History > 2007 > USA > Justice > Jails / Prisons (I)

Inmates waited to be placed in cells

at the Arizona State Prison-Phoenix Complex.

Arizona has over 37,000 inmates in its prisons throughout the state,

127 percent of its official capacity.

Photo: David Sanders for The New York Times

States Export Their Inmates as Prisons Fill

NYT        31.7.2007

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/31/us/31prisons.html

States Export Their Inmates as Prisons Fill

July 31, 2007
The New York Times
By SOLOMON MOORE

ELOY, Ariz. — For Bob Weier, a Hawaiian convicted of armed robbery, incarceration at the Red Rock Correctional Center on the outskirts of this dusty town is the latest stop in a far-flung and nomadic exile.

Since his imprisonment 12 years ago on Maui, Mr. Weier, 53, has served his sentence in prisons in Minnesota, Oklahoma and Arizona. He last saw his daughter 11 years ago and has five grandchildren he has never met.

“To them, I’m just a voice who talks to them on the phone for a while,” said Mr. Weier, a heavyset man who expects to be released next year.

Chronic prison overcrowding has corrections officials in Hawaii and at least seven other states looking increasingly across state lines for scarce prison beds, usually in prisons run by private companies. Facing a court mandate, California last week transferred 40 inmates to Mississippi and has plans for at least 8,000 to be sent out of state.

The long-distance arrangements account for a small fraction of the country’s total prison population — about 10,000 inmates, federal officials estimate — but corrections officials in states with the most crowded prisons say the numbers are growing.

One private prison company that houses inmates both in-state and out of state, the Corrections Corporation of America, announced last year that it would spend $213 million on construction and renovation projects for 5,000 prisoners by next year.

“They find that their prison populations are at or beyond capacity and they have to relieve that capacity,” Tony Grande, the company’s president for state relations, said of states turning to private prisons. “They quickly turn to us and we have open prison capacity where we can accommodate growth.”

About one-third of Hawaii’s 6,000 state inmates are held in private in Arizona, Oklahoma, Mississippi and Kentucky. Alabama has 1,300 prisoners in Louisiana. About 360 inmates from California, which has one of the nation’s most crowded prison systems, are in Arizona and Tennessee.

But while the out-of-state transfers are helping states that have been unwilling, or too slow, to build enough prisons of their own, they have also raised concerns among some corrections officials about excessive prisoner churn, consistency among the private vendors and safety in some prisons.

Moving inmates from prison to prison disrupts training and rehabilitation programs and puts stress on tenuous family bonds, corrections officials say, making it more difficult to break the cycle of inmates committing new crimes after their release.

Several recidivism studies have found that convicts who keep in touch with family members through visits and phone privileges are less likely to violate their parole or commit new offenses. There have been no studies that focused specifically on out-of-state placements.

Paige M. Harrison, a researcher for the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics, said the out-of-state inmates faced problems familiar to the large number of in-state prisoners incarcerated hundreds of miles from their homes. A study in 1997 found that more than 60 percent of state inmates were held more than 100 miles from their last place of residence.

“If you’re being held on the other side of Texas or California, you better believe that for many inmates, they’re beyond visitation,” Ms. Harrison said.

The frequent moves can also have a disruptive effect on prisons, whether the transfers occur within a state or not, corrections officials said. In California, a federal court official overseeing a revamping of the prison medical system reported more than 170,000 prisoner moves within the state in the first three months of this year. The moves were found to be inhibiting the ability of inmates to receive health care and draining resources.

In Arizona, where more than 2,000 inmates have been exported to prisons in Oklahoma and Indiana, corrections officials are struggling to provide consistent and effective programming for them, said Dora B. Schriro, the director of the Arizona Department of Corrections.

“Having a long-term impact on public safety and recidivism is that much more challenging,” Ms. Schriro said of the arrangements.

The number of inmates shipped out of Arizona would be even larger, but plans for additional transfers to Indiana had to be called off in April after 500 inmates from Arizona rioted at a privately run prison in New Castle, Ind., in part because of complaints about the long distance. Two correctional officers and five inmates were injured in the two-hour incident. Officials there assigned blame to poorly trained guards, many of whom were hired just days before the transfers.

Ms. Schriro said the riot showed how desperate the situation had become. The state’s overcrowding worsened, she said, after two private prisons in Texas now run by the GEO Group, canceled Arizona’s contract and instead signed more lucrative deals with federal corrections agencies.

“We started to add provisional beds in-state through double-bunking, converting several kitchens to bed space and making preparations to bring additional tents online,” Ms. Schriro said.

Eli Coates, a 26-year-old inmate from Arizona serving 10 years for armed robbery, did time at six Arizona prisons and one in Oklahoma before arriving at the New Castle prison early this year. New Castle is managed by the GEO Group.

Mr. Coates said his frequent moves had made it hard to complete educational programs that he hoped would help him get a steady job upon release.

“I was on my way to being able to finish a college program and vocational programs to get a trade,” Mr. Coates said. “But they snatched me up from those opportunities, and here I have to start all over again.”

Mr. Weier, the Hawaiian prisoner here in Arizona, said that each time he moved, he had to reapply for phone privileges, a process that can take six months. Even when he was allowed to call home, he said, he could not always afford the long-distance bills.

“You lose your family identity,” said Mr. Weier. “And that’s not good, because when we go back into society — and more than 95 percent of us will — the only ones who are going to take care of you are your family.”

Without big construction plans or radical sentencing reforms in the offing, Arizona will continue to rely on out-of-state alternatives. The state has some of the toughest sentencing laws in the country and an inmate population exceeding 37,000, or 127 percent of the state’s official prison capacity. Several public prisons are already surrounded by tent cities to accommodate the overflow.

Adam Ramirez, 35, an inmate from Tucson serving six years for a parole violation, sat sweating recently in a 16-man tent at the 100-year-old Florence State Prison, about 15 miles northeast of Eloy in Florence, Ariz.

