaining stable. Between 2000 and 2007, the Vermont Department of Corrections' budget grew 74 percent.

During that time period, the state has built two new prisons, launched a community work camp (a second work camp has been proposed and the state is now looking for a receptive community) and started sending some prisoners to out-of-state facilities.

But the growing cost of imprisoning people literally threatens to consume the state budget.

The Justice Center of the Council of State Governments released a report this month that estimated a growth of 23 percent in Vermont's prison population over the next 10 years — at the potential cost of $82 million to $206 million over what the state is spending now.

That group also presented a plan to lawmakers and Gov. James Douglas this month that would have the state invest in substance abuse programs in and out of the prison system and reduce the term lengths for inmates who do not violate probation.

That plan had a $2.7 million price tag, but estimates are that it would save between $5 million to $6 million annually.

Corrections Commissioner Robert Hofmann unveiled a slate of cost-cutting proposals in a report in December, which also included possibly closing one facility, increasing the caseload for probation and parole officers and using drug treatment programs across the state to reduce recidivism.

Hofmann said the plan proposed by lawmakers Wednesday was "very close to one of the proposals" the department suggested last month. All the proposals on the table have their own "pluses and minuses," he said, adding that the Douglas administration will reveal its own approach to the corrections crisis in the governor's budget speech next week.

"I think there is a strong consensus among lawmakers and other stakeholders that these recommendations are reasonable," Hofmann said. "Some have more cost savings than others, but all the options on the table may be viable in some way."

The plan unveiled Wednesday — which was supported by Sen. Susan Bartlett, D-Lamoille, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and Sen. Richard Mazza, D-Grand Isle, vice chairman of the Senate Institutions Committee — is similar to one proposed by Sears toward the end of the legislative session last year.

Sears said this new effort is an expansion of what he jokingly called his "wacky idea" last year to close the Waterbury prison. This reworked plan now also focuses on placing the estimated 200-300 nonviolent inmates with substance abuse problems into residential and community programs to ease the bed crunch at the prisons, he explained.

"This is a new option for the state," said Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin, D-Windham. "If we continue to do what we do now, we'll be eaten as a state by this unsustainable growth."

One aspect that the senators had few details on Wednesday was the finances attached to the plan. Sears estimated that once the new substance abuse program in local communities were up and running, the state could see about $4 million annually in savings — about what it costs now to run the Waterbury facility.

But he and other supportive lawmakers said those savings wouldn't kick in until at least 2009 because the first-year savings from closing Dale would need to be funneled toward building that community substance abuse system. There also may be additional costs to upgrade and renovate the two other facilities, lawmakers said.

Bartlett, who as chairwoman of Senate Appropriations holds the purse strings for major projects, said she knows the proposal will ruffle some feathers. But this new approach is a work in progress and more details will be clarified through the legislative process.

"We expect to hear a lot of criticism, but we're pretty tough," she said. "We can take it."

http://www.rutlandherald.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080117/NEWS04/801170345/1004/NEWS03

Posted by lois at 09:47 AM | Comments (0)

January 16, 2008

U.S. to Speed Deportation of People with Criminal Convictions Now in Jail

New York Times
U.S. to Speed Deportation of Criminals in Jail
By JULIA PRESTON
Published: January 15, 2008

Federal authorities expect to identify and deport more than 200,000 immigrants this year who are convicted criminals serving time in prisons and jails across the country, the country¹s top federal immigration enforcement official said Monday.

The effort to speed the deportation of foreign-born criminals is part of a campaign by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency to help federal and state prisons reduce the costs of housing immigrants, the official, Julie L. Myers, assistant secretary of homeland security and head of the agency, said in an interview.

In 2007, Ms. Myers said, the agency, known as ICE, brought formal immigration charges against 164,000 immigrants who are behind bars nationwide for crimes committed in this country. Many of those immigrants are still in the United States and are also slated for deportation this year, she said. By comparison, in 2006, the agency identified 64,000 immigrants behind bars, most of whom were deported.

The big increase in deportations will place ³a significant burden,² on ICE¹s detention centers, she said, and on the airplanes, mostly from the Justice Department, used by the agency to fly immigrants back to their home countries. Last year, Congress authorized $200 million for programs to deport immigrant criminals.

Under current law, immigrants convicted of crimes are deported only after serving their sentences in this country. Foreigners behind bars, Ms. Myers said, include large numbers of immigrants who were legal residents, but lost their legal status as a result of being convicted of crimes.

Ms. Myers said the agency would work with states to devise parole programs allowing immigrants imprisoned for nonviolent crimes to reduce their prison time if they agreed to be deported immediately upon release.

The issue of immigrants in county jails and state prisons has been a sore point in many states. At city council meetings and in local elections, taxpayers vented frustration at having to pay for the imprisonment of illegal immigrants convicted of crimes committed in this country.

The Bush administration, after failing to win legislation last year to give legal status to illegal immigrants, has rapidly increased enforcement, placing a ³huge priority² on deporting criminal immigrants, Ms. Myers said.

In general, immigrants end up in prison at significantly lower rates than people born in this country, said Rubén G. Rumbaut, a sociology professor at the University of California, Irvine, who studies immigrants and crime. Among men between the ages of 18 and 39, Mr. Rumbaut has found, Americans are five times more likely to land in prison than immigrants.

In 2007, ICE sent 276,912 immigrants to their home countries, including many who were had never been arrested for crimes, but were deported for civil immigration violations.

In the past year, Ms. Myers said, agents have stepped up efforts to find immigrants behind bars and complete immigration proceedings so they could be deported directly from prison without being released into the streets.

Ms. Myers, who was confirmed in late December after serving a year in the post, said the agency would intensify the crackdown this year with increased criminal prosecutions of employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants.

³There should be more of those,² she said of such prosecutions. Last year, the agency totaled $30 million in fines and forfeitures against employers, but fewer than 100 executives or hiring managers were arrested, compared with 4,100 unauthorized workers.

Ms. Myers said ICE agents were frustrated that employment cases had moved slowly in the courts and had not been treated as serious crimes by federal prosecutors and judges.

³This can¹t be that we are the only ones who want to have these laws enforced,² she said.

Some employers, Ms. Myers said, were moving on their own to fire immigrant workers who lacked proper authorization and to tighten their hiring practices. She cited an Electrolux factory in Springfield, Tenn., that fired more than 150 immigrants in December after ICE arrested a handful of its workers.

³Do I think we have solved this problem? No,² Ms. Myers said of the hiring of illegal immigrants. ³Do I think we are starting to make an impact? I think we¹re starting to.²

On a separate issue, Ms. Myers confirmed that the agency adopted a new policy last week requiring a court order for medical staff members to give sedation drugs to immigrants being deported. The decision, in a Jan. 9 memorandum, responded to a lawsuit in California by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of two immigrants who were forcibly drugged during attempts by ICE to deport them.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/15/us/15immig.html

Posted by lois at 04:53 PM | Comments (0)

Calif. Assembly to Consider Drug Tests for Welfare Recipients

Calif. Assembly to Consider Drug Tests for Welfare Recipients
January 15, 2008

A high-school student born to a drug-using mom has proposed a law that would require welfare applicants in California to submit to testing for illicit drugs, and the state Assembly will soon be considering the proposal.

The City News Service reported Jan. 12 that R.J. Feild, a sophomore at Jurapa Valley High School in Mira Loma, proposed the law as part of a "There Ought to Be a Law" contest sponsored by Assemblyman John J. Benoit.

"R.J.'s captivating story provided a clear reason why we need his law," Benoit said. "I look forward to introducing 'RJ's Law' in this legislative session."

Feild suffers from cerebral palsy; he was born underweight and with traces of heroin, cocaine, marijuana, methamphetamine, alcohol, and cocaine in his body. His mother, who was on public assistance, used drugs throughout her pregnancy.

A spokesperson for Benoit said the bill was intended to "break the destructive cycle of supporting drug addicts with public assistance monies."

http://www.jointogether.org/news/headlines/inthenews/2008/calif-assembly-to-consider.html?log-event=sp2f-view-item&nid=35490721

Posted by lois at 04:48 PM | Comments (0)

January 15, 2008

“Racial Impact Statements as a Means of Reducing Unwarranted Sentencing Disparities”

http://www.sentencingproject.org/Admin/Documents/publications/rd_racialimpactstatements.pdf

An article by Marc Mauer, Director of the Sentencing Project, in the Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law that proposes the development of "Racial Impact Statements" as a means of assessing the impact of proposed sentencing policies.
In “Racial Impact Statements as a Means of Reducing Unwarranted Sentencing Disparities”, he suggests that these statements have much in common with fiscal and environmental impact statements that have become commonplace at many levels of government. The goal of a racial impact statement would be to assess the projected impact of new sentencing legislation on racial and ethnic minorities prior to enactment of the policy. If the statement indicates that unwarranted sentencing disparities might be produced, legislators would have the opportunity of considering alternative means of achieving public safety goals that would not exacerbate existing disparities.

Posted by lois at 01:47 PM | Comments (0)

Human Rights Watch: California: Repeal Law Jailing Children for Life. Senate Should End ‘Life Without Parole’ for Juvenile Offenders

California: Repeal Law Jailing Children for Life
Senate Should End ‘Life Without Parole’ for Juvenile Offenders

January 14, 2008 http://hrw.org/english/docs/2008/01/14/usdom17726.htm

"Sentencing children to life without parole means they will die in prison, without the possibility of a second chance at life. "
Elizabeth Calvin, children’s rights advocate at Human Rights Watch

California’s State Senate should pass a law this month to end the sentencing of children to prison for life with no possibility of parole, Human Rights Watch said today in a report on a practice outlawed in most of the world.

In the 100-page report, “When I Die, They’ll Send Me Home: Youth Sentenced to Life without Parole in California,” Human Rights Watch found that in many cases where juveniles were prosecuted with an adult, the youth received heavier sentences than their adult codefendants. There are 227 inmates in California sentenced as juveniles to life in prison without parole.

“Sentencing children to life without parole means they will die in prison, without the possibility of a second chance at life,” said
Elizabeth Calvin, children’s rights advocate at Human Rights Watch and author of the report. “The public can be kept safe without
locking children up forever for crimes committed when they were too young to vote, drink, or even drive.”

For the report, Human Rights Watch interviewed 27 people sentenced to life without parole for crimes committed at ages 14 to 17. The report draws on records from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and analyzes findings from a Human Rights Watch survey of more than half of all youth serving the sentence.

Despite popular belief to the contrary, Human Rights Watch found that life without parole is not reserved for children who commit the worst crimes or who show signs of being irredeemable criminals. Forty-five percent of California youth sentenced to life without parole for involvement in a murder did not actually kill the victim. Many were convicted of felony murder, or for aiding and abetting the murder, because they acted as lookouts or were participating in another felony when the murder took place.

In nearly 70 percent of cases reported to Human Rights Watch in which the youth was not acting alone at least one codefendant was an adult. Survey responses reveal that in 56 percent of those cases, the adult received a lower sentence than the juvenile.

Many survey respondents wrote heartfelt messages of remorse and apology to the families of their victims.

Nationally, a 2005 Human Rights Watch study estimated that 59 percent of youth offenders serving life without parole in the United States were first-time offenders, without even a juvenile court matter on their records.

Other states are considering reforms or have efforts underway to eliminate the sentence, including Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Michigan, and Washington.

International law prohibits the sentence for child offenders, and it is banned in nearly every other country in the world. Human Rights Watch believes only seven people outside the United States are serving life without parole for crimes committed as children.

“The immaturity that leads children to commit crimes in the first place leaves them ill-prepared to navigate the criminal justice system, so they’re more likely than adults to receive the heaviest sentence,” Calvin said. “Some of those I interviewed didn’t understand the plea bargain system, for instance, so they’d reject a 15-year sentence as being too long and then end up with life.”

One interviewee, Dave U., who was 16 years old at the time of his crime, said he had several adult codefendants, one of whom was more
than 10 years older than he:

“I thought these older dudes would be my friends, but in the end, they said that I did it all.”

Almost all of those interviewed said they did not fully understand the proceedings, their role in the process, and the consequences at stake. Jeff S., 16 at the time of his crime, told Human Rights Watch: “I didn’t even know I got LWOP [life without parole] until I talked to my lawyer after the hearing.”

California has the worst record in the nation for racial disparity in the imposition of life without parole for juveniles. African-American youth are serving the sentence at a rate that is 18 times higher than the rate for white youth, and the rate for Hispanic youth is five times higher in California than for white youth.

Despite there being no evidence that these youth are incapable of rehabilitation, many youth serving life without parole reported that their sentence precludes participation in rehabilitative programs in prison.

The Juvenile Life Without Parole Reform Act (SB 999) is scheduled for a vote in the State Senate before January 31, 2008. If passed in the
State Senate and House, the bill, written by Senator Leland Yee (D- San Francisco/San Mateo), would end the sentencing of juveniles to life without parole in California. Youth convicted of murder could still be sentenced to life in prison, but would have the opportunity for parole consideration after serving 25 years or more. The bill is supported by a diverse and sizable number of organizations, coalitions, and religious groups.

“Even children convicted of crimes that cause terrible suffering can turn their lives around,” said Calvin. “California’s child offenders should be punished for their crimes, but they also deserve a chance to rehabilitate themselves. And California’s political leaders should help them by passing SB999.”

Selected Testimonies

“When they offered [my codefendant and me] 30 years – a flat 30 years, not 30 to life – we were 17 [years old.] We didn’t understand.
Thirty years? I was 17 and in 30 years I’d be 47. That seemed like forever to me. We were in juvie hall. We said no.”
– Robert D.

“The judge let me hug my mom and I cried and I couldn’t stop... I got life without and I didn’t kill anybody.”
– Ray J., 17 at the time of his crime, described the moment when he heard the sentence.

“As a kid, you don’t realize how fragile life is or how fragile it becomes.”
– Billy G., 17 at the time of his crime.

“My thoughts about what I had done to them – I’ve been thinking about the crime, my case, and the victims a lot... I didn’t realize my situation until I was about 24 or 25 years old. I started thinking about my whole life, what my whole family went through – their pain and suffering. I started waking up. I started regretting… Just me really accepting what I had done to them.”
– Roland T., 33, described the process of beginning to understand what he had done, and his feelings of remorse.