“It’s always crowded in here,” said Mr. Ramirez, pointing to an empty bed next to his. “They sent that guy out to Oklahoma today and there will be somebody else here today or tomorrow.”

Overcrowding has been a problem in prisons for decades, and the country’s prison and jail population has never been higher, rising 2.8 percent from July 2005 to July 2006 to reach 2,245,189, according to the most recent Bureau of Justice Statistics bulletin. A report by the Pew Charitable Trusts estimates that the prison population will grow by another 192,000 in the next five years.

State corrections officials and prison industry executives say that prison companies are an attractive alternative when cash-strapped state governments need additional prison space faster than they can build it. Private prisons can also provide political cover to elected officials seeking to avoid charges of coddling criminals and spending large sums on prison construction.

Alabama officials turned to the Corrections Corporation of America for space after a judge threatened to hold the overloaded state corrections department in contempt for failing to pick up inmates from county jails, said Mr. Grande, the company official. The company found out-of-state space for 1,500 inmates within 30 days. When hurricanes beset Florida in 2003, Mr. Grande said, the company found alternative prison space within 72 hours.

But state governments often pay a premium for those spaces. The riot in Indiana in April came after Ms. Schriro, the Arizona corrections director, agreed to pay about $14 million a year to house 610 prisoners there. That is about $3 million more than the state would have paid for inmates at in-state public prisons, said a spokeswoman for Arizona corrections, Robin Wilkins.

Ms. Schriro is moving forward with plans to expand prison space for Arizona prisoners locally and in private prisons in Oklahoma. But she expects the state prison population to exceed capacity by the time those expansion projects are complete.

    States Export Their Inmates as Prisons Fill, NYT, 31.7.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/31/us/31prisons.html

11.15am

Prisoner found guilty of masturbating in his cell

Thursday July 26, 2007
Guardian Unlimited
David Batty

It is a verdict likely to cause great consternation to lonely prisoners throughout the US penal system. A prisoner in Florida has been found guilty of indecent exposure for masturbating alone in his cell.

Terry Lee Alexander, 20, of Lauderdale Lakes, Florida, was sentenced to a further 60 days in jail on top of the 10-year term he is currently serving for armed robbery, the Miami Herald reported yesterday.

He was prosecuted after a female sheriff's office deputy witnessed him performing the sex act in his cell in Broward County, Florida, last November.

The case drew sniggers from the courtroom as prospective jurors were questioned about their own masturbatory habits and the only witness was asked whether she had considered calling in a Swat team to tackle the defendant.

In reaching their verdict on Tuesday, jurors decided that an inmate's cell was "a limited access public place" where exposing oneself wasagainst the law.

The only witness in the case, Broward sheriff's office deputy Coryus Veal, testified that Alexander did not try to conceal what he was doing as most prisoners did.

She witnessed the act while working in a glass-enclosed master control room, 30 metres (100ft) from Alexander's cell. There was no videotape evidence of the offence.

The prisoner's lawyer, Kathleen McHugh, failed to get him cleared on the grounds that a cell was a private place and what Alexander was doing was perfectly normal.

"Did other inmates start masturbating because of Mr Alexander?" Ms McHugh asked Ms Veal. "Did you call a Swat team?"

"I wish I had," the deputy replied.

Ms Veal, who has charged seven other inmates with the same offence, said she was not against masturbation, but she objected to Alexander performing it so blatantly. She told the court that most inmates masturbated in bed, under the blankets.

The deputy said it was the third time she had caught Alexander masturbating, and she had had enough.

After the verdict, the juror David Sherman said the case was "pretty straightforward".

"The prosecution's case was clear, and the defence did not dispute any of the major elements," he told the Miami Herald.

Mr Sherman said jurors determined that a prison cell, which was owned and operated by the government, was neither public nor private but was a "limited access public place'.'

Ms McHugh asked the 17 prospective jurors who among them had never masturbated. No hands went up.

Prosecutors filed charges in all seven of Ms Veal's other cases, according to a spokesman for the Broward state attorney's office.

The charges were dropped in one of these cases to allow the defendant to begin his sentence in the state prison system on a more serious, unrelated charge. Four of the others pleaded guilty and were sentenced to time served. Charges against the other two inmates are pending.

    Prisoner found guilty of masturbating in his cell, G, 26.7.2007, http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2135251,00.html

New Court to Address California Prison Crowding

July 24, 2007
The New York Times
By SOLOMON MOORE

LOS ANGELES, July 23 — Two federal judges took a major step toward solving California’s prison overcrowding crisis by issuing orders on Monday to create a three-judge court that will be charged with reducing the number of state inmates.

In separate orders, Judges Thelton E. Henderson and Lawrence K. Karlton, both of Federal District Court, argued that overcrowding in California’s prisons had thwarted federal court interventions to address the lack of health care and that state responses had been inadequate.

The orders must be considered by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, which will decide whether to combine the cases under one panel or to create two panels. If the courts do impose a population cap on the California prison system, it will be the first time the federal courts have taken such strong action against a state correctional agency.

“The court therefore believes that a three-judge court should consider whether a prisoner release order is warranted,” wrote Judge Henderson, who is overseeing a class-action lawsuit seeking to provide adequate medical care to prisoners.

With 173,453 prisoners as of June 2006, California’s prison population is the country’s largest and is among the nation’s most overcrowded. Some facilities are at 210 percent of their designed capacity.

The orders are a major blow to California legislators and to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who recently signed into law a $7.7 billion prison construction bill. The law creates space for a major expansion of the prison population, with an additional 12,000 prison beds by 2009 and 8,000 medical and mental health beds. It also authorizes the transfer of 8,000 prisoners to out-of-state facilities.

But the judges argued that without money for staff members, new rehabilitation programs and other critically underfinanced and understaffed areas, the prison population would continue to grow at unsustainable levels.

“From all that presently appears,” said Judge Karlton, who is overseeing a mental health care class-action lawsuit against the prison system, “new beds will not alleviate this problem but will aggravate it.”

Mr. Schwarzenegger, a Republican, said the state would follow through with construction plans and out-of-state prison transfers, even as it planned to appeal the decisions.

“I’m confident that the steps the state has taken and will continue taking to reduce overcrowding will meet the court’s concerns,” he said in a statement. “At the same time, we intend to appeal these orders to ensure that dangerous criminals are not released into our communities.”

The orders will now be considered by the chief justice of the Ninth Circuit, Judge Mary M. Schroeder, who will make the final decision about the creation of the panels.

Michael Bien, a lawyer who argued a class-action lawsuit on behalf of prisoners seeking constitutionally adequate mental health care resources, said the three-judge panel could either order the state to fix its own problems or create a special federal trustee to do the job directly.

“They will have to determine what is the constitutionally permissible population level in California given how many prison cells and beds we have, how many doctors and clinicians we have,” Mr. Bien said. “Obviously, it’s going to be less than we have now, but the question is, Is it 5,000 less or 50,000 less or somewhere between, and once you establish that how do you get there?”

The judges recommended that the state continue working on ways to reform the prison system as the special court was established and suggested reforms to rehabilitation and parole programs as ways to reduce the number of parole violators now flooding the prison system.

    New Court to Address California Prison Crowding, NYT, 24.7.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/24/us/24calif.html

Paris Hilton Is Released From Jail

June 26, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 7:10 a.m. ET
The New York Times

LYNWOOD, Calif. (AP) -- A smiling Paris Hilton walked out of a Los Angeles County jail early Tuesday, officially ending a bizarre, three-week stay that ignited furious debate over celebrity treatment in the jail system.

The 26-year-old celebutante was greeted by an enormous gathering of cameras and reporters upon leaving the all-women's facility in Lynwood about 15 minutes past midnight. She had checked into the Century Regional Detention Facility late June 3, largely avoiding the spotlight, after a surprise appearance at the MTV Movie Awards.

Hilton smiled and waved as she filed past deputies and the media, her blond hair pulled back in a braided ponytail. Her parents, Kathy and Rick, waited in a black SUV. Hilton hurried to the vehicle, where she hugged her mom through the window.

Hilton, who was wearing a sage jacket with white trim over a white shirt and skinny jeans, did not respond to reporters' questions.

''She fulfilled her debt. She was obviously in good spirits. She thanked people as she left,'' said sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore.

Photographers sprinted after Hilton's vehicle as she left. When the SUV hit a red light during the ride, photographers jumped out of their cars and swarmed it.

Hilton appeared to have gone to a family home in a ritzy Los Angeles canyon north of Sunset Blvd.

The hotel heiress will complete her probation in March 2009 as long as she keeps her driver's license current and doesn't break any laws. She can reduce that time by 12 months if she does community service that could include a public-service announcement, the city attorney's office has said.

During her stay at the Lynwood facility, Hilton was mostly confined to a solitary cell in the special needs unit away from the other 2,200 inmates.

After spending only three days there, she was released to home confinement by Sheriff Lee Baca for an unspecified medical condition that he later said was psychological.

The following day, Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer, who sentenced the hotel heiress, called her back into court and ordered her returned to jail, saying he had not condoned her release.

Hilton left the courtroom in tears calling for her mother and shouting, ''It's not right!''

She was then taken to the downtown Twin Towers jail, which houses men and the county jail's medical treatment center, where she underwent medical and psychiatric exams to determine where she should be confined.

Hilton's stay there cost taxpayers $1,109.78 a day, more than 10 times the cost of housing inmates in the general population.

The move by Baca caused a firestorm of criticism over whether the celebrity was getting special treatment. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has launched an investigation into whether the multimillionaire received special treatment because of her wealth and fame.

At least one person has filed a claim against the county alleging she ''had serious medical issues'' but was not treated as well as Hilton.

A few days into her stint at the Twin Towers medical ward, the heiress said in a phone call to Barbara Walters that she had a new outlook.

''I used to act dumb. It was an act. I am 26 years old, and that act is no longer cute,'' Hilton said during the call, according to an account posted June 11 by Walters on ABC's Web site.

''It is not who I am, nor do I want to be that person for the young girls who looked up to me,'' Hilton was quoted as saying.

Hilton's path to jail began Sept. 7, when she failed a sobriety test after police saw her weaving down a street in her car on what she said was a late-night run to a hamburger stand.

She pleaded no contest to reckless driving and was sentenced to 36 months' probation, alcohol education and $1,500 in fines.

In the months that followed, she was stopped twice by officers who discovered her driving with a suspended license. The second stop landed her in Sauer's courtroom, where he sentenced her to 45-days in jail. She was released after three weeks for reasons including good behavior.

    Paris Hilton Is Released From Jail, NYT, 26.6.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/arts/AP-Paris-Hilton.html?hp

Prisoner Kills Officer at Utah Hospital

June 25, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 11:09 a.m. ET
The New York Times

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- A prison inmate getting medical treatment at the University of Utah stole a gun from a corrections officer Monday and fatally shot him, authorities said.

The inmate fled the scene and drove to a Arby's restaurant, where he was captured by police.

The prisoner was inside an examination room at the campus orthopedic center, university Police Chief Scott Folsom said.

''There was some sort of altercation. The inmate got hold of the weapon and shot the officer,'' he said.

A spokesman for the Utah Department of Corrections said officers routinely transport prisoners to the university for medical appointments.

''Nobody here can remember one of our officers every being killed during a transfer,'' spokesman Jack Ford said.

    Prisoner Kills Officer at Utah Hospital, NYT, 25.6.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Medical-Center-Shooting.html

3.30pm update

Prisoners to be released early

Tuesday June 19, 2007
Guardian Unlimited
Fred Attewill and agencies

Lord Falconer was today accused of performing a "total U-turn" after he authorised the early release of non-violent prisoners including burglars, drug dealers and fraudsters - just six weeks after he denied the government was contemplating the move to ease acute overcrowding.