“[I was] scared to death. I was all of 5’6”, 130 pounds and they sent me to PBSP [Pelican Bay State Prison]. I tried to kill myself because
I couldn’t stand what the voices in my head was saying…‘You’re gonna get raped.’ ‘You won't ever see your family again.’”
– David C., 29, described being sent at age 18 to one of California’s highest-security prisons. David was 16 at the time of his crime.

Posted by lois at 09:35 AM | Comments (0)

Reforming Our Prisons in 2008: Can California Get Rational Sentencing and Parole Reforms in the Crucible of the Budget Crisis?

http://www.californiaprogressreport.com/2008/01/reforming_our_p.html
This article is filled with links, go to the URL above for links.

Reforming Our Prisons in 2008: Can California Get Rational Sentencing and Parole Reforms in the Crucible of the Budget Crisis?

By Frank D. Russo

The outcry over Governor Schwarzenegger’s proposal last week to release 22,000 prisoners as part of a budget deficit reduction plan has drawn some predictable responses—mostly expressions of horror and fear mongering ala Willie Horton about criminals coming to your neighborhood. It came as a shock to Assembly Republicans—and taking a look at what the Governor had to say repeatedly last year about prisoner releases, this is actually very understandable. In fact, the Governor’s proposal has been criticized by leading Democrats such as Speaker of the Assembly Fabian Nunez as being irresponsible and he voiced his opposition last week shortly after the Governor spoke.

The reality is that some prisoners will have to be released early and sentences need to be brought more in line with what is needed to protect Californians. This is either going to happen through a Federal Court order because of overcrowding or through action by the state—in the form of executive orders of the Governor or legislation. Aside from the numbers and categories of criminals to be released early or diverted from the prisons, the biggest flaw in what the Governor has put forth is that those being released will be put on summary probation—meaning none of them will be supervised by a parole agent and in the main they will not receive the help needed to prevent them from committing new crimes and being back in the prison system—if there is room for them in the jails or prisons in the state. While from a financial standpoint we may be saving the $40,000 per year that it costs to incarcerate a criminal, it is penny wise and pound foolish not to spend some fraction of that amount to counsel, supervise, and provide what is needed to keep many of them from returning.

The legislature gavels into a special session today to act on the fiscal emergency declared by the Governor and find ways to deal with a $3 billion shortfall the state faces in the year that ends June 30, 2008. One of the areas they must look at is the ballooning budget of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. The rise in this area of the state budget has been meteoric for decades—with a 12% increase in 2006 alone.

And it went up at an even higher rate last year. 2007’s prison construction bill, AB 900, means we will spend an additional $7.4 billion on top of the current annual operating budget of more than $10 billion. A San Francisco Chronicle news article warned last May that: “Based on current spending trends, California's prison budget will overtake spending on the state's universities in five years. No other big state in the country spends close to as much on its prisons compared with universities.”

The 45 days allowed by Proposition 58 for the legislature to act in this special session and the urgency of the situation may bring about some thoughtful policy in this area or it may prove an impossibility and devolve into a new orgy of demagoguery and what our Governor calls “Kabuki theater”—a stylized and ritualized play on the stage of politics where our elected leaders try to prove they are tougher on crime. Given how we have gotten into this mess, with the constant one-upmanship of over 1000 laws passed ratcheting up sentences for all sorts of crimes since 1977 when California switched to a determinate sentencing law scheme (fixed terms rather than leaving some discretion in sentencing and releasing criminals with an eye towards rehabilitation), I am somewhat dubious. California is now responsible for 1 out of every 5 new inmates in the country in prison. Some Republicans in the legislature still don’t get it. Tomorrow, during the regular session, the Assembly Public Safety Committee will take up at least two proposals to increase sentences and add to that list of 1000.

We haven’t seen, yet, the actual language of what the Governor is putting forth, although there should be specifics in the bill that was transmitted to the legislature along with his proclamation of a fiscal emergency under Proposition 58. But if press reports and what Department of Corrections officials are saying are at all accurate, it sounds a bit like Jonathan’s Swift’s “A Modest Proposal.”

"There is going to be a population that does not spend one day in prison," corrections spokesman Oscar Hidalgo said.

“The department said those convicted of drug offenses, drunken driving, white collar or property crimes such as vehicle theft, grand theft or receiving stolen property likely would serve little or no time.”

James Tilton, Schwarzenegger’s Director of the California Department of Corrections, according to the Sacramento Bee: “said the releases will only be available to inmates classified as non-serious and non-violent who are not sex offenders – including their prior convictions. Qualifying inmates will be placed on summary parole, meaning no supervision, and can be returned to custody only if they get convicted of a new crime and are sentenced to more than 20 months.” [Emphasis added] No time at all if the sentences is less than 20 months? I have a hard time believing this is actually what the Governor is proposing.

While we wait for the details of the Governor’s bill, which will be scrutinized by the legislature and undoubtedly modified, there needs to be some review of what we have known for some time so we don’t repeat the mistakes of the past.

Take a look at “Why Prison Reform Doesn’t Happen” in which former California State Senator Jackie Speier gives this advice:

“Given that 95 percent of inmates will be released from prison within five years, it is critical that rehabilitation efforts affect as many inmates as possible. But, only seven percent of inmates receive alcohol treatment although 42 percent have a high need for treatment. Worse yet, only 2.5 percent of inmates with a serious need for drug treatment actually receive treatment during their time in prison. Again, California recycles rather than rehabilitates men and women who have broken the law.”

Consider what some of the experts in criminology have had to say in “Stanford Report and Recommendations Show Need for a Sentencing Commission in California to Complete Reform Already Under Way”, building on recommendations of many prior reports including that of former prosecutor and Republican Governor George Deukmejian. Pass AB 160 or SB 110—now on the floors of both houses of the legislature—to create a sentencing commission.

Look at the data from the National Council on Crime and Delinquency and consider the report they have released just a few days ago, including this passage:

“The number of released prisoners has increased in California more than in any other state in the nation. In 1980, 11,759 prisoners returned to their communities; less than 25 years later that number is 113,000, an increase of almost 1000%. In the Golden State, 65% of parolees end up back in prison within three years; nationally that figure is only 35%.

“Many released prisoners are ill-equipped to live successful lives. Too often, they have low levels of job training and literacy. As a result of incarceration, they are disenfranchised, barred from public housing, and refused jobs. Facing hopelessness and obstacles, a parolee will often violate probation or commit a new crime and land back in prison.

“The intent of punishing rather than rehabilitating was to "get tough on crime." But in reality, aggressive incarceration without effective reentry programs is inhumane for the prisoner, unsafe for our communities, and extremely expensive for all taxpayers.

“How do we correct a parole system the California Little Hoover Commission called in 2003, "a billion dollar failure?" Successful reentry depends on having a system of services—housing, jobs, mentoring, meals, addiction treatment, and mental health services—in place and immediately available to prisoners returning home. This can be achieved at the community level through the development and implementation of a data-driven, evidence-based strategic plan.”

Consider what other states are doing about prisons: looking at rehabilitation.

Take a look at the San Francisco Chronicle article from 2005, “California's system for parolees called ineffective revolving door”. The time line at the end of this excellent article is very telling of the history we must not repeat:

“1976: 21,088 total prison population, 2,233 parolees returned to prison.

1977 California adopts fixed sentencing, reducing parole board's role in determining when inmates are ready to be released.

1990 A blue-ribbon commission says the prison system compromises public safety by relying so heavily on punishment and recommends drug treatment and work programs for parolees.

1991 Facing a budget crisis, Gov. Pete Wilson orders that parolees who test positive for drug use be sent to treatment instead of prison.

1994 Wilson's parole policy is attacked by rival in governor's race for allowing dangerous parole violators to avoid prison and commit new crimes.

2003 Little Hoover Commission calls California's parole system a "billion-dollar failure," noting that 48 states do a better job helping released convicts re-enter society and stay out of prison.

2004 Schwarzenegger administration announces new programs for parolees. A year later, plagued by poor planning, they are dropped.

2004: 163,939 total prison population, 76,565 parolees returned to prison”

I’m glad to see a change in the Governor’s own rhetoric in the last couple of weeks and his coming to grips with the reality of the state’s swelling prison population. Although he really didn’t answer the question on Thursday when asked if his prison release proposal was budgetary or otherwise, this is what he had to say:

“Q: If the people are sending enough money to Sacramento for state spending, the inmate -- the early inmate release proposal then, is that more of a philosophical thing on your part than budgetary?

“GOVERNOR: No. I think first of all, as you know, we are having parole reforms already on the way. Second of all, we have institutions that were built for 100,000 people and there 172,500 people in there. I think the federal judges are breathing down our neck and saying that we're going to put a cap on you, 140,000 prisoners, that's all you can have in there. So there are all kinds of problems developing.

“Now, it happens to be also at the same time that we have a budget situation where we want to cut across the board. And so therefore when we say across the board, even though some people criticize that, I say that was the fair way to do it, and we really went after every program. Now, of course there are programs that one party enjoys that we are cutting, this program and that program, and another party will enjoy different programs that we are cutting, and one party will be dissatisfied with one program cutting, and all of this will happen.

“This is a budget that doesn't please everybody, I know that for sure. And you will have people coming out of this room afterwards and spinning why this is all terrible. But the bottom line is, I think this is the fairest way to go, and we wanted to show and send a signal that we don't cut back on what is popular amongst Republicans, or cut back of what's popular amongst Democrats. It was across the board.”

Regardless of the reason for his conversion, this is a far cry from what one paper described last September as “trying to whip up opposition to any move by the courts to release thousands of prison inmates before they've completed their sentences.”

Around that time, the Governor’s office put out releases such as this one: “Schwarzenegger Joins with Assembly Republicans, Law Enforcement Officials to Warn of Dangers if Felons are Released into Communities”:

“Public safety is the most important thing to us all, and our communities have the most at stake at this. And this is why we must do absolutely everything that we can to prevent the federal three-judge panel from ordering criminals to be released early out of our prisons. We have sheriffs here, district attorneys, probation officers, Assembly Members, and all of these people think exactly the way we think, and they know exactly what we know, that releasing criminals back into our streets will be a public safety disaster, and it is absolutely unacceptable.

“So I fully support their effort. Public safety has always been my No. 1 priority, and I’m proud to support local law enforcement. We are doing everything, absolutely everything we can, to protect our communities and to make sure that no one is released early because of overcrowding. The only ones that should be released is if they have served their term and if they are safe to go out into society.” [Emphasis added]

One can see the charges next year by demagogues. They will switch their ire from Federal Court Judges to those running for re-election. Just take a look at the Assembly Republican page that begins with the question: “How many dangerous criminals will be on the loose in your neighborhood?” and lots of scary photographs.

It will take Profiles in Courage for Democrats (since probably no Republicans will join in) to heed the words of Democratic President pro Tem Don Perata on the Senate floor last April when the prison construction bill was passed:

“So we’re jammed up in this situation right now because we have fallen in love with one of the most undocumented, nonevidentiary beliefs. And that is somehow you get safer if you put more people in jail.”

Our elected leaders will need to hear from those of us who would like to see the unaffordable and unworkable status quo of the prison-industrial complex challenged.

Posted by lois at 09:24 AM | Comments (0)

January 14, 2008

IA: Ft. Madison prison: A town's future in state's hands

Ft. Madison prison: A town's future in state's hands
Des Moines Register
By WILLIAM PETROSKI • REGISTER STAFF WRITER • January 14, 2008

Fort Madison, Ia. -- Retired businessman Rudie Allison stopped shoveling snow for a minute. He reflected on what would happen if the maximum security prison here were shut down and replaced by a new prison elsewhere.

"It would be a death blow to the city. ... It would be terrible to lose it," said Allison, who formerly operated a downtown jewelry store.

Support for the prison runs deep in this southeast Iowa community, where the Iowa State Penitentiary has been a landmark since it was established as a territorial prison in 1839. Many people took it for granted that a new, $121 million maximum security prison would be built here after Gov. Chet Culver, a Democrat, endorsed Fort Madison for a new prison during his 2006 election campaign.

But some of the Legislature's minority Republicans differ with Culver, contending other Iowa communities should be considered during this year's legislative session, which starts today, to provide the best deal for the public. In the 1990s, under Republican Gov. Terry Branstad, communities competed for prisons eventually built in Fort Dodge and Newton.

"We have a fiduciary responsibility to taxpayers," said state Rep. Lance Horbach, a Tama Republican who serves on a legislative prison budget subcommittee.

While Fort Madison's location on the Mississippi River made it a prime site in the 1800s when steamboats were a major mode of travel, that's not true now, Horbach said. One problem, he said, is that Fort Madison is almost 90 miles from University of Iowa Hospitals in Iowa City and it's costly to transport sick prisoners back and forth.

Other critics said Fort Madison's location in extreme southeast Iowa makes it a hardship for families to visit inmates, requiring a two-day trip from Sioux City and other places in northwest Iowa. Also, prison officials acknowledge it's difficult to recruit professionals to Fort Madison because of its rural location.

Iowa Senate Majority Leader Michael Gronstal, a Council Bluffs Democrat, said last week he wouldn't rule out the Republican proposal to consider other communities, but he wondered if some Republicans were playing political games by suggesting the new prison could be built elsewhere. Fort Madison is unique because it hosts Iowa's only maximum security prison with inmates serving very long terms, he said.

"I think our caucus would likely vote pretty resoundingly" against allowing other Iowa communities to compete for the new maximum security prison, Gronstal said.

State Rep. David Tjepkes, a Gowrie Republican who was on a legislative prison study committee, said he's willing to consider Fort Madison for a new maximum security prison. But lawmakers need to explore more options, including phasing out the Fort Madison prison while expanding other Iowa correctional facilities, he said.

"A lot of folks at the state Capitol are all for consolidation when they talk about our local schools and that sort of thing. I think that same sort of principle should be explored with our state prisons," Tjepkes said.

Horbach proposes constructing a new maximum security prison at Newton, where there are already facilities for minimum and medium custody inmates. This would allow a smooth transition for convicts as they made progress or caused trouble, reducing transportation costs, while sharing fixed expenses to run three modern facilities, he said. Health care could be provided by University Hospitals or Broadlawns Medical Center in Des Moines, he suggested.

Culver still supports Fort Madison for a new maximum security prison, said Brad Anderson, the governor's communications director. "He believes Fort Madison is an appropriate location for a new prison because there is a highly-qualified, built-in work force capable of meeting the security challenges that go along with a maximum security prison," Anderson said.