The justice minister told the House of Lords he had issued guidance to prison governors concerning inmates coming to the end of sentences of a maximum of four years as a "temporary" measure.

The controversial move will allow prisoners to be released up to 18 days early and has attracted widespread criticism from opposition parties and the police.

The shadow prisons minister, Edward Garnier, said: "What we have seen today is the government doing a total U-turn on early release within a matter of weeks - and it is the public that will pay the price with their safety."

But the relentless pressure on prison places - with the jail population hitting a record figure of 81,016 - left the new Ministry of Justice with little option.

An MoJ spokesman said an estimated 25,500 prisoners would be released early over a year.

This would mean the total prison population will be reduced by 1,200 at any one time.

Lord Falconer said only prisoners who met certain criteria would be considered.

"The criteria excludes offenders convicted of serious or violent crimes, those who have broken the terms of their licence in the past and foreign nationals subject to deportation."

The programme will start on June 29, although police and court cells will be needed until the end of the year.

But the shadow home secretary, David Davis, attacked the plans, saying the public would still pay for the government's incompetence.

"It is clear from what has been announced today that there will be a continuing reliance on police and court cells, meaning the taxpayer will continue to pay through their pay packets," he said.

"The government's poor record at preventing those released on licence from committing more crimes means they will also continue to pay with their safety."

The cost of housing prisoners in court and police cells has reached £1m a week, and yesterday the Prison Governors' Association called for early releases to provide "breathing space".

More jail places are in the pipeline but will not come on stream soon enough to avert an immediate crisis.

Lord Falconer also told peers that funds for an extra 1,500 places had been granted by the Treasury in addition to the money for 8,000 more places first announced in July last year.

Speaking to the Association of Chief Police Officers in Manchester earlier today, Gordon Brown pledged additional money for more places, including "extra fast-build units this year".

Earlier today, Tony Blair's claimed the overcrowding problems were in part due to the government's success in tackling crime.

"Partly it is because we have been catching more people, giving them longer sentences and convicting more people, and therefore that does create pressures," he said.

Offenders will be risk-assessed by prison staff ahead of release, in the hope of reassuring the public.

They will also be subject to some form of supervision and could be recalled to prison if they breach the terms of their release licence.

Earlier, the chairman of the Police Federation, Jan Berry, said the proposal was not "safe or viable".

"The early release of prisoners gives cause for concern," she said.

"The resilience of the service is already stretched to breaking point and whilst in the future it could be made possible to effectively monitor more offenders in the community, the structure and the resources are not in place to make this a safe or viable option at the present time."

Simon Hughes, the Liberal Democrats' justice spokesman, said: "Creating thousands more offences, sending thousands more people to prison and then releasing others before they have served their time is the criminal justice policy of the madhouse."

But the Prison Reform Trust welcomed the news, saying that the government ought to use the time to assess a way forward.

Juliet Lyon, the lobby group's director, said: "Releasing some people, assessed as no risk to the public, will take the heat off overcrowded jails for a while.

"Instead of lurching from crisis to crisis, [the] government must use this respite to set out how it will reserve prison for serious and violent offenders."

She suggested that these plans could include enforced community work for the 6,000 prisoners serving less than six months, diversion for the mentally ill and treatment for addicts.

    Prisoners to be released early, G, 19.6.2007, http://www.guardian.co.uk/prisons/story/0,,2106382,00.html

La. Murderer Built Coffins for Grahams

June 17, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 7:57 a.m. ET
The New York Times

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- Shortly before he died, convicted murderer Richard Liggett was asked to make two of the simple plywood coffins he meticulously crafted for fellow prisoners. Except the caskets would be for Billy and Ruth Graham.

''Humbled? He was honored, he was honored,'' said Burl Cain, warden of the Louisiana State Penitentiary. ''He told me, of everything that ever happened in his life, the most profound thing was to build this coffin for Billy Graham and his family.''

Graham's son Franklin made the request after seeing the coffins on a visit to the Angola prison and being struck by their simplicity, according to a statement from the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.

Ruth Graham was to be buried in one Sunday at a private ceremony at the Billy Graham Library in Charlotte, N.C. She died Thursday at age 87 after a lengthy illness.

''I wish you could look in that casket because she's so beautiful,'' Billy Graham told mourners who gathered Saturday to remember his beloved wife. ''She was a wonderful woman.''

The coffins are made of birch plywood and lined with a foam mattress pad covered with fabric. Brass handles are on the sides, while a cross adorns the top.

Liggett, who was serving a life sentence for second-degree murder, led a team of prisoners who built the coffins for the Graham family. He had found God in prison, Cain said.

''You would never think he'd be a prisoner. He wasn't all marked up,'' Cain said. ''He just did a terrible thing, one time in New Orleans.''

The prison has a Bible college and chapel near death row funded largely by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and Samaritan's Purse.

Cain said many of its 5,108 prisoners are Christian and were spending the weekend ''preaching and praying and remembering the Graham family.''

But Liggett won't be among them: He died of cancer in March, nearly 31 years into his sentence. He was buried in one of the last coffins he built, Cain said.

Associated Press writer Mike Baker in Montreat, N.C., contributed to this report.

    La. Murderer Built Coffins for Grahams, NYT, 17.6.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Graham-Coffin.html

Inmate in Escape With Warden's Wife Dies

June 13, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 12:34 p.m. ET
The New York Times

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- A convicted killer who spent more than a decade on the run with a former prison warden's wife died Wednesday in a prison infirmary, officials said.

The cause of death was not released, but Randolph Franklin Dial had suffered from a lengthy illness, said Margaret Sexton, a spokeswoman for the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester.

During a December 2006 court hearing, Dial, 62, had said his heart was failing and doctors had given him a year to live.

Dial had been convicted in 1986 of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison for the 1981 slaying of a karate instructor.

He was serving time at the Oklahoma State Reformatory in Granite when he disappeared in 1994 with Bobbi Parker, the wife of the prison's deputy warden. He remained on the run until 2005, when he and Parker were found at a chicken ranch in east Texas.

A sculptor and painter with a master's degree in art, Dial had obtained trusty status at the Oklahoma State Reformatory, meaning he could stay in minimum security housing outside the prison walls.

He ran an inmate pottery program with Parker, used a kiln in the Parkers' garage and had access to their home during the day. The morning of Parker's disappearance, her husband saw Dial working in his garage as he left.

Law enforcement officers acting on a tip found Dial in a mobile home near Campti, Texas, in April 2005. Parker was found nearby unharmed, working on a chicken farm. After she was interviewed by investigators, she was reunited with her husband, Randy Parker, and their two daughters, who were 8 and 10 when she disappeared.

After his capture, Dial said he kidnapped Parker at knifepoint then forced her to live with him as a hostage. Parker told investigators she stayed with Dial because she feared he would hurt her family.

Oklahoma prosecutors never charged Dial with kidnapping or filed any charges against Parker in connection with the escape.

    Inmate in Escape With Warden's Wife Dies, NYT, 13.6.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Inmate-Death.html

Montana Prison Escaped Convicts Spotted

June 13, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 6:32 a.m. ET
The New York Times

HELENA, Mont. (AP) -- A search for two escaped convicts, one of whom was once accused of plotting to kidnap David Letterman's son, is focusing on an area where the duo apparently were camping.

U.S. Forest Service workers spotted William J. Willcutt, 22, and Kelly A. Frank, 45, at about 6 p.m. Tuesday bathing in a creek near Swan Lake in northwestern Montana, authorities said.

The men fled when they realized they had been spotted, Lake County Undersheriff Jay Doyle told KERR-AM in Polson. The Forest Service workers checked the men's campsite and found Department of Corrections clothing, an address book and other items that identified the men as Willcutt and Frank.

About 40 people and six search dogs combed the area for the inmates late Tuesday. They were joined by a Department of Homeland Security helicopter.

Frank was arrested in 2005 on allegations he crafted a plan to kidnap Harry Letterman and the boy's nanny for a $5 million ransom.

A charge of solicitation to kidnap was dropped in return for pleas of guilty to other charges, including felony theft and misdemeanor obstruction. Frank, who worked as a painter at Letterman's ranch, received a 10-year sentence for theft for overcharging Letterman.

The two men escaped Friday from a working ranch that Montana State Prison operates to rehabilitate inmates. Prison officials, aided by a Black Hawk helicopter, searched the mountains around the prison for four days.

Employees at a store in Clancy, near Helena, reported that a man they believed to be Willcutt stole three knives, a box of .38 caliber ammunition and food from the business on Sunday. Law enforcement officials said Willcutt is familiar with the Clancy area from several burglaries he committed there in 2005.

Willcutt was serving time for burglary and was denied parole earlier this year. Frank would have been eligible for parole in three months.

At the time of his arrest, Frank was on supervised release for a 1998 conviction for stalking and intimidating a woman.

Both men face additional prison sentences of up to 10 years each for escaping, prison spokeswoman Dana Eldredge said.

Letterman's production company has not commented on the escape. Authorities have not commented on whether they have increased security around the talk show host's 2,700-acre Montana ranch.

    Montana Prison Escaped Convicts Spotted, NYT, 13.6.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Inmates-Escape.html

Gay Inmates to Get Conjugal Visits in California

June 3, 2007
The New York Times
By JESSE McKINLEY

SAN FRANCISCO, June 1 — Gay and lesbian prisoners in California will be allowed overnight visits with their partners under a new prison policy, believed to be the first time a state has allowed same-sex conjugal stays.

The policy comes more than two years after a 2003 California law provided equal rights for registered domestic partners in California, including those of the same sex and non-married heterosexuals. Gay and civil rights groups had threatened to sue to permit the conjugal visits in prisons, which they say have been slow to enact changes promised by the law.

“It’s a little troubling that a state agency had to be threatened with legal action to obey state law,” said Geoff Kors, the executive director of Equality California, a gay rights organization. “There was no justifiable excuse for not complying.”

Terry Thornton, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said the slow pace of change was due, in part, to considerations of whether allowing the visits would expose gay inmates to danger inside the prison, where they are sometimes singled out for attack. “We had to thoroughly evaluate all the security concerns,” Ms. Thornton said.

The policy change was spurred by a letter warning of legal action from the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of Vernon Foeller, 40, a gay man who had been serving a 20-month sentence for attempted burglary at the state prison in Vacaville, Calif. Alex Cleghorn, an AC.L.U. lawyer, said that Mr. Foeller was eligible for a conjugal visit except that the prison system “didn’t recognize his partner as a family member.”

“They have pages and pages of regulations that must be met to permit these visits,” Mr. Cleghorn said, “and Vernon met all of these requirements.”

Mr. Foeller was released in April.

Overnight visits, which can be up to 72 hours long, have been allowed in California since the 1970s, Ms. Thornton said, and are conducted in units inside prison grounds, often trailers. While suggestive of sexual activity, the visits sometimes include several family members, including children.

“It’s not exclusive to conjugal activities,” Ms. Thornton said.

Gay and lesbian inmates were not allowed visits from their partners because only spouses were recognized as “immediate family.”

Several categories of inmate are not allowed the visits, including those on death row, sex offenders, those serving sentences of life without parole, and those who have been violent with minors or family members. Prisoners also must have been on good behavior, with no violations.

The new policy will allow only those currently registered as domestic partners to ask for the visits, and affirms that no prisoners will be allowed overnight visits with other prisoners, regardless of status.