The possibility that Fort Madison could lose the Iowa State Penitentiary sends chills through the town's 11,476 residents, who have already witnessed the loss of several major employers. This includes Fruehauf Trailers; Sheaffer Pen, which will be fully closed in March; and the Catfish Bend Casino riverboat, which shut down in November after 13 years docked in Fort Madison. The unemployment rate in Lee County in November was 5.6 percent, fourth-highest among Iowa's 99 counties.

The penitentiary is a major employer here, providing recession-proof jobs for 530 people.

"The prison has been a lifeline for our community, and it would be tragic to lose it. It's been a blessing, even though we've had some scary times" with escapes and other incidents, said Sue Saunders, co-owner of the Ivy Bake Shoppe & Cafe in downtown Fort Madison. She counts many prison employees as regular customers.

Mike O'Tool, a senior correctional officer and a canine handler, is a graduate of Fort Madison High School who has worked at the penitentiary for seven years. He contends a new prison should be built in Fort Madison to keep the jobs here. "The staff here is great. You can count on them for anything," O'Tool said.

A proposal to construct a new, 800-bed maximum security prison at Fort Madison was endorsed by a 7-2 vote in November by a bipartisan legislative study committee. The Iowa Board of Corrections had earlier backed the plan. Other communities weren't considered because of Culver's unequivocal support for Fort Madison, prison officials said.

The push to construct a new prison to replace the antiquated Fort Madison penitentiary developed after two dangerous convicts made a daring escape in November 2005, fleeing over a 30-foot limestone wall. They were later recaptured in Illinois and Missouri.

The recommendation for a new maximum security prison assumes the Fort Madison penitentiary complex would continue to host adjacent prison units for medium security convicts and mentally ill prisoners, and a nearby prison farm in Montrose. The legislative committee and corrections board also endorsed expansions and upgrades of state prisons in Mitchellville and Newton, as well as expansions of community corrections facilities. The total package would cost an estimated $240 million.

Mike Wilkens, a correctional officer who has worked at the Fort Madison penitentiary since 1983, questions the idea that a new maximum security prison is even needed. Prison consultants, though, have had a different view, pointing out that new institutions can be staffed more efficiently and are less costly to operate.

"This is still a good institution. We have good, qualified staff here, and they have put a lot of money into this place," Wilkens said.

Rhonda Faeth, whose family has owned Faeth's Cigar Store in downtown Fort Madison since 1910, said she is already angry at Culver because of his support for a $1 per pack increase in cigarette taxes approved last year. The tax hike has meant droves of border-state smokers now head to Missouri instead of Fort Madison to buy cigarettes, she said.

Faeth won't forgive Culver if a new maximum security prison is built somewhere else.

"He needs to keep the prison here. Our town is hurting bad enough," she said.
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080114/NEWS10/
801140321/-1/NEWS04

Posted by lois at 01:25 PM | Comments (0)

January 13, 2008

CT: Pipeline To Prison

"For every $1 invested in a high-quality preschool program, economists have determined that taxpayers earn a return on investment of nearly $17 in the long run. That’s because a far greater number of children participating in a high-quality preschool program will graduate from high school, earn a significantly higher salary, and — more importantly — will be less likely to commit a crime."

Hartford Business.com
Editorial
Pipeline To Prison
01/14/08
There is no question that violent criminals — particularly repeat offenders — are a danger to society. That is why state lawmakers recently unveiled their proposals for a more stringent parole system. Tougher consequences for violent acts are necessary.

Prompted by the nightmarish home invasion this past summer in Cheshire, Gov. M. Jodi Rell and state lawmakers have pondered and debated how best to make the state safer from violent criminals.

Connecticut isn’t the only state that releases violent criminals early. According to federal government statistics, violent offenders generally serve less than half of their sentence in confinement.

If violent criminals are required to serve their full sentences, it is logical that the state will ultimately need to construct more prisons, or at the very least, expand the 18 prisons it now operates.

The cost to house the state’s 19,438 inmates is about $1.67 million per day. If you do the math, that’s nearly $12 million a week, or about $608 million annually. It isn’t cheap.

While there is no question that Connecticut residents should be protected from hardened, violent criminals who commit unspeakable crimes, taxpayers will shell out more money to put away more criminals for longer periods of time.

If lawmakers meet this month-- as expected -- for a special session to discuss criminal reform matters, they also need to consider how to cut incarceration costs by examining how state funds can reduce the number of youngsters already heading into the prison pipeline and reduce recidivism.

More than a third of those incarcerated are reconvicted, according to the state Department of Correction Web site. The overall reincarceration rate is 22 percent. And it doesn’t take long for former inmates to get in trouble with the law after they are released from prison. The average number of days a former inmate is in the community prior to rearrest — that led to a new conviction — is 255. Notably, inmates released to a community program were out of prison the longest (343 days) and inmates released from prison with no community supervision averaged the shortest (238 days) amount of time prior to rearrest.

There is also data — to be discussed this week at the Governor’s Early Childhood Summit: Investing in the First 1,000 Days — that establishes the pipeline to prison is significantly influenced by a child’s early reading ability and academic success.

The summit, hosted by the governor’s Early Childhood Cabinet, will focus on the cabinet’s 18-month compilation of quantitative research, which concludes that it pays to invest in programs that boost academic performance of at-risk children during the first 1,000 days of their lives. In fact, such an investment significantly reduces the likelihood of the children committing a felony later in life.

The road to prison starts early. The cabinet will highlight research at the summit that establishes that youngsters experiencing academic failure by grade three are far more likely to experience later school failure, welfare dependence and incarceration as adults. The research shows that children who participate in a high-quality preschool, combined with regular home visits by a trained family resource specialist, are four times less likely to commit a felony by the time they’re 40.

For every $1 invested in a high-quality preschool program, economists have determined that taxpayers earn a return on investment of nearly $17 in the long run. That’s because a far greater number of children participating in a high-quality preschool program will graduate from high school, earn a significantly higher salary, and — more importantly — will be less likely to commit a crime.

Hopefully, lawmakers will realize that if they want to make the state safer, they must commit to investments that reduce the number of people who are in the pipeline heading to prison.

http://www.hartfordbusiness.com/news4246.html

Posted by lois at 08:05 PM | Comments (0)

January 12, 2008

NY: Citing Drop in Inmate Population, Spitzer Plans to Close Four Prisons Upstate

January 12, 2008
Citing Drop in Inmate Population, Spitzer Plans to Close Four Prisons Upstate
By TRYMAINE LEE and LESLIE KAUFMAN, NY Times

The Spitzer administration announced on Friday a plan to close a medium-security prison and three minimum-security camps upstate, citing the declining crime and prison population across the state. Officials said the move would save taxpayers upward of $70 million in the next few years.

The closing of the four prisons — the medium-security Hudson Correctional Facility in Columbia County and the minimum-security camps Pharsalia in Chenango County, Gabriels in Franklin County and McGregor at Mount McGregor Correctional Facility in Saratoga County — will be felt in the counties where the prisons have provided steady, good-paying jobs.

Republican lawmakers and the New York State Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Association were highly critical of the plan, announced just days after Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s pledge to work more closely with Republican leaders.

“We are very concerned with his plan, especially in light of the governor’s push to release criminals out of prison early through the parole system,” said Mark Hansen, a spokesman for the Republican Senate majority. “We have some very serious questions about his plan. We want to see his justification for this.” Mr. Hansen said Mr. Spitzer’s announcement was particularly distressing to lawmakers whose districts are home to the centers and whose communities depend on prison employment.

But officials from the New York State Department of Correctional Services said the proposed closings were not expected to cause significant layoffs because many employees could be absorbed into other prison department jobs.

The officials said all four complexes were operating at about half capacity with a total of 939 inmates and 584 full- and part-time employees.

The inmates will be transferred to other medium-security prisons when the four prisons are closed in January 2009, said Brian Fischer, the corrections commissioner. State law requires that such closings be announced a year in advance.

“This is long in the works,” Mr. Fischer said. “We’ve been looking at this on and off for the last three, four years, and each year the number of inmates has gone down. The minimum-security facilities are underutilized. We have empty dorms. It’s a good economic and management decision.”

The closings are expected to save taxpayers $10.4 million in operating costs in the fiscal year 2008-9, $33.5 million annually in operating costs beginning in 2009-10 and $30 million in prison capital expenditures, according to the corrections department.

Mr. Fischer said the closings would allow the corrections department to bolster programs for sex offenders, mental health treatment and community re-entry. New laws have enabled the department to move more nonviolent offenders out of correctional facilities and into their communities.

Over the past decade, the number of inmates at medium-security prisons decreased by 18 percent and the number at minimum-security facilities fell by 47 percent, according to corrections data. But this decline was countered by the rise of more violent offenders entering the system. Mr. Fischer said that the cost of meeting the physical and mental health needs of this new inmate population was rising and that the department’s resources needed to be redirected to meet those needs.

Larry Flanagan Jr., the president of the corrections officers’ union, said in a statement on Friday that the union did not support the closings.

“We respect the fact that state leaders face trying fiscal times and many difficult decisions in the upcoming session,” Mr. Flanagan said. “But we remain committed to our members and the communities they work and live in. Along with educating all public officials that closing prisons should never be a first option.”

The state’s 69 correctional facilities held 62,243 inmates as of Friday, down from a peak of 71, 538 in 1999, the corrections department said. The department has about 31,000 employees.

“I’m sure they have some concerns about the loss of certain jobs,” Mr. Fischer said of the plan’s critics.

“There will be some impact, no question, on the local communities,” he said. “But my concern is that I have 32,000 employees. I have to be concerned about where I am going to place my employees in the long haul.”

Separately on Friday, the New York State Office of Children and Family Services announced it would close six residential detention centers upstate for low-level juvenile offenders as part of a continuing effort to overhaul the juvenile justice system.

The agency hoped to cut a total of 241 beds in the system’s nonsecure and limited-secure facilities by next year.

The centers being closed serve juveniles convicted of misdemeanors. None of the secure detention facilities that serve children convicted of more serious crimes will be closed.

Juveniles usually sent to the nonsecure centers will instead be allowed to return to their communities on the condition that they and their families accept intensive counseling in their neighborhoods and homes for a period set by a family court judge.

Gladys Carrión, the commissioner of the Office of Children and Family Services, said the governor had proposed to use savings from the closings, which the budget office estimated would be $16 million a year, to help pay for such locally based rehabilitation services.

“What these children need is intervention and support,” Ms. Carrión said. “We want them to transition safely into the community and not go directly into the penal system, which happens too frequently now.”

The state has been shrinking the residential detention system for children 16 and younger for years because it is widely seen as expensive and ineffective. The average annual cost of keeping a child in one of the centers runs from $140,000 to $200,000.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/12/nyregion/12prisons.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&ref=nyregion&pagewanted=print

Posted by lois at 10:30 AM | Comments (0)

CA: Prisons: 22,000 prisoners could be set free early to save millions

Prisons: 22,000 prisoners could be set free early to save millions
John Wildermuth, Chronicle Staff Writer
Saturday, January 12, 2008

What a difference a budget crisis makes.

Less than six months ago, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger promised that there was no way any California convict was going to get a break on his prison term.

"I am here to tell you that the early release of inmates is totally unacceptable," the governor said July 28. "They should only be let out when they have served their sentences and are ready to return to society. Period."

But with the state facing a $14.5 billion budget deficit over the next 18 months, Schwarzenegger on Thursday announced that more than 22,000 nonviolent offenders will be released as much as 20 months early over the next year and a half in an effort to slash $260 million from the Department of Corrections budget.

About half the inmates eligible for the early release program are expected to be drug offenders, with most of the rest in custody for property crimes like forgery, auto burglary and car theft, corrections officials say.

The state expects to save another $110 million by placing the former inmates on "summary parole," which means they won't have to meet with parole officers and can't be returned to prison for a parole violation.

A panel of federal judges, upset about overcrowding in the state prison system, is ready to slap a cap on the prison population, the governor said, just as the state's fiscal crisis is forcing 10 percent, across-the-board cuts in state spending.

"So there are all kinds of problems developing," said Schwarzenegger, who backed and signed legislation last year for new prison construction.

The decision to give an early release to inmates whose offenses are "nonviolent, nonserious and not sexually related" was simply a matter of money, said Aaron McLear, a spokesman for Schwarzenegger.

But prisoner advocates said Schwarzenegger's decision was long overdue, citing studies showing that releasing inmates early doesn't result in an increase in crime.

"California is imprisoning way too many people," said Rose Braz of Oakland, campaign director for Critical Resistance, a group opposed to expansion of prisons and incarceration. "It's not surprising to see fear-mongering by opponents of early release, but decisions have to be based on reality."

By dropping 22,000 prisoners from the system as part of efforts to reduce the prison population by 35,000 inmates from the current total of 172,000, the state will be able to eliminate about 6,000 prison guard positions, with about 2,000 of those losses coming through layoffs, said Seth Unger, a spokesman for the Department of Corrections.

Those convicted of nonviolent offenses typically are sent to state prison for two years or less, said Steve Wagstaffe, chief deputy district attorney in San Mateo County. Because prisoners get credit for time served in county jail while awaiting trial, they could walk onto the street after being sentenced to two years in state prison.

"This is a dramatic change in the criminal justice system," Wagstaffe said. "It's as big as the changes in the early 1970s, when sentences started to increase and more people were sent to prison."

The new parole rules for such nonviolent offenders also mean they can't be quickly returned to prison violating parole. If police discover someone on summary parole with narcotics, for example, they can't simply ask a judge to send him to prison. They will have to file new charges and put the parolee on trial, a long and often expensive proposition.

If Schwarzenegger gets his way, plenty of ex-convicts are going to be back on the street and local officials are worried about what that will mean.

Even nonviolent offenders often return to their communities with drug problems, no jobs and no place to stay, said Alameda County Supervisor Keith Carson.

"The state drops their problems on us and it's challenging for counties to raise the money to deal with them," he said.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2008/01/12/MNHPUDVP4.DTL&type=printable

Posted by lois at 10:27 AM | Comments (0)

Va: People convicted of Felonies not being told of new evidence

Va: Felons not being told of new evidence

Felons not being told of new evidence Biological material turns up in2,215 Va. cases prior to widespread DNA tests
Friday, Jan 11, 2008 -
By FRANK GREEN TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER

Virginia felons convicted of crimes before DNA testing was widely in use are not being notified when biological evidence is found in their old forensic case files. As a result, it is largely being left up to authorities to determine whether DNA testing is warranted in such cases and to interpret whether the results have any bearing on innocence. In a groundbreaking project far larger than first envisioned, the Virginia Department of Forensic Science has searched 530,079 paper files dating from 1973 to 1988, finding 2,215 that contain crime-scene biological material and include a suspect's name.

Five men wrongly convicted of rape have been cleared with evidence from the old files. Advocates and others are concerned that for the most part, only authorities are being told the evidence exists and not the felons who potentially have the most at stake. In a 6-5 vote, the state Forensic Science Board has decided not to apprise the governor and General Assembly that convicted people are not being told about the evidence -- a move that might result in the state locating and notifying them. "It's really astounding to me and it's sad. . . . It's bad policy and there really is no justification for this kind of inaction," Mary Kelly Tate, director of the Institute for Actual Innocence at the University of Richmond School of Law, said yesterday. Tate added: "I know that the people on the board are fair and decent, but this decision does not reflect fairness." Shawn Armbrust, executive director of the Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project in Washington, agreed. Among other things, she said, felons have a right under state law to seek DNA testing in appropriate cases. . . .

Forensic Science Board member Steven D. Benjamin, a criminal defense lawyer, argued at Wednesday's meeting that the felons should be notified, or at least the governor and lawmakers be alerted that they are not being notified. "It's unconscionable . . . not to notify folks there is biological evidence that has been discovered," Benjamin said. Board member S. Randolph Sengel, the Alexandria commonwealth's attorney, strongly disagreed with Benjamin's proposal. "It implies the way it is working now is defective, and it implies law enforcement is . . . not properly responding. It seems to me to raise this red flag at this juncture sends the wrong message," Sengel said. Sengel added that prosecutors in Virginia take the study very seriously and will do the right thing if evidence of innocence is turned up.

Board member Dr. Leah Bush, the state's new chief medical examiner, agreed with Benjamin that notifications should be made when possible out of fairness. But Col. W. Steven Flaherty, head of the Virginia State Police, said that while the goal was laudable, he feared, among other things, unforeseen burdens that might be placed on any state agency given the job of tracking the people down and notifying them. Peter Marone, director of the Department of Forensic Science, told the board that lawyers who are asking whether evidence had been found in the files of clients are being told. . . .

It was first learned in 2001 that former state forensic serologist Mary Jane Burton saved biological evidence -- primarily blood or semen on swatches or swabs -- in her case files after Marvin Anderson, of Ashland, sought DNA testing to clear his name. Anderson was convicted wrongly of a 1982 rape and spent 15 years in prison until his parole in 1997. Anderson first was told no evidence remained for DNA testing. However, the state forensics lab discovered biological material in Burton's case file on Anderson -- and in many of her other old files. Subsequent DNA testing cleared Anderson and implicated the real rapist, who later was convicted. Benjamin argued to the board Wednesday that there could be others who, like Anderson, were told initially that evidence no long existed for DNA testing but who accepted the state's word and did not keep asking. After Anderson, two other men were exonerated of old rape charges based on evidence saved by Burton. . . .

In 2005, then-Gov. Mark R. Warner ordered DNA testing in a sample of 31 of her old cases, and two more men wrongly convicted of rape -- neither of whom had sought DNA testing -- were cleared. Warner then ordered testing in all appropriate cases from 1973 to 1988. Marone said the original directive from Warner dealt with sex offenses only and quickly was expanded to include murder. His department is contacting prosecutors, clerks and the state police to determine whether individuals were convicted of such crimes in each of the 2,215 cases. Once a case meets all the criteria, the material is sent to an independent laboratory for testing. The test results are forwarded to the prosecutor's office that originally handled the case to see if it has a bearing on innocence. All DNA test results are forwarded to the governor.

http://www.inrich.com/cva/ric/news.apx.-content-articles-RTD-2008-01-11-\
0158.

Posted by lois at 10:20 AM | Comments (0)

GEO to Sponsor Democratic and Republican Presidential Debates in FL

Florida Atlantic Univ. finds sponsors for presidential debates
Friday, January 11, 2008

BOCA RATON — Florida Atlantic University has raised more than
$200,000 in sponsorships for the U.S. Democratic and Republican
presidential primary debates it will host Jan. 24 and Jan. 27.

The debates are scheduled to take place at FAU's Boca Raton campus at
777 Glades Road, Boca Raton.

The GEO Group and Delray Beach-based Office Depot are the two lead
FAU sponsors for the debates.

JM Family Enterprises Inc. and Woolbright Development Inc. are the
debates' premier sponsors, and contributing sponsors include
AutoNation; Alan B. Larkin Symposium on the American Presidency;
Gunster, Yoakley & Stewart, P.A. and The Pugliese Co.

The presidential debates will be televised live on MSNBC, and are
produced by Leadership Florida, the Florida Press Association and
Florida Public Broadcasting Service, Inc.
http://www.tcpalm.com/news/2008/jan/11/fau-finds-sponsors-
presidential-debates/

Posted by lois at 10:16 AM | Comments (0)

January 11, 2008

MA: Gov. Patrick Announces CORI Reforms

THE COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS
EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT
STATE HOUSE, BOSTON, MA 02133
DEVAL L. PATRICK, GOVERNOR

PATRICK ADMINISTRATION ANNOUNCES CORI REFORMS
Initiative Aimed at Strengthening Public Safety and Creating Economic Opportunity

BOSTON — Friday, January 11, 2008 — Continuing his efforts to strengthen public safety and create economic opportunity, Governor Deval Patrick today unveiled a criminal justice initiative that would enhance employment opportunities for rehabilitated individuals with criminal records, helping to reduce recidivism rates and increasing the likelihood of successful reintegration into society.

Stressing the need to reduce recidivism by expanding employment opportunities, Governor Patrick filed legislation to reform existing Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI) policy to emphasize the importance and value to all residents of successful reintegration of ex-offenders. He also issued an Executive Order to ensure that the information in criminal records is accurate and understandable so that the best information is available to assist in the decision-making process.

“CORI was never intended to turn every offense into a life sentence,” said Governor Patrick. “All but a handful of people incarcerated are eventually released, and they need to get back to work. These reforms require decision-makers to make an individual determination about whether an applicant is rehabilitated, rather than excluding ex-offenders categorically. If we want to reduce crime and help people re-integrate successfully, this is a smarter approach.”

Each year, approximately 20,000 inmates return home from incarceration, while 97 percent of all inmates are eventually released from custody. Without proper guidance and support — including access to employment and housing opportunities — 49 percent of offenders recidivate after one year.

Incarcerating an offender costs approximately $43,000 per year. Estimates based on effective re-entry programs operating in Massachusetts suggest that the cost for the last year of incarceration and the first year of release can be cut by two-thirds with better program services. Coupled with mandatory post-release supervision, which the Governor proposed through legislation last April, CORI reform can save taxpayers millions of dollars a year, not only by reducing prison costs but by also reducing the cost of criminal behavior in the Commonwealth’s communities, thereby enhancing public safety.

Provisions of the Executive Order and legislation include:

Fairer state employment practices -- The existence of a criminal record too often disqualifies rehabilitated individuals from employment even if they are qualified and competent to do the job. To improve fairness during the hiring process, the Executive Order establishes a policy that a criminal background check can only occur once an applicant has been deemed otherwise qualified for a position and the contents of a criminal record are relevant to the duties and qualifications of the job.

“People will be examined as people,” said Public Safety and Security Secretary Kevin M. Burke. “These reforms are critical to improving our re-entry efforts and reducing recidivism.”

Enhancing law enforcement access to sealed records -- In addition to expanding employment opportunities, the legislation also strengthens public safety by providing criminal justice agencies with access to all sealed records. Presently, once a criminal record is sealed, law enforcement entities are routinely denied access by the courts. In addition, Governor Patrick has ordered a study to determine the feasibility of providing a 50-state criminal record check for employees of agencies serving vulnerable populations. This would allow agencies to comprehensively determine whether or not a prospective or present employee poses a public safety threat.

Ensuring accuracy of CORI information -- To provide greater guidance and clarity to employers, the Governor’s order also requires the Criminal History Systems Board (CHSB), which grants CORI access, to develop an electronic learning system for CORI users, draft regulations to require training and examination as a condition of CORI-certification and enhance auditing of CORI users.

Increasing public education of CORI rights and uses -- To further improve the system, the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security, the CHSB and the Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development are directed to develop an educational campaign to notify the public of their legal rights with respect to criminal records and to inform employers of permissible uses of CORI. The CHSB, the Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD), and the Department of Transitional Assistance (DTA) will review federal and state laws governing the collection and use of CORI in connection with housing decisions and recommend regulatory changes to mitigate housing placement delays.

Focusing on human services and post-release training -- The Executive Office of Health and Human Services (EOHHS) is directed to revise its hiring guidelines for human services providers and vendors while the Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development (EOLWD) is charged with making recommendations concerning successful pre-release and post-release training programs.

“EOHHS is committed to making sure that we balance the need to give work opportunities to ex-offenders while protecting the individuals and communities served by our agencies," said Secretary JudyAnn Bigby.

“One thing we heard time and time again during the many public meetings on this issue is that employers and job seekers alike will benefit from these reforms: employers have jobs available that they cannot fill and yet many ex-offenders cannot access these employment opportunities because of the significant barriers the current system creates,” said Secretary of Labor and Workforce Development Suzanne M. Bump. “These reforms will reduce those barriers and will support policies which promote education, re-entry, and job training in a tight labor market. Our economy needs the skills and talent of all our citizens.”

Changing timeframes for sealing of records -- Acknowledging studies of recidivism that strongly suggest that rates consistently fall the longer an ex-offender has stayed clear of criminal activity after completing a sentence, the bill changes the timeframes and mechanisms for sealing and distributing criminal records and makes them consistent with the timeframes that exist in courtroom trials and consistent with studies concerning recidivism. Mandatory waits for rehabilitated individuals to seal criminal records would change from 15 to 10 years for felonies and 10 to 5 years for misdemeanors, but only if the individual has stayed clear of criminal activity during that period. Misdemeanor violations of restraining orders would remain in the 10 year category to account for the seriousness of these crimes and their relevance to employers that may serve vulnerable populations. Additionally, sex offenders would never be eligible to seal records.

Penalties for abuse of CORI information - The Governor’s legislation also makes it a crime, punishable by a $5,000 fine and/or up to one year in prison, to make any knowing and unauthorized request, collection, use, dissemination, altering or sale of CORI.

Juvenile Records -- Lastly, the administration will continue to enforce the present law concerning the dissemination of juvenile records. “We are especially concerned that young people have every opportunity to get on the right path and stay there. Massachusetts law prohibits the release of juvenile records to all but law enforcement and a select few agencies. We are going to see that that law is enforced,” said Governor Patrick.

Those agencies with access to juvenile records include the Department of Youth Services and the Department of Social Services. In addition, operators of youth camps are granted access to juvenile records to conduct background checks of all employees or volunteers prior to employment.

Many of the initiatives in the Executive Order and the legislation mirror recommendations within two Boston Foundation / Crime and Justice Institute studies. “CORI: Balancing Individual Rights and Public Access” was a study conducted in 2005. In 2007, a task force co-chaired by Elizabeth Pattullo and Robert Gittens presented “CORI: Opening Doors of Opportunity”.

“I applaud the Governor for balancing the imperatives of public safety and justice with the needs of our economy in his executive order and bill,” said Paul S. Grogan, president and CEO of the Boston Foundation. “The Governor is updating CORI policy in measured and practical ways that advance reform. In today’s economy, we need all hands on deck, and must create a climate in which people with criminal records who are qualified and rehabilitated can rejoin the workforce.”
#########

Executive Order http://www.cjpc.org/ExecutiveOrder.pdf
Proposed Bill http://www.cjpc.org/Proposedbill.pdf

Posted by lois at 10:20 PM | Comments (0)

NY Office of Children & Family Services: Agency Closing, Reducing, or Merging Underutilized Residential Facilities to Improve Services to Children & Help Prevent Youth Crime

News from New York State Office of Children & Family Services

NY Office of Children & Family Services Accelerating Transformation of Juvenile Justice System

Agency Closing, Reducing, or Merging Underutilized Residential Facilities to Improve Services to Children & Help Prevent Youth Crime

RENSSELAER, NY (01/11/2008; 1314)(readMedia)-- New York State Office of Children & Family Services Commissioner Gladys Carrión today announced the closing of six underutilized residential facilities as part of an ongoing restructuring to significantly improve services to troubled children.

The agency is closing the Adirondack Wilderness Challenge in Clinton County, Auburn Residential Center in Cayuga County, Brace Residential Center in Delaware County, Gloversville Group Home in Fulton County, Great Valley Residential Center in Cattaraugus County, and the Pyramid Reception Center in The Bronx.

OCFS also is reducing by half the number of beds at the Lansing Residential Center in Tompkins County. The program at the Adirondack Wilderness will be merged into the Adirondack Residential Center, and the intake functions at Pyramid will be relocated to the Ella McQueen Residential Center in Brooklyn.

These changes take effect on Jan. 11, 2009, consistent with a state law that requires a 12-month notification process prior to the closure of residential facilities in the OCFS system.

There are approximately 2,000 children in New York State’s juvenile justice system, and most of them are between 12 and 18 years old. A few are as young as 10. They were all under the age of 16 when they committed an act that would have been a crime if committed by an adult.

These closings, reductions, and mergers are at non-secure and limited-secure facilities housing children adjudicated as juvenile delinquents by the family courts. The vast majority of the children in these facilities were placed in the system for committing misdemeanors. No youth will be released prematurely as a result of the restructuring.

Secure facilities housing juvenile offenders, those children sentenced for committing felonies, will not be directly impacted by these facility changes.

This ongoing restructuring is driven by a widely shared recognition among children’s advocates and legal experts that the needs of New York’s children, families, and communities are not adequately addressed by the juvenile justice system. Since 2002, OCFS has reduced 379 beds in its residential facilities. With these closings, the total reduction of beds rises to 620.

Many of the children in these facilities have mental health issues, learning disabilities, and substance and alcohol abuse problems and come from some of the poorest communities in the state. Additionally, it has been estimated that 80 percent of these children who enter the juvenile justice system return or go to prison within three years of their release.