Only a handful of states — including New York — allow conjugal visits, which some prison officials say can help reduce the stress of prison life and maintain prisoners’ connections to their families. Critics, however, have cited a variety of reasons to oppose the visits, including the potential for spreading sexually transmitted diseases and the additional cost of maintaining separate conjugal prison quarters.

Shannon Minter, the legal director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights in San Francisco, called the policy change a “great leap forward” but said gay and lesbian inmates were often still the target of discrimination and violence.

“There are certain social arenas that have been insulated from social changes going on in broader society, and jails and prisons is one of those areas,” Mr. Minter said.

California has a ban on same-sex marriage, although that law has been the subject of legal battles. The California Supreme Court is currently reviewing the law’s constitutionality as part of a suit brought by the City of San Francisco and a group of gay and lesbian couples.

The policy change must be approved by the state’s Office of Administrative Law before taking effect, most likely later this year.

    Gay Inmates to Get Conjugal Visits in California, NYT, 3.6.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/03/us/03visit.html

Some LA Inmates Already Angry at Hilton

June 2, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 11:56 p.m. ET
THE New York Times

LYNWOOD, Calif. (AP) -- Many women at the Los Angeles County jail where Paris Hilton is expected to arrive any day are already angry at the socialite, a former inmate said.

Susannah Johnson, who was released Saturday after a one-day stay at the jail, said inmates were angry at Hilton, believing officials were making room for the starlet at the expense of other inmates already coping with crowded conditions in the 2,200-bed jail.

''The only advice I could give her when she comes is to shut her mouth and do the time,'' said Johnson, 35, of Claremont.

Hilton has been ordered to turn herself in by Tuesday to begin her sentence for violating probation in an alcohol-related reckless driving case.

Some 15 photographers, reporters and television crews staked out positions at three entrances to the Century Regional Detention Facility in Lynwood. Authorities had also cordoned off a grassy area outside the jail for members of the media.

''Today, Paris is the story,'' said Robert Penfold, a TV reporter with Australia's Nine Network.

As of Saturday night, however, the hotel heiress had yet to appear. By then, most of the media had packed up their folding chairs and tripods, though a handful of remaining reporters bundled up in the cooling temperatures.

Adrian Sanchez, a photographer with Agencia Efe, a Spanish language wire service, said he was ''bored, hungry and cold.''

The 13-year-old jail, five miles south of downtown Los Angeles, has been an all-female facility since March 2006. The two-story concrete building sits in an industrial neighborhood, beside train tracks and beneath a bustling freeway.

Though a judge sentenced her to 45 days behind bars, Hilton is expected to serve only 23 days because of a state law that requires shorter sentences for good behavior, sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore said.

Once she arrives, the ''Simple Life'' star will be housed in the jail's ''special needs'' unit.

Like other inmates in the special-needs area, Hilton will take her meals in her cell and will be allowed outside the 12-foot-by-8-foot space for at least an hour each day to shower, watch TV in the day room, participate in outdoor recreation or talk on the telephone.

Inmates are not allowed to bring cell phones into the jail.

Besides a decidedly unglamorous orange jumpsuit, inmates are issued a standard-issue kit that includes: a toothbrush, tube of toothpaste, soap, a comb, deodorant, shampoo and shaving implements, along with a jail-issued pencil, stationery, envelopes and stamps.

Officers arrested Hilton in Hollywood on Sept. 7. In January, she pleaded no contest to the reckless-driving charge and was sentenced to 36 months' probation, alcohol education and $1,500 in fines.

She was pulled over by the California Highway Patrol on Jan. 15. Officers informed Hilton she was driving on a suspended license and she signed a document acknowledging she was not to drive. She was pulled over again by sheriff's deputies Feb. 27 and was charged with violating her probation.

    Some LA Inmates Already Angry at Hilton, NYT, 2.6.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/arts/AP-Paris-Hilton.html

New York Prison Creates Dementia Unit

May 29, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 11:57 a.m. ET
The New York Times

FISHKILL, N.Y. (AP) -- In the day room, white-haired men in robes watch ''The Price is Right.'' Out on the balcony, another looks through bars as he fidgets from side to side.

Prisons have been dealing with the special needs of older prisoners for years, but the one here in Fishkill state prison is considered unique because it specializes in dementia-related conditions.

The unit -- 30 beds on the third floor of the prison's medical center -- is a first for New York and possibly the nation, though experts say it likely won't be the last as more people grow old behind bars.

The unit has the clean-white-wall feel of a nursing home -- but for the prison bars. A marker board in the day room includes a picture of a sun with a smiley face and a reminder to ''Have a great day.'' The activity calendar lists puppies on Thursday and bingo on Friday. As long as they behave, patients can wander from their rooms to the day room.

''They're still in prison,'' said Fishkill superintendent William Connolly. ''This is just a unique environment within a prison environment.''

Connolly said the men's crimes are not considered in the screening process, though their prison record matters. The idea is to provide proper care and a safe environment.

''A lot of guys, when they were confined to the general population, they stayed in their rooms, they wouldn't come out,'' said nursing director Angela Maume. ''They were in a cocoon.''

The average age of patients here is 62, or 26 years above the systemwide average. All have been diagnosed with some level of dementia, which in the case of some patients is related to Alzheimer's or AIDS. One has Parkinson's disease and another has Huntington's disease. Some have additional psychiatric or medical disorders.

''Some of them don't even remember their crimes,'' said Dr. Edward Sottile, medical director for the Hudson Valley prison.

The average age of New York's prisoners is climbing. Inmates 50 and over accounted 3 percent of the prison population two decades ago, compared to 11 percent last year.

Like society as a whole, inmates are getting older as health care improves and baby boomers hit retirement age. But researchers also note that inmates are staying behind bars longer thanks to ''three strikes'' and other tough-on-crime laws.