“What these children need is intervention and support,” said Commissioner Carrión. “This includes an education, job training, and mental health and substance abuse services to support their rehabilitation and return to the community. It is our responsibility to prepare them for a successful transition to adulthood.”

In addition to the system’s failure to address these children’s needs, it is also wasteful. Nearly a dozen of the state’s youth facilities are operating under 40 percent of capacity. At some facilities, a quarter of the beds are filled.

“Instead of continuing to pour money into this broken system and confining these children to facilities hundreds of miles from their homes, OCFS has aggressively been moving toward more community-based alternatives to incarceration where these children can maintain and strengthen connections with their families and the significant adults in their lives,” the Commissioner said.

Community-based programs, such as those in Missouri, have proven to better prevent youth crime and to drop recidivism rates to as low as 30 percent – at a fraction of the cost New York State is currently paying to maintain empty beds.

This new paradigm includes placing an emphasis on working with families from the first day a child enters the state juvenile justice system. Just last year, the agency enhanced staffing by 218 new positions, including 36 mental health professionals, to better meet these children’s needs.

These closings, reductions, and mergers will result in $16 million in annual savings.

The OCFS Office of Human Resources, the state Department of Civil Service, and the state Department of Labor have organized teams to assist the employees at these impacted facilities to identify and secure positions at other facilities or other state agencies.

Department of Civil Service Commissioner Nancy G. Groenwegen said, "Our goal at Civil Service is to find an alternative State employment opportunity for every one of the affected workers. We have experience at this and will work closely with OCFS, other State agencies, and employees themselves to make this transition as smooth as possible."

The Office of Children and Family Services’ mission is to promote the well-being, safety, and permanency of New York’s children and families by setting and enforcing policies, building partnerships, and funding and providing high-quality services. The agency is responsible for foster care; adoption; adoption assistance; child protective services, including operating the Statewide Central Register of Child Abuse and Maltreatment; preventive services for children and families; services for pregnant adolescents; child care licensing and funding; and operating the state juvenile justice programs. The agency also is responsible for protective programs for vulnerable adults, including adult protective services and the Commission for the Blind and Visually Handicapped.

###

NEW YORK STATE OFFICE OF CHILDREN & FAMILY SERVICES

FACT SHEET ON CLOSINGS, REDUCTIONS & MERGERS OF UNDERUTILIZED RESIDENTIAL FACILITIES

The Problem

New York State’s juvenile justice system needs to be fixed.

The system is predominantly populated by troubled children – mostly African-American and Latino - from the poorest communities in the state. Many of them have mental health issues, learning disabilities, or substance and alcohol abuse problems.

The system was designed around the idea that if the state took these children away from their families and the neighborhoods where they got into difficulty they could be rehabilitated.

It hasn’t worked that way for a long time. Instead, it’s been estimated, 80 percent of the children who enter New York State’s juvenile justice system return or go to prison within three years of their release. The needs of these children, their families, and their communities are clearly not adequately addressed by the current model.

The system is also inefficient. Nearly a dozen of the state’s youth facilities are operating under 40 percent of capacity. At some facilities, only a quarter of the beds are filled. Just this past Monday (Jan. 7), 86 percent of the beds in the non-secure facilities that are closing and 33 percent of the beds in limited secure facilities that are closing were empty. An analysis of historic trends and projections of future usage indicate these beds will not be filled in the near future. This is partially due to local municipalities stepping up and creating community-based programs as alternatives to incarceration to keep these children closer to home.

The Children

There are 2,000 children in New York State’s juvenile justice system. They were all under the age of 16 when they were confined. Most of them are between 12 and 18-years-old. A few are as young as ten.

Eighty-six (86) percent of the youth in state custody are African-American or Latino. Ninety-five (95) percent of the youth in state custody who are from New York City are African-American or Latino.

Most of these children have mental health problems, learning disabilities, or substance and alcohol addictions.

The vast majority of children in non-secure and limited secure residential facilities were judged by the family courts to be juvenile delinquents for committing misdemeanors.

No child currently in the impacted facilities is a resident of the county in which the facility is located. Over 70 percent of them are from New York City.

The Solution

Based on these facts, OCFS has determined that closing some facilities and placing these children in community-based alternative-to-incarceration programs closer to their homes and families will help them successfully return to their neighborhoods and result in lower recidivism rates.

Closings, Reductions, Mergers, Relocations

Based on underutilization, OCFS has decided to close the following non-secure or limited-secure facilities:

* Auburn Residential Center in Auburn in Cayuga County
* Adirondack Wilderness Program in Schuyler Falls in Clinton County
* Brace Residential Center in Masonville in Delaware County
* Gloversville Group Home in Gloversville in Fulton County
* Great Valley Residential Center in Great Valley in Cattaraugus County
* Pyramid Reception Center in The Bronx

The agency also is reducing by half the number of beds at:

* Lansing Residential Center in Lansing in Tompkins County

There are presently 35 residential facilities in the system. With these closings there will be 28.

Effect

These changes take effect 12 months from today’s announcement, per state law.

Savings

These closings, reductions, and mergers will result in $16 million in annual savings, making possible investments in community-based programs and services for vulnerable youth.

Reductions

Since 2002, OCFS has reduced 379 beds in its residential facilities. With these closings, the total reduction of beds rises to 620.

The Parents

OCFS staff will be calling all the parents of the remaining children in these underutilized facilities to inform them of the closings and following up by mail.

Facility Details

Adirondack Residential is a non-secure and limited secure residential facility for boys. It has 24 beds. Adirondack Wilderness Challenge is a four-month residential and outdoor experiential education program for boys 13 to 17-years-old, which includes hiking and overnight camping trips. These programs have 25 full-time positions. This property belongs to the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

Auburn Residential Center is a non-secure facility for girls aged 13 to 17-years-old. It has 24 beds, but only three children. It has 25 full-time positions.

Brace is a limited secure facility for juvenile delinquents aged 12 to 17-years-old. It has 25 beds, but only six children. It has 25 full-time positions. This property belongs to the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

Cass Residential Center is currently used as a training facility. It has 25 full-time positions. It will be transferred to the state Department of Parks & Recreation, which will continue to use it as a training center for its own employees.

Gloversville Group Home has not been in use for over a year. It has seven full-time positions. Its lease, which runs out on June 2008, will be terminated.

Great Valley is a non-secure to limited secure facility for male juvenile delinquents 13 to 18-years-old. It has 25 beds, but only nine children. Great Valley has 25 full-time positions. This property belongs to the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

Lansing is a limited secure facility for female juvenile delinquents aged 12 to 18-years-old. It has 100 beds, but only 48 children. Its capacity will be reduced to 50 beds. Lansing has 32 full-time positions.

Pyramid is a 57-bed reception center on East 161st Street in The Bronx where male juvenile delinquents undertake psychological, educational, vocational, and intake assessment tests over a 14-day orientation to determine their most appropriate placement. It has 90 full-time positions. These reception and assessment functions will be transferred to the Ella McQueen Residential Center on Howard Avenue in Brooklyn.

Criteria

A number of different criteria were considered in decided which facilities to close. These include the condition of the physical plant and the cost involved in upgrading it. This was an important factor in the decision made around moving the intake function out of Pyramid and relocating it to Ella McQueen. Other criteria used were the location of the programs and their geographic proximity to other programs, as was the case with Lansing and Auburn and the Adirondack Wilderness Challenge and Group Home. The proximity of these programs to each other gave OCFS more options for staff reassignment. We also considered the demographic trends of the youth in the facilities and the distance from New York City.

Legal Process

OCFS closings, service and staff reductions, and transfer of any operations must comply with state law. This includes formal announcements to employee labor organizations, individual staffers, local governments where the changes occur, community organizations, and consumer and advocacy groups at least twelve months before changes are scheduled to occur.

The law also requires that the agency coordinate with the state Department of Civil Service, the Office of Employee Relations, and any other state agency to develop strategies to minimize the impact on the state workforce, in cooperation with representatives of employee labor organizations and managerial and confidential employees.

In addition, OCFS must consult with the Department of Economic Development and other appropriate state agencies to minimize the impact on local and regional economies.

Disposition of Property

Per state law, OCFS will be consulting with the Office of General Services on the disposition of these individual properties.

Staff

OCFS will be doing everything possible to minimize the impact these facility closures will have on employees and their families. After all, OCFS’s principal mission is to support all children and families, including our own employees.

Building on the agency’s successful management of the closure of Harlem Valley Secure Center several years ago, OCFS is working closely with the state Departments of Civil Service and Labor to assist the staff at these impacted facilities to identify and secure positions at other facilities or other state agencies.

Agency Mission

The Office of Children and Family Services mission is to promote the well-being, safety, and permanency of New York’s children and families by setting and enforcing policies, building partnerships, and funding and providing high-quality services. The agency is responsible for foster care; adoption; adoption assistance; child protective services, including operating the Statewide Central Register of Child Abuse and Maltreatment; preventive services for children and families; services for pregnant adolescents; child care licensing and funding; and operating the state juvenile justice programs. The agency also is responsible for protective programs for vulnerable adults, including adult protective services and the Commission for the Blind and Visually Handicapped.

Commissioner

New York State Governor Eliot Spitzer named Gladys Carrión, Esq. commissioner of the New York State Office of Children and Family Services in January, 2007. Ms. Carrión previously served as Senior Vice President for Community Investment at United Way of New York City. Prior to that, she was Executive Director of Inwood House from 1999 to 2005. From 1995 to 1999, Ms. Carrión served as Executive Director of Family Dynamics, Inc and in 1994 she was a Program Officer at the Ford Foundation in the Community Development area. Ms. Carrión served as Commissioner of the New York City Community Development Agency from 1990 to 1993. From 1984 to 1988, she worked at the New York State Workers' Compensation Board in a variety of capacities including General Counsel, Supervising Law Judge and Senior Law Judge. Ms. Carrión also served as Acting Executive Director of ASPIRA from 1982 to 1983. She received her B.S. from Fordham University in 1973 and her J.D. from the New York University School of Law in 1976.

Contact Information
Edward Borges
Director of Communications
NYS Office of Children and Family Services
518.473.7793
edward.borges@ocfs.state.ny.us
52 Washington Street, Suite 305 South
Rensselaer, NY

http://readme.readmedia.com/news/show/NY-Office-of-Children-Family-Services-
Accelerating-Transformation-of-Juvenile-Justice-System/36957

Posted by lois at 04:47 PM | Comments (0)

Reaction to Schwarzenegger's state budget proposals

"The governor's budget recognizes that the only way to cut prison spending is to reduce the number of people in prison. The next step is to make permanent changes and to reduce the number of prisons in the state, not build 53,000 more cells as envisioned in (legislation Schwarzenegger signed last year)." ‹ Debbie Reyes, California Prison Moratorium Project."

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/01/10/state/n163556S54
.DTL&type=politics

Reaction to Schwarzenegger's state budget proposals
By The Associated Press
Thursday, January 10, 2008

(01-10) 16:35 PST , (AP) --
Here is a sample of the reaction to state budget proposals announced Thursday by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, which included across-the-board cuts, early release of more than 22,000 prisoners, some fee increases and state park closures:

"The budget proposed today is what a cuts-only budget looks like. ... Clearly, if it is passed as written, it would cause tremendous, permanent pain to the people of California." ‹ Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, D-Los Angeles.

"I agree with the governor (that) we cannot tax our way out of this problem. We must regain control of spending and live within our means." ‹ Senate Minority Leader Dick Ackerman, R-Tustin.

"The governor says the system is broken, but then he says we have to live with whatever the system spits out ‹ even if that means closing parks, socking it to the students and ignoring the elderly, poor and disabled. We have real problems, but this is an overly pessimistic solution. The budget is asking us to abandon our values." ‹ Assemblywoman Patty Berg, D-Eureka.

"By no means can we solve California's budget problems by raiding the taxpayers' wallets. Though cuts are never easy, with over $140 billion annually flowing into the state's coffers, it is clear that we must cut the fat from the bloated Sacramento bureaucracy." ‹ Sen. Dennis Hollingsworth, R-Temecula.

"At a time when California must make substantial investment in schools in order for our young people to survive and succeed in the global economy, the governor's budget takes a giant step backward. I fear that the 'year of education' will become the year of education evisceration." ‹ state Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell.

"If anybody can tell me how we can cut the budget to a point where we are happy in California and there are no new taxes, I would be happy to entertain that. I don't think that day is going to come soon." ‹ Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, D-Oakland.

"When fees rise, qualified and hardworking students are blocked from attending the University of California. Already fees have risen faster than the average income of hardworking Californians. The governor's budget proposal could mean fees climb by more than 7.4 percent, which students just cannot take." ‹ Louise Hendrickson, president of the University of California Student Association.

"Today, the governor took aim at California's treasured state parks, releasing a budget that contains the most draconian cuts ever considered for the state park system. Never before have so many parks, and such a diversity of state parks, state historic parks, state recreation areas and state beaches been placed on the chopping block. The millions of Californians who visit their parks will not tolerate this and will lead the fight to keep our state parks open." ‹ California State Parks Foundation.

"Slashing payments that will go toward providing health care to the poor will only exacerbate the health care crisis in California. These cuts will force doctors out of this important program, will force hospitals and clinics to close their doors and will force tens of thousands of patients to get their care in emergency rooms." ‹ Richard Frankenstein, president of the California Medical Association.

"The governor's budget recognizes that the only way to cut prison spending is to reduce the number of people in prison. The next step is to make permanent changes and to reduce the number of prisons in the state, not build 53,000 more cells as envisioned in (legislation Schwarzenegger signed last year)." ‹ Debbie Reyes, California Prison Moratorium Project.

"While the choices before us are difficult ones, across-the-board cuts, including the Legislature's budget, are a good way to start the discussion about how to cut spending because they avoid picking winners and losers. One thing is clear: Higher taxes will do nothing to solve the problem, and Republicans stand united in rejecting any attempt to raise taxes." ‹ Assembly Minority Leader Mike Villines, R-Clovis.

"The governor's budget proposal justly recognizes that increasing small business taxes would hamper the ability of California small businesses to create new jobs and greater state revenue at a time when both are gravely needed." ‹ John Kabateck, California executive director of the National Federation of Independent Business.

Posted by lois at 10:30 AM | Comments (0)

January 09, 2008

CT: Gov. Rell Resists Calling for New Prisons

"Still, Mrs. Rell deferred making recommendations on costlier issues ‹ such as hiring new support workers for the parole board, increasing the use of tracking devices for offenders and possibly expanding an already overcrowded prison system ‹ until the Assembly resumes in February for its regular session, when budgetary questions can be addressed. For now, she said, the system could handle any anticipated increase in the prison population."

January 9, 2008, NY Times
Rell Urges Strengthening Connecticut Justice System
By ALISON LEIGH COWAN

HARTFORD — In the aftermath of last summer’s grisly home invasion in which a mother and her daughters were killed, Gov. M. Jodi Rell on Tuesday proposed a package of measures intended to bolster Connecticut’s criminal justice system.

The man whose family was murdered in the ordeal, Dr. William A. Petit Jr., welcomed the governor’s gesture and called it “a good start toward improving public safety,” but added that “some of these things may not have protected my family even if they were in place.”

At a news conference here with legislative leaders, Governor Rell presented her recommendations, which included a stiffer law for home invasions, the formation of a full-time parole board and notification of victims when a criminal is considered for release.

A sign of how crucial the views of Dr. Petit have become in the debate came when the governor said she had discussed her recommendations with him before the news conference. Lawmakers have also received late-night e-mail messages from Dr. Petit in recent weeks, pressing them to fix a system that has many people feeling vulnerable.

In a telephone interview Tuesday after the news conference, Dr. Petit said, “I realize that none of this will bring my family back, and some of these things may not have protected my family even if they were in place, but it’s just amazing how many cracks there are in the system when people looked.”

In the first newspaper interview he has granted since the July 23 attack in his home in suburban Cheshire, Dr. Petit said he particularly welcomed the governor’s support for classifying more home burglaries as a violent crime and for strengthening the Board of Pardons and Paroles, which he had previously described as a “total failure.”

Under the governor’s proposal, by July 1 the seven part-time members of the board would be replaced with five full-time people who would assemble a “complete file” on offenders before authorizing an inmate’s release.

The governor, a Republican, also called on the Democratic-controlled General Assembly to strengthen the laws on persistent offenders by imposing minimum penalties on career criminals and subjecting some three-time violent offenders to life in prison. Breaking with members of her own party, who wanted to see an automatic life sentence for certain career criminals, Mrs. Rell said her proposal would allow repeat offenders sentenced to life to appeal after 30 years. Top Democrats have been resisting proposals that might limit the flexibility of judges to use their discretion in sentencing.

Dr. Petit said he thought that a properly written “three-strikes-you’re-out” law made common sense.

“It’s almost beyond belief that you could commit a violent crime and be convicted by a jury of your peers and then get out, and commit a second violent crime and be convicted by a jury of your peers, and then commit a third violent crime and then be convicted by a jury of your peers and still get out,” he said softly. “If you haven’t figured it out yet, then you probably won’t, and you should not have the right to remain in civilized society.”

Top Democratic legislators found most of her proposals consistent with their own ideas. “Some of the stuff is common sense and crosses party lines,” said Dr. Petit, hopeful that the proposals can win bipartisan support.

Indicative of the air of cooperation that surrounded the news conference, the governor jokingly offered her reading glasses to the House speaker, James A. Amann, as he was about to speak. He, in turn, said, “Ninety-five percent of what the governor has here, on its face, I think we can support,” and promised to schedule a special session later this month to advance what he expected would be a bipartisan bill.

Still, Mrs. Rell deferred making recommendations on costlier issues — such as hiring new support workers for the parole board, increasing the use of tracking devices for offenders and possibly expanding an already overcrowded prison system — until the Assembly resumes in February for its regular session, when budgetary questions can be addressed. For now, she said, the system could handle any anticipated increase in the prison population.

Democratic lawmakers were not satisfied. They have been pressing her to acknowledge that the prisons are overtaxed, and want her to commit more resources to helping nonviolent offenders when they are released. On Tuesday, she said she could support increased financing for such programs, but stopped short of doing much beyond commissioning a study.

Another feature of her proposal would give the pardons and parole board access to information on juvenile offenders, which it cannot see now. “We have to have that kind of information to make appropriate decisions,” she said.

Posted by lois at 07:52 PM | Comments (0)

Georgia: Inmates Sue Corrections Officers

National Briefing | South
Georgia: Inmates Sue Corrections Officers

Published: January 9, 2008, NY Times

A group of prisoners filed a class-action lawsuit contending that corrections officers have systematically beaten restrained inmates in prisons throughout the state, leaving two dead and dozens of others injured. The lawsuit, filed in Federal District Court in Valdosta, names 25 guards and other corrections officials as culprits in routine beatings and torture of inmates. It also claims that they subsequently covered up the abuses by inflicting even more beatings on prisoners who filed complaints. Most of the incidents reportedly took place from 2003 to 2005.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/09/us/09brfs-INMATESSUECO_BRF.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=Georgia+prisons&oref=slogin

Posted by lois at 05:03 PM | Comments (0)

January 08, 2008

Arresting African Americans: How Drug Laws Redistribute Wealth

January 7, 2008
Our View - Tuesday
Colorado Springs Gazette
Arresting blacks: How drug laws redistribute wealth

Anew report tells us something most already knew: Blacks in El Paso County are far more likely than whites to be incarcerated for drug crimes. El Paso County blacks are a whopping seven times more apt than whites to be imprisoned for drugs, based on a national report by the Justice Policy Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that wants to reform sentencing policies.

Though El Paso County residents should be outraged, blacks in some parts of the country face prison for drugs at 10 times the rate of whites.

The solution to this de facto racism, of course, is simple: Stop imprisoning people for trading in drugs or using them.

Recreational drug use isn’t good, and black leaders, as well as white leaders, should do everything possible to eradicate it from their communities. But the government’s war on drugs has done little, if anything, to curtail drug use among blacks or any other Americans. A reduction in drug use involves the work of counselors, parents, teachers, preachers, doctors and friends. It takes a culture, not armed state agents charged with feeding a growth industry of incarceration.

Joel Dyer, author of “The Perpetual Prisoner Machine; How America Profits from Crime,” told The Gazette that blacks are disproportionately arrested for drugs mostly because of their collective economic plight.

“We still have a higher percentage of blacks than whites living in poverty,” Dyer said. “In policing, communities tend to have more enforcement in minority and low income neighborhoods. That means if you’re using drugs, and you live in one of those neighborhoods, you’re more likely to get caught. You are likely to be defended by a busy public defender’s office, rather than a private lawyer who can spend ample time and money on your case. Once you’re in prison for drugs, you stand a good chance of becoming a violent criminal because it’s tough to survive in prison.”

Dyer, an expert on the public/private prison phenomenon, explains that for nonviolent drug convicts, survival in the joint often involves joining a race-based prison gang that mandates violent behavior.

“Stiff penalties for drug crimes can actually generate violent crime because drug convicts eventually get released, having become violent in prison,” Dyer said.

Research by author and former law professor David Kopel, of the Golden-based Independence Institute, has found that incarceration of drug criminals diverts law enforcement resources from violent crime and results in shorter sentences for violent criminals. That’s partly because imprisonment of common drug offenders has created a cell shortage. Burgeoning inmate populations have left sheriffs and politicians throughout the country clamoring for new and bigger prisons for the past decade. When voters balk at funding them, private corporations build the institutions and charge the state for feeding and housing inmates.

In a system that has turned drug users into a cash commodity, some local sheriffs are soliciting them the way motel chains woo travelers. Last year, the Park County Sheriff’s Office published a flier that said: “Overcrowding a problem? House your prisoners in our ‘park.’ ” Park County transports them, houses them and feeds them in the jail for $45 a day — the cost of a cheap motel room.

Drug sentences conveniently feed an informal and slightly delusional pact of public servants and private profiteers desperate for more prison space needed to grow an industry founded on a fake, government-mandated need.

Any society that views human captivity as economic development isn’t well. Prisoners are not functional, productive members of society. They are dependent liabilities that drain money, time and energy from productive elements of the community. While some who traffic in prisoners earn profits, it’s merely a redistribution of wealth with a negative economic outcome for everyone else.

We need prisons in order that governments — not profiteers — can protect us from violent predators and those who steal wealth and destroy property. Prisons and jails are necessary evils, not societal assets.

Official drug prohibition results in a dangerous and sometimes violent black market, as forbidden trade usually does. In this case, the underground market has spawned a judicial racket that places a price on human heads. Based on our history, it’s not surprising that the humans in our modern inmate trade are disproportionately black.
http://www.gazette.com/opinion/drug_31716___article.html/county_violent.html

Posted by lois at 09:30 PM | Comments (0)

Baltimore is Suing Wells Fargo Over Lending Practices in Wave of Foreclosures

January 8, 2008
Baltimore Is Suing Bank Over Foreclosure Crisis
By GRETCHEN MORGENSON
NY Times
Baltimore’s mayor and City Council are suing Wells Fargo Bank, contending that its lending practices discriminated against black borrowers and led to a wave of foreclosures that has reduced city tax revenues and increased its costs.

The recent surge in homeowner defaults nationwide, generated by lax lending practices during the real estate boom, has officials bracing for a range of problems that often accompany foreclosures. Some municipalities, including Cleveland and Buffalo, are trying to make lenders responsible for abandoned properties to ward off crimes like arson, drug use and prostitution.

But the civil suit that officials in Baltimore are filing in United States District Court may presage another type of litigation against lenders by municipalities facing shortfalls in their budgets.

In the suit, Mayor Sheila Dixon joined with the City Council to ask that the court bar Wells Fargo from charging higher fees to black borrowers. Many of these borrowers paid more under the bank’s subprime lending program, designed for less creditworthy consumers, and are more likely to default on their loans.

In 2006, Wells Fargo made high-cost loans, with an interest rate at least three percentage points above a federal benchmark, to 65 percent of its black customers in Baltimore and to only 15 percent of its white customers in the area, according to the lawsuit. Similarly, refinancings to black borrowers were more likely to be higher cost than to white ones and to carry prepayment penalties.

The complaint requests unspecified damages to cover the diminished property tax revenues and higher costs that the city said it had incurred. Additional costs include those for fire and police protection in hard-hit neighborhoods and expenditures to buy and rehabilitate vacant properties.

Kevin Waetke, a Wells Fargo spokesman, rejected the contention that race was a factor in the bank’s pricing of mortgage loans. “We do not tolerate illegal discrimination against or unfair treatment of any consumer,” Mr. Waetke said. “Our loan pricing is based on credit risk. We are committed to serving all customers fairly — our continued growth depends on it.”

But Suzanne Sangree, chief solicitor for the Baltimore City Law Department, said: “This wave of foreclosures in minority neighborhoods really threatens to undermine the tremendous progress the city has made in developing distressed neighborhoods and moving the city ahead economically. Wells Fargo could do a lot, as well as other banks that have engaged in similar practices, to help to curb the flood of foreclosures that the city is experiencing now.”

Among the practices cited by the city, Wells Fargo allowed mortgage brokers to charge higher commissions when they put borrowers in loans with higher interest rates than the customers qualified for based on their credit profiles. The bank also failed to underwrite mortgage loans to traditional criteria, the suit said, setting up the borrowers for default. Such practices were common at many lenders during the boom.

Now, Baltimore is a city in a foreclosure crisis, according to the complaint. Citing figures from the Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development, the suit said foreclosure-related events in the city, including notices of default, foreclosure sales and lenders’ purchases of foreclosed properties, rose more than five times between the first and second quarters of 2007.

Wells Fargo has been the largest or second-largest provider of mortgage loans to Baltimore borrowers since 2004, according to the lawsuit. From 2004 through 2006, Wells Fargo made at least 1,285 mortgage loans a year to area residents with a total value of more than $600 million. Wells Fargo now has the largest number of foreclosures in Baltimore of any lender, the suit stated.

Half of the Wells Fargo foreclosures in 2006 occurred in census tracts with populations that were more than 80 percent black, the suit said. Meanwhile, only 16 percent of the foreclosures were found in tracts with populations that are 20 percent or less black. Figures for 2007 were similar, the city said.

John P. Relman, a lawyer at Relman & Dane in Washington, represents the City of Baltimore in its case against Wells Fargo. “Foreclosures have a more profound effect in minority communities because they are closest to the line of distressed neighborhoods in many cities,” Mr. Relman said. “That causes big problems for the cities, not just the lost income from taxes but also the long-term social costs. Programs are going to be needed to stabilize the communities to be rebuilt.”

The Baltimore complaint cited a 2005 study showing that foreclosures required more municipal services and higher costs. The study, commissioned by the Homeownership Preservation Foundation of Minneapolis, identified 26 different costs incurred by government agencies responding to foreclosures in Chicago and in Cook County, Ill., in 2003 and 2004. The analysis concluded that total costs reached $34,199 for each foreclosure.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/08/us/08baltimore.html?ei=5070&en=a4d9023afd721d44&ex=1200459600&pagewanted=print

Posted by lois at 06:35 PM | Comments (0)

ACLU Hopes Candidates Won’t Make Straw Man of Sensible Sentencing Reforms

ACLU Hopes Candidates Won’t Make Straw Man of Sensible Sentencing Reforms (1/7/2008)

Eliminating mandatory minimums is a step to fixing unjust laws; lawmakers should not fear reforms

Washington, DC The American Civil Liberties Union Washington Legislative Office, a non-partisan organization, believes Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) was mistaken when she called ending mandatory minimum sentences a controversial position. The organization urges all candidates, from all parties, to oppose mandatory minimum sentencing and support legislation to close the sentencing disparities between crack and powder cocaine.

The policy of mandatory minimum sentencing has led to thousands of people serving longer jail sentences and has contributed to the unfair sentencing disparities between federal crack and powder cocaine offenses that disproportionately affect people of color.

The following can be attributed to ACLU Legislative Counsel Jesselyn McCurdy:

"There is nothing controversial about allowing judges to give people the punishment they deserve based on the crime they committed. Mandatory minimum sentences take the authority away from judges and give it to prosecutors to determine a person¹s sentence.