Nationwide, the number of prisoners over age 50 in state and federal prisons is rising at about 8 percent a year, said sociologist Ronald Aday, author of ''Aging Prisoners: Crisis in American Corrections.''

''This group is going to mirror what's going on in our nursing homes. You have the terminally ill, you have people who have strokes in this population, you have people who have dementia,'' said Aday, of Middle Tennessee State University.

Fishkill, a 1,700-inmate, medium-security prison some 70 miles north of New York City, serves as a regional medical hub for the system. Inmates can get everything from throat cultures to long-term nursing care at the modern medical center built inside the prison's accordian-wired perimeter.

The dementia unit opened in October and is still getting up to speed. Twenty inmates from state prisons around the state -- Attica, Midstate, Coxsackie, Orleans -- are now patients.

Neither the American Correctional Association nor several experts in prison geriatrics were aware of any other special prison units for inmates with dementia.

Prison health care consultant Dr. Robert Greifinger said the idea makes sense because staff can be trained to deal with the special cases.

All workers on the Fishkill unit -- nurses, corrections officers, housekeepers -- go through a 40-hour training course to learn how to work with the cognitively impaired.

The job can be especially tricky for corrections officers, who usually must fill out a report every time they touch an inmate. Here, contact comes with the territory. Officers are trained to know that, on this ward, an outburst by an inmate could be a symptom of a troubled mind instead of a hostile act.

''A lot of times it would be construed as bad behavior,'' Sottile said, ''but they have no idea what they're doing.''

------

On the Net:

http://www.docs.state.ny.us

    New York Prison Creates Dementia Unit, NYT, 29.5.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Prison-Dementia-Unit.html

Texas to Release 226 Juvenile Prisoners

May 20, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 2:40 a.m. ET
The New York Times

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) -- The agency that runs the state's juvenile prison system said it will release 226 inmates after a review found their sentences were improperly extended.

Advocates for Texas Youth Commission inmates and their families have complained that sentences are often extended inconsistently or in retaliation for filing grievances.

Jay Kimbrough, who is heading an investigation into allegations of physical and sexual abuse at the agency's facilities, formed a panel to review the records of nearly all inmates with extended sentences. The six-member panel, which included community activists and prosecutors, reviewed the cases of 1,027 inmates whose sentences were extended.

''For the youth we're releasing, we did not find that the extensions were warranted,'' agency spokesman Jim Hurley said Friday. ''The others will be reviewed on a regular basis.''

Hurley said the 226 inmates will be released on parole as soon as guardians can pick them up or they can be transferred to an interim halfway house.

Kimbrough said in March that the panel would review the documentation on each inmate's sentencing extension and discuss whether the decision was just and appropriate, and then refer their recommendation to a retired judge.

The review is one of many ongoing reforms to the state's juvenile system after the disclosure of allegations of sexual abuse of inmates by staff and a possible cover-up by agency officials. The commission incarcerates about 4,700 offenders ages 10 to 21.

    Texas to Release 226 Juvenile Prisoners, NYT, 20.5.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Juvenile-Prison-Abuse.html

For $82 a Day, Booking a Cell in a 5-Star Jail

April 29, 2007
The New York Times
By JENNIFER STEINHAUER

SANTA ANA, Calif., April 25 — Anyone convicted of a crime knows a debt to society often must be paid in jail. But a slice of Californians willing to supplement that debt with cash (no personal checks, please) are finding that the time can be almost bearable.

For offenders whose crimes are usually relatively minor (carjackers should not bother) and whose bank accounts remain lofty, a dozen or so city jails across the state offer pay-to-stay upgrades. Theirs are a clean, quiet, if not exactly recherché alternative to the standard county jails, where the walls are bars, the fellow inmates are hardened and privileges are few.

Many of the self-pay jails operate like secret velvet-roped nightclubs of the corrections world. You have to be in the know to even apply for entry, and even if the court approves your sentence there, jail administrators can operate like bouncers, rejecting anyone they wish.

“I am aware that this is considered to be a five-star Hilton,” said Nicole Brockett, 22, who was recently booked into one of the jails, here in Orange County about 30 miles southeast of Los Angeles, and paid $82 a day to complete a 21-day sentence for a drunken driving conviction.

Ms. Brockett, who in her oversize orange T-shirt and flip-flops looked more like a contestant on “The Real World” than an inmate, shopped around for the best accommodations, travel-ocity.com-style.

“It’s clean here,” she said, perched in a jail day room on the sort of couch found in a hospital emergency room. “It’s safe and everyone here is really nice. I haven’t had a problem with any of the other girls. They give me shampoo.”

For roughly $75 to $127 a day, these convicts — who are known in the self-pay parlance as “clients” — get a small cell behind a regular door, distance of some amplitude from violent offenders and, in some cases, the right to bring an iPod or computer on which to compose a novel, or perhaps a song.

Many of the overnighters are granted work furlough, enabling them to do most of their time on the job, returning to the jail simply to go to bed (often following a strip search, which granted is not so five-star).

The clients usually share a cell, but otherwise mix little with the ordinary nonpaying inmates, who tend to be people arrested and awaiting arraignment, or federal prisoners on trial or awaiting deportation and simply passing through.

The pay-to-stay programs have existed for years, but recently attracted some attention when prosecutors balked at a jail in Fullerton that they said would offer computer and cellphone use to George Jaramillo, a former Orange County assistant sheriff who pleaded no contest to perjury and misuse of public funds, including the unauthorized use of a county helicopter. Mr. Jaramillo was booked into the self-pay program in Montebello, near Los Angeles, instead.

“We certainly didn’t envision a jail with cellphone and laptop capabilities where his family could bring him three hot meals,” said Susan Kang Schroeder, the public affairs counsel for the Orange County district attorney. “We felt that the use of the computer was part of the instrumentality of his crime, and that is another reason we objected to that.”

A spokesman for the Fullerton jail said cellphones but not laptops were allowed.