"Even a predominantly conservative Supreme Court recognized in a 7-2 decision in the Kimbrough case that judges need to have more sentencing discretion; that does not sound like a controversial stance. We want to change sentencing laws for one reason: to keep our justice system just. Doing the right thing is more important than the fear of a political attack. We hope every candidate will stand up against unfair sentencing laws."
ttp://www.aclu.org/drugpolicy/sentencing/33536prs20080107.html

Posted by lois at 05:38 PM | Comments (0)

January 07, 2008

Parents, relatives call for independent investigation of deaths at RHUs in PA

Huntingdon PA Daily News Staff Writer
January 6, 2008
By GEORGE GERMANN
Parents, relatives, friends and prison-rights advocates are calling for an independent investigation into suicide deaths that happened within the past six months in the Restricted Housing Unit (RHU) at SCI Smithfield. About two dozen participated in a vigil Saturday at the state prison in an effort to gain support for such an investigation.
Inmate suicides do occur, but what is troubling is the fact that of the over two dozen-plus prisons operated by the state Department of
Corrections, fully one-third of those suicides took place in the
Smithfield prison's RHU.

"We are seeking to raise awareness and an outside oversight into the
conditions at Smithfield," Naimi Black of the American Friends Service
Committee - a Quaker organization - told The Daily News. "Three suicides

in six months should be a red flag."

Prior to Saturday's vigil, Lisa Hollibaugh, the spokesperson for SCI
Smithfield, told The Daily News the deaths were unfortunate, but said,
"there was nothing more staff could have done."All policies and procedures were followed," said Hollibaugh. "There is a review of all deaths" that happen in a prison.She also stated that any time an inmate alleges abuse, the allegation is"taken very seriously by the
institution and the DOC (Department of Corrections)."

But the raw data concerning the number of inmate suicides at the
Smithfield prison are discomforting. Of the nine inmate suicides in the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections system, three occurred at

Smithfield between June and December. There were two suicides at
Rockview and one each at Albion, Greene, Muncy and Waymart.
One of the organizers of the vigil was Angelina Zheng, whose brother,
Joe Holguin, is reported to have hanged himself Oct. 29.
"He was on his way home," said Zheng. "My brother did not want to die." Zheng said that she received letters from her brother warning that something may happen to him. "He said, don't let them get away with it." The other inmate suicides at Smithfield include Joe Kapa Jr. June 25 andClifford Finney Dec. 2.Evelin Finney said her son claimed in letters that he may be murdered at the prison.

Relatives said that all of the inmates who committed suicide had mental health issues."What we want is an independent investigation," said Zheng. "These people are in pain," she said of the others at the vigil.

Joe Kapa Sr. said his son was only a couple of months away from being
released and had been in prison for over a decade. He questions why his son would commit suicide so close to being released.

Those at the vigil also claimed they were harassed by a prison
corrections officer Saturday.Prison staff had cordoned off an area in a field across from the prison, an area that would have held thousands.

Posted by lois at 09:18 PM | Comments (0)

Virginia's prison population forecast to rise. To house estimated 6,700 more inmates by 2013, state builds, expands sites

"It's going to require building one prison a year. I don't like that fact. But I think that spending a hundred million a year to keep violent criminals and drug dealers out of my neighborhood is worth it." - chairman of the Virginia State Crime Commission

Virginia's prison population forecast to rise
To house estimated 6,700 more inmates by 2013, state builds, expands sites

Monday, Jan 07, 2008 - 12:09 AM

By FRANK GREEN
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER

Since 1990, in response to rising crime, predictions of rising crime and tougher sentencing, Virginia has approved 21,000 new prison beds at a cost of more than $1 billion.

Barring the unexpected, more prisons are in Virginia's future.

By 2013, Virginia's prison population is expected to grow by 6,700 men and women to 44,700. A half-dozen major prison projects -- costing roughly $300 million -- are planned, under way or have been recently completed.

As of June 30, 2007, there were 38,007 state inmates -- 32,651 in more than 40 prisons, field units, work release centers and one privately run prison. The rest were held for the state in local and regional jails.

The Virginia Department of Corrections, now the state's largest agency with more than 13,000 employees, manages a population of felons larger than the cities of Manassas, Petersburg, Fredericksburg or Winchester.

"More offenders are being committed to prison, and they are incarcerated, on average, for longer periods," Deputy Secretary of Public Safety Barry Green said.

The department's annual budget topped $1 billion this year for the first time. Virginia, however, is not imprisoning its residents at a rate higher than other states.

According to the most recent federal figures available, 472 men and women were in prison for every 100,000 Virginians. The national average was almost 500. Virginia's per capita spending on prisons ranks 20th among states and its crime rate 37th.

Officials say that the equivalent of a new prison is needed for every 1,100 additional inmates. Each such prison costs roughly $100 million to build and $25 million a year to operate.

After the 2010 completion of a new prison in Grayson County, more prisons will be needed if the forecast for 2013 proves accurate. However, the Department of Corrections and others caution that it is difficult to predict five years ahead.

Del. David B. Albo, R-Fairfax, says, contrary to popular belief, Virginia prisons are not holding many, if any, nonviolent, first-time property or drug-ossession offenders.

"These prisons are basically full of very bad guys," said Albo, chairman of the Virginia State Crime Commission and the House Courts of Justice Committee. "The public policy choice is, do you think they should be in prison or out in the neighborhoods?"

"If you think that they should be in prison, you're going to have to build the prisons," he said.

"It's going to require building one prison a year. I don't like that fact. But I think that spending a hundred million a year to keep violent criminals and drug dealers out of my neighborhood is worth it."

According to state figures, violent offenders are forming a growing part of the prison population. Since 1994, the percentage of violent offenders in state prisons has increased from 69 percent to 79 percent (with burglary counted as a violent offense).

But critics, including Marc Mauer, executive director of The Sentencing Project in Washington, insists Virginia and other states are imprisoning many people who are not dangerous public-safety risks.

Mauer agrees that there are few first-time, nonviolent offenders in prisons. "The question is, even if somebody is there because they're a secondor third-time car thief, is that still the best way to spend $25,000 a year?" he said.

"We should be looking at other intensive supervision options in the community that can be far less costly than incarceration and arguably more productive in keeping the offender in the community," he said.

Mauer contends that "it's not a question of prison or do nothing -- it's what else could we do as an alternative [to prison] that both protects the public and changes behavior in a less costly way." While the numbers are sobering, in some rural areas prisons are a welcome source of employment. It is, however, a hardship for those in the urban eastern and northern parts of Virginia who have friends or relatives in far away prisons.

In addition to the growing number of state prisoners, Gov. Timothy M. Kaine is considering putting 1,000 nonstate inmates into state prisons through 2010 as a way to help save $19 million a year.

Less than a decade ago,Virginia had more than 3,000 surplus beds -- roughly one-tenth of the system's total capacity -- and rented them to other states and the District of Columbia. Those inmates are long gone, their bunks filling up with Virginia criminals.

Cells were available to rent, in part, because Virginia built prisons in the mid-to-late 1990s anticipating a crime wave that did not occur. Instead of climbing as predicted, violent crime here and across the U.S. dropped dramatically from 1993 to 2000.

However, from 2000 to 2006, the number of violent crimes in Virginia rose by 8.1 percent. (While the rate of violent crime per capita remained largely steady, the total number of violent crimes rose at least as fast as the population in general.)

At the same time, the number of arrests increased by 14.3 percent. Also, the number of individuals sentenced to prison each year rose 42 percent, from 9,183 to 13,071.

Nearly half of the inmates entering Virginia prisons violated terms of their probation. Most committed a new crime, but 15 percent to 20 percent had technical violations, such as repeatedly failing drug tests.

The Kaine administration, other policymakers and the Department of Corrections are trying to keep freed prisoners from winding up back behind bars as a way of cutting the need for more prisons.

Not only are the number of prison admissions rising, but with the end of parole and new sentencing guidelines for crimes committed on or after Jan. 1, 1995, the length of time served by inmates has been growing, particularly for violent and repeat offenders.

All totaled, as of June 30, 2007, one of 44 adult Virginians were in prison, jail or under state or local probation supervision.

"If we have to build more prisons to keep our citizens safe, we should do that," said Green, the deputy secretary. "But if we find better ways to prevent reoffending, we should act on those first."

http://www.inrich.com/cva/ric/news.apx.-content-articles-RTD-2008-01-07-0147
.html

Posted by lois at 09:12 PM | Comments (0)

January 06, 2008

NY Times: Can Foundations Take the Long View Again?

The New York Times
January 6, 2008
Re:Framing
Can Foundations Take the Long View Again?
By DENISE CARUSO

AS business leaders like Ted Turner, Bill Gates and George Soros have moved vast swaths of their private wealth into the philanthropic sector, market expertise has migrated there, too. As a result, foundation directors, trustees and advisers from corporate America have taken a stance that the return on charitable dollars should be tangible and measurable, and should drive capital flow in much the same way that earnings figures do in commerce.

But a small and increasingly vocal group of foundation leaders is challenging the benefits of this approach.

“In the 1980s and early 1990s, there was a huge push for private philanthropy to be more accountable and to spend more time being goal-driven,” said Kathleen Enright, the executive director of Grantmakers for Effective Organizations, a Washington-based coalition of foundations that promotes ways to improve nonprofit results.

Advisers and trustees compelled foundations to redirect their unrestricted grants to more discrete, short-term projects — for example, distributing mosquito nets in malaria regions — that would deliver a measurable bang for the buck.

“The reason the nonprofit sector exists at all is because it can fund and invest in social issues that the for-profit market can’t touch because they can’t be measured,” said Paul Shoemaker, a former Microsoft employee and entrepreneur who is now executive director of the Seattle affiliate of Social Venture Partners International, a philanthropic network. “The nonprofit ‘market’ is not designed to be efficient in that way. Yet we’re applying the same efficiency metrics to both sectors.”

As a consequence, when foundations switched to project-based accounting, they forced grantees to sacrifice long-term effectiveness for short-term efficiency, Ms. Enright said. Nonprofits could no longer afford to focus on important strategic activities like advocacy or working for social change, which require “deep resources and the ability to change tactics overnight if the situation demands it,” she said.

In addition, critics say, project-based funding allows grantees to collect only a fraction of their real overhead costs. According to “In Search of Impact,” a 2006 study of foundation grant-making practices from the Center for Effective Philanthropy, foundation chief executives will allow a nonprofit to add only 10 to 30 percent of direct project costs for overhead. Some refuse to provide any operational costs at all.

The financial strain knocks many promising nonprofits out of business.

“Everyone is managing against the perception that nonprofits are supposed to be low-cost and low-overhead,” said Thomas Tierney, chairman and co-founder of the Bridgespan Group, a Boston-based consultancy and search firm for nonprofits that was founded at Bain & Company. The only way for nonprofits to increase their working capital is to take on more projects, which in turn keeps increasing the amount of capital they need — a “vicious cycle that perpetually starves them of capacity,” Mr. Tierney said.

The issue is not a lack of charitable capital. In 2005, grant-making foundations distributed more than $36 billion on assets of $550 billion, up from grants of $1.94 billion on assets of just over $30 billion in 1975, according to the Foundation Center, an organization based in New York that maintains a comprehensive database on the philanthropic sector in the United States.

Based on its data, the Center for Effective Philanthropy concluded that the present situation was limiting the effectiveness of those charitable dollars. After surveying nearly 20,000 grantees of 163 foundations and interviewing 79 foundation chief executives and 26 leaders of nonprofits, it recommended that to maximize the impact on grant recipients, foundations “should make larger, longer-term operating grants” of unrestricted funds that can be used to support the organization and its overall mission, not just specific projects or programs.

Two other recent publications reached the same conclusion: the “General Operating Support Action Guide” for foundations, published by the Grantmakers group in July 2007; and “Daring to Lead 2006,” a survey of nearly 2,000 nonprofit executives conducted by CompassPoint Nonprofit Services and the Eugene and Agnes E. Meyer Foundation.

Their findings echo the experiences of a handful of foundations at the vanguard of the movement to provide more operating support to charities over the last 10 years. They include the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation, the Philadelphia Foundation, the Whitman Institute and organizations like Social Venture Partners.

These grant makers have successfully shown that providing nonprofits with operating support “does not mean forking over tens of thousands of dollars and relinquishing expectations for results,” the Grantmakers’ report said.

Instead, they have built due diligence and accountability measures into their agreements that go much deeper than simple project budgets and reports.

The Edna McConnell Clark Foundation in New York, for example, has created a detailed system for evaluating results of general operating support grants to organizations that work to improve the lives of low-income youths.

David Hunter, the former director of assessment at the foundation, said in an interview published in the Grantmakers’ report that agreements between the Clark foundation and its grantees include specific milestones that are clear indicators of progress. They include benefits for the youths who benefit from the nonprofit’s charitable work, not just “process milestones for the organization.”

Each of the three reports concluded that general operating support yielded better results for foundations and grantees alike, particularly as larger grants are offered over a longer period.

Yet in 2005, according to the Foundation Center, only 20 percent of grants from the largest private and community foundations were designated for general operating support. A majority of foundation leaders polled in the studies acknowledged that unrestricted operating funds were better and more effective for grantees. But they continue to focus their grant-making on project support, they said, because they prefer its clear-cut results and because their boards often mandate project support as a way to show a foundation’s prominence in a specific funding area.

WHILE this may be good for a foundation’s image, Ms. Enright said, it can turn nonprofits into glorified vendors that provide only the services the foundation requests, sapping the sector of both passion and innovation.

“The presumption is that the donor knows more about how to address a given problem than its grantees, and I think that’s usually not a correct presumption,” she said. “More operating support can shift the locus of action and ideas to the people who are closest to the problem.”

Denise Caruso is executive director of the Hybrid Vigor Institute, which studies collaborative problem-solving.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/business/06frame.html?ei=5070&en=d0c154fe833571a9&ex=1200286800&pagewanted=print

Posted by lois at 03:41 PM | Comments (0)

Kinkri Devi: Fought Illegal Mining in India

January 6, 2008
Kinkri Devi Is Dead at 82; Fought Illegal Mining in India
By HARESH PANDYA

Kinkri Devi, an illiterate and impoverished woman who had waged a long and at least partly successful fight against illegal mining and quarrying in the mountainous northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh, died last Sunday in Chandigarh, India. She was 82.

The cause was age-related ailments, family sources said.

Ms. Devi was born into a poor Dalit, or untouchable, family in the village of Ghaton in 1925. Her father was a subsistence farmer. That she came from a low caste made her struggle against powerful and politically connected mining interests all the more remarkable.

With no hope of an education, she began working as a servant in early childhood and, at 14, married Shamu Ram, a bonded laborer. He died of typhoid when she was just 22, and she was forced to become a sweeper.