While jails in other states may offer pay-to-stay programs, numerous jail experts said they did not know of any.

“I have never run into this,” said Ken Kerle, managing editor of the publication American Jail Association and author of two books on jails. “But the rest of the country doesn’t have Hollywood either. Most of the people who go to jail are economically disadvantaged, often mentally ill, with alcohol and drug problems and are functionally illiterate. They don’t have $80 a day for jail.”

The California prison system, severely overcrowded, teeming with violence and infectious diseases and so dysfunctional that much of it is under court supervision, is one that anyone with the slightest means would most likely pay to avoid.

“The benefits are that you are isolated and you don’t have to expose yourself to the traditional county system,” said Christine Parker, a spokeswoman for CSI, a national provider of jails that runs three in Orange County with pay-to-stay programs. “You can avoid gang issues. You are restricted in terms of the number of people you are encountering and they are a similar persuasion such as you.”

Most of the programs — which offer 10 to 30 beds — stay full enough that marketing is not necessary, though that was not always the case. The Pasadena jail, for instance, tried to create a little buzz for its program when it was started in the early 1990s.

“Our sales pitch at the time was, ‘Bad things happen to good people,’ ” said Janet Givens, a spokeswoman for the Pasadena Police Department. Jail representatives used Rotary Clubs and other such venues as their potential marketplace for “fee-paying inmate workers” who are charged $127 a day (payment upfront required).

“People might have brothers, sisters, cousins, etc., who might have had a lapse in judgment and do not want to go to county jail,” Ms. Givens said.

The typical pay-to-stay client, jail representatives agreed, is a man in his late 30s who has been convicted of driving while intoxicated and sentenced to a month or two in jail.

But there are single-night guests, and those who linger well over a year.

“One individual wanted to do four years here,” said Christina Holland, a correctional manager of the Santa Ana jail.

Inmates in Santa Ana who have been approved for pay to stay by the courts and have coughed up a hefty deposit for their stay, enter the jail through a lobby and not the driveway reserved for the arrival of other prisoners. They are strip searched when they return from work each day because the biggest problem they pose is the smuggling of contraband, generally cigarettes, for nonpaying inmates.

Most of the jailers require the inmates to do chores around the jails, even if they work elsewhere during the day.

“I try real hard to keep them in custody for 12 hours,” Ms. Holland said. “Because I think that’s fair.”

Critics argue that the systems create inherent injustices, offering cleaner, safer alternatives to those who can pay.

“It seems to be to be a little unfair,” said Mike Jackson, the training manager of the National Sheriff’s Association. “Two people come in, have the same offense, and the guy who has money gets to pay to stay and the other doesn’t. The system is supposed to be equitable.”

But cities argue that the paying inmates generate cash, often hundreds of thousands of dollars a year — enabling them to better afford their other taxpayer-financed operations — and are generally easy to deal with.

“We never had a problem with self pay,” said Steve Lechuga, the operations manager for CSI. “I haven’t seen any fights in years. We had a really good success rate with them.”

Stanley Goldman, a professor of criminal law at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, has recommended the program to former clients.

“The prisoners who are charged with nonviolent crimes and typically have no record are not in the best position to handle themselves in the general county facility,” Professor Goldman said.

Still, no doubt about it, the self-pay jails are not to be confused with Canyon Ranch.

The cells at Santa Ana are roughly the size of a custodial closet, and share its smell and ambience. Most have little more than a pink bottle of jail-issue moisturizer and a book borrowed from the day room. Lockdown can occur for hours at a time, and just feet away other prisoners sit with their faces pressed against cell windows, looking menacing.

Ms. Brockett, who normally works as a bartender in Los Angeles, said the experience was one she never cared to repeat.

“It does look decent,” she said, “but you still feel exactly where you are.”

    For $82 a Day, Booking a Cell in a 5-Star Jail, NYT, 29.4.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/29/us/29jail.html?hp

Riot Breaks Out at Indiana Prison

April 25, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 5:21 a.m. ET
The New York Times

NEW CASTLE, Ind. (AP) -- Indiana officials suspended plans to accept hundreds more inmates from Arizona following a two-hour riot at a state prison run by a private company.

Authorities were investigating whether Tuesday's two-hour fracas, involving about 500 inmates, started because some newly arrived prisoners from Arizona were upset about their treatment at the medium-security men's prison.

The riot, during which two staff members and seven prisoners suffered minor injuries, involved inmates from both states. No one escaped from the New Castle Correctional Facility, officials said.

Prison guard Larry Savage said he, two other guards and three maintenance workers barricaded themselves in a room as dozens of inmates tried to break in before a prison response team arrived about 15 minutes later.

''They were wrapped up in masks, with sticks, knives, shanks,'' Savage said of the inmates. ''They were just flexing their muscles and they wanted to show that they could take the prison over at any time, and that's what they did.''

Inmates set fire to mattresses and paper in the courtyard, destroyed furniture and windows and armed themselves with clubs before the prison was secured, officials said.

Indiana Department of Correction Commissioner J. David Donahue said the riot began after a group of inmates from Arizona disobeyed orders and took off their shirts in the prison's recreation area to show staff they wouldn't comply with orders.

The disturbance came six weeks after the first of some 600 Arizona inmates began joining 1,050 Indiana prisoners at the facility, about 45 miles east of Indianapolis.

Donahue said he has delayed the transfer of 600 more inmates from Arizona until authorities can reassess the condition of the prison.

''This system is different than what they are accustomed to,'' Donahue said.

Some of the newly arrived inmates had complained about a lack of recreation and other programs, said Trina Randall, a spokeswoman for GEO Group Inc., the Boca Raton, Fla.-based company that in January 2006 took over the prison's management.

Arizona Department of Corrections spokeswoman Katie Decker said at least some of the transferred inmates had complained about being moved, which was prompted by the state's shortage of prison space.

The injured staff members suffered cuts and scrapes, while the injuries to inmates involved