Over the years, she watched the world around her change for the worse. Uncontrolled quarrying despoiled the fabled hills in many parts of Himachal Pradesh, harming the water supply and destroying once-rich paddy fields. Seeing the damage in her own district, she vowed to take on the mining interests.

Backed by People’s Action for People in Need, a local volunteer group, Ms. Devi filed a public interest lawsuit in the High Court of Shimla, the state capital, against 48 mine owners, accusing them of reckless limestone quarrying. The quarry owners dismissed her campaign, saying she was only trying to blackmail them.

After a long period with no response to her suit, she headed for Shimla and staged a 19-day hunger strike outside the court until it agreed to take up the issue. The strike won Ms. Devi national and international headlines. In 1987, the High Court not only ordered a stay on mining but also imposed a blanket ban on blasting in the hills.

Faced with the prospect of closing their operations, her opponents threatened to kill her, but she continued to fight. The mine owners appealed to the Supreme Court of India, which ruled against them in July 1995, adding to Ms. Devi’s renown.

The same year, still working as a sweeper, she was invited to attend the International Women’s Conference in Beijing because of the keen interest taken in her by Hillary Rodham Clinton, then the first lady.

A private organization sponsored her trip to China, where Mrs. Clinton asked her to light the lamp at the inaugural function. She spoke to thunderous applause about how the enchanting Himalayas were being degraded by illegal limestone quarrying and how it was up to ordinary people like her to save the environment.

Despite Ms. Devi’s efforts and the Supreme Court ruling, quarrying continues not only in the hills but also in the forest preserves, though with some improved regulation.

She is survived by a son and 12 grandchildren.

Ms. Devi, who could neither read nor write and learned to sign her name just a few years ago, also waged a long campaign for opening a degree-granting college in Sangrah, the village where she spent most of her life.

“It wasn’t in my destiny to study,” she said, “but I don’t want others to suffer the way I did for want of education.”

Posted by lois at 03:36 PM | Comments (0)

LA Times: Prisoners of panic. Media hype and political quick fixes have swelled our inmate population

Los Angeles Times
Prisoners of panic
Media hype and political quick fixes have swelled our inmate population.
By Joe Domanick
January 6, 2008

How much more folly, absurdity, fiscal irresponsibility and human tragedy will we endure before we stop tolerating the political pandering that has dictated our criminal justice law and policy over the last two decades?

The pattern has become all too clear. Our politicians, fearful of being labeled "soft on crime," react to sensationalistic coverage of a crime with knee-jerk, quick-fix answers. Only years later do the mistakes, false assumptions and unexpected consequences begin to emerge, and then the criminal justice system is forced to deal with the mess created by the bad lawmaking.

For example, remember the great crack scare of the 1980s? When basketball superstar Len Bias, who'd been drafted by the Boston Celtics as a franchise player, died of a crack overdose, the media went wild in covering it. Alarmed by the sudden increase in crack use and fearful that the drug was highly addictive and disposed users to commit violence, Congress mandated tough minimum sentences for crack-related crimes. A defendant convicted of possessing a small amount of crack could receive the same sentence as one possessing 100 times that amount of powder cocaine. Because crack users were disproportionately African American (and powder cocaine users were disproportionately white), 85% of those receiving dealer-like sentences for possession or sale of small amounts of crack were black -- an outcome that helped to fuel widespread perceptions among blacks that there was a double standard of justice in the U.S.

In December, the overly harsh and misguided sentencing policy concocted during the "war on drugs" in the 1980s was finally modified. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that judges were no longer bound by the strict sentencing guidelines, freeing the jurists to craft punishment that best fits the crime and the background of the defendant.

The 1990s produced its own racially tinged crime panics. Led by John J. Dilulio Jr., a political scientist at Princeton University, and William J. Bennett, a former secretary of Education in the Reagan Cabinet, law-and-order proponents declared that the U.S. was being overrun by a new generation of remorseless "super-predators" spawned by crack-head mothers in violence-infested ghettos. Stories of kids committing heinous crimes were common in the media. One of the most sensational occurred in Chicago in October 1994. Two boys, one 10 years old, the other 11, dropped 5-year-old Eric Morse from the 14th floor of a housing project, killing him, because he refused to steal candy for them.

In response to such crimes, politicians across the country passed anti-super-predator laws. In many states, including California, the age kids could be tried as adults was lowered to 14, and in 48 states, the decision to try juveniles as adults was taken away from judges and given to prosecutors. As a result, the number of people under 18 tried as adults rose dramatically through the 1990s, and a small percentage of them were even sentenced to prison. Ironically, the predicted crime explosion caused by super-predators never materialized. Juvenile arrests declined by more than 45% from 1994 to 2004, according to FBI statistics.

But the ultimate example of media hype meeting irresponsible politicians to produce bad public policy is California's three-strikes law. It was chiefly written by Fresno photographer Mike Reynolds after the murder of his daughter, Kimber, in 1992.Introduced in the Legislature, the bill languished until the rape and murder of 12-year-old Polly Klaas in 1993. A network of right-wing talk-radio hosts reacted to the killing by fiercely promoting Reynolds' measure, which had provisions like no other three-strikes bill in that virtually any crime, no matter how petty, could be prosecuted as a third strike.

In 1994, the Legislature unanimously put the measure on the November ballot, and Proposition 184 passed easily. The law would eventually send thousands of Californians to prison for 25 years to life, some for such third-strike crimes as attempting to steal a bottle of vitamins from a drug store, buying a macadamia nut disguised as a $5 rock of cocaine from an undercover cop and shoplifting $2.69 worth of AA batteries.

Today, Californians are still paying the price for that folly and other like-minded laws, not just in the ruined and wasted lives of people sentenced under these laws, but in other ways. There are now tens of thousands of inmates in California convicted of nonviolent crimes and serving out long second- and third-strike sentences, as well as thousands more behind bars because minor crimes were turned into felonies with mandatory minimum sentences.

All these laws have contributed to severe overcrowding in the state's prisons -- as high as 200% of capacity -- that has produced conditions of such "extreme peril" for prisoners and guards that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was forced to declare a systemwide state of emergency in 2006. Since 2003, the inmate population has grown 8%, to about 173,000. But the budget of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has skyrocketed 79%, to $8.5 billion, becoming the fastest-growing category in the state budget and a factor in opening up a $14-billion budget deficit.

The get-tough-on-crime laws also have helped create a crisis in California's prison healthcare system, where spending has risen to $1.9 billion a year, up 263% since 2000. A large part of the problem is that the prison population is aging because inmates are serving the longer sentences approved by lawmakers, and with aging comes more medical problems. The system became so understaffed and dysfunctional that a federal judge ruled that it was causing at least one avoidable death a week through sheer neglect and ineptitude. He has seized the entire prison medical system and placed it under his direct supervision.

Faced with the huge budget deficit and judicial threats to cap the state's prison population, Schwarzenegger's office has been floating the idea of early release for about 22,000 inmates convicted of nonviolent crimes. That 13% cut in prisoners, however, would require legislative approval, something that is by no means certain. The story of crime and punishment in California
-- and the country -- since the 1980s, after all, has been quick-fix answers fueled by media hype. Let's hope that such proposals as releasing nonviolent inmates receive serious attention rather than panicky headlines that lead to bad criminal justice laws.

Joe Domanick, a senior fellow at the USC Annenberg Institute for Justice and Journalism, is writing a book about California's prison system.
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-op-domanick6jan06,1,4632749.story?coll=la-news-comment

FYI---Joe Domanick is the author of an excellent book, “Cruel Injustice: Three Strikes and the Politics of Crime in America’s Golden State.”

Posted by lois at 03:31 PM | Comments (0)

January 05, 2008

15th Dallas County Inmate Since ’01 Is Freed by DNA

January 4, 2008
NY Times
15th Dallas County Inmate Since ’01 Is Freed by DNA
By RALPH BLUMENTHAL
HOUSTON — After nearly 27 years in prison for a rape he did not commit, Charles Chatman walked free on Thursday, the 15th wrongfully convicted prisoner in Dallas County to be exonerated by DNA testing since 2001.
The innocence claims of seven other Dallas-area prisoners are pending, thanks in large part to a crime laboratory that, unlike others in Texas, has preserved evidence going back as long as three decades.
“I’m bitter toward what happened,” Mr. Chatman, 46, said by telephone after Judge John Creuzot of State District Court, who had championed a review of his case, ordered him released in a jubilant Dallas courtroom.

“He’s my fourth one,” said Judge Creuzot, who had invited Mr. Chatman to his courtroom on Wednesday to hear the news that a DNA sample recently taken from him did not match the profile from the rape victim’s vaginal swab of 1981.
The judge said that he had bought Mr. Chatman a T-bone steak for lunch but that he had to instruct him how to use a knife to cut the meat — he was only allowed spoons in prison — and later showed him his first cellular phone and helped him call his family.
Dressed in a new blue blazer, gray slacks, blue shirt and red tie bought by his lawyers, Mr. Chatman said he harbored no feelings of animosity toward the neighbor who had misidentified him as her rapist, earning him a 99-year sentence. But he said he felt he was victimized because he was black.
“I want to let the world know what happened,” he said, “I won’t shy away from that.”
Mr. Chatman, who had been locked up since age 20, said he had lost three chances for release by insisting to the Parole Board, “I never committed the crime.”
He said he wanted to work alongside his lawyers, Jeff Blackburn, Natalie Roetzel and Michelle Moore, to help others he had met in prison prove their innocence. The lawyers work with the Innocence Project of Texas, a consortium of university law clinics that has been using DNA evidence to exonerate people who were wrongly convicted.
The lawyers and District Attorney Craig Watkins of Dallas County credited Judge Creuzot for taking a personal role in the case. But they also said the unusual string of exonerations was made possible by the many specimens saved by the Southwest Institute of Forensic Sciences, the laboratory under contract to Dallas County, and the latest DNA testing by Orchid Cellmark, a leading genetic research organization.
“I think we’re no worse than any other part of the country,” Judge Creuzot, 50, said of the wrongful convictions. “We just keep the samples.”
Mr. Watkins, who made history in 2006 as the first African-American elected a district attorney in Texas, agreed.
“People look at Dallas County as an anomaly,” he said. “We’re not. We just have the DNA.” He said his office had reviewed 80 other claims of wrongful conviction and submitted seven cases for tests.
“This is not the end of it,” he said. “There’s a feeling of finally getting things right in the criminal justice system.”
Mr. Blackburn, chief counsel of the Innocence Project of Texas, said Texas needed an Innocence Commission to officially investigate claims of wrongful conviction. A bill to create a commission died in the Texas Legislature last year.
Exonerations have been making news elsewhere in the country. Since 1973, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, a nonprofit group specializing in capital punishment issues, 126 prisoners in 26 states have been released from death row based on evidence of their innocence. Eight of the cases were in Texas, but Florida led with 22, followed by Illinois with 18, the center said.
The Innocence Project said Mr. Chatman appeared to be the longest-serving prisoner exonerated. In March 2005, a Cuban refugee, Luis Díaz-Martínez, was released as innocent after 26 years in prison for a rash of rapes in the Miami area.

Posted by lois at 05:24 PM | Comments (0)

NY Times Editorial: Juvenile Detention Trap

January 5, 2008
Editorial, NY Times
Juvenile Detention Trap

One way to lessen the chance that troubled young people grow up to be full-fledged criminals is to send them to community-based counseling and probation programs instead of to detention centers where they are often traumatized and inducted into a life of crime. The community-based programs are less expensive than detention and more effective when it comes to cutting recidivism. But states and localities are often hampered by policies that provide perverse financial incentives for sending young people to the lockup.

That’s the case in New York City, which is struggling to remake its juvenile justice system. Detaining one youth for a year costs city taxpayers $200,000 — many times what it costs to care for troubled children in community-based programs. Unfortunately, the system encourages officials to choose detention for juveniles. The state reimburses the city 50 percent of the cost of pretrial detention, but pays nothing for community-based alternative programs that can make all the difference in getting troubled young people back on track.

Another serious problem, according to a recent study by the city’s Independent Budget Office, is that the juvenile courts close at 5 p.m. and aren’t open on weekends. Police officers who arrest young people at those times usually have no option but to send them directly to detention until the courts open. In some cases, the process can take several days. That’s outrageous — especially since statistics show that once young people do make it to court, two-thirds are defined as low-risk suspects and are released to their parents pending trial. It would never be tolerated in the adult system where the law requires that suspects be swiftly arraigned.

Thanks to innovative policies, New York City has begun to reduce the number of low-level young offenders who are sent to state-run detention facilities. Many are now diverted to community-based programs where they can receive mental health and counseling services. That’s a good thing, since more than 80 percent of young men who are sentenced to detention facilities end up arrested again within three years.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/05/opinion/05sat4.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

Posted by lois at 10:06 AM | Comments (0)

January 03, 2008

NY Times Editorial: Comic Books in the Classroom

January 3, 2008
Editorial, NY Times
Comic Books in the Classroom

Generations of children grew up reading comic books on the sly, hiding out from parents and teachers who saw them as a waste of time and a hazard to young minds. Comics are now gaining a new respectability at school. That is thanks to an increasingly popular and creative program, often aimed at struggling readers, that encourages children to plot, write and draw comic books, in many cases using themes from their own lives.

The Comic Book Project was started in 2001 by Michael Bitz at an elementary school in Queens. Mr. Bitz now serves as the director of the project, which is run out of Teachers College at Columbia University. Since its creation, the program, which is mainly conducted after school, has spread to more than 850 urban and rural schools across the country. It has gotten a big push from the current craze among adolescents for comic book clubs and for manga, a wildly popular variety of comic originating in Japan.

The point is not to drop a comic book on a child’s desk and say: “read this.” Rather, the workshops give groups of students the opportunity to collaborate on often complex stories and characters that they then revise, publish and share with others in their communities.

Teachers are finding it easier to teach writing, grammar and punctuation with material that students are fully invested in. And it turns out that comic books have other built-in advantages. The pairing of visual and written plotlines that they rely on appear to be especially helpful to struggling readers. No one is suggesting that comic books should substitute for traditional books or for standard reading and composition lessons. Teachers who would once have dismissed comics out of hand are learning to exploit a genre that clearly has a powerful hold on young minds. They are using what works.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/03/opinion/03thu4.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

Posted by lois at 05:48 PM | Comments (0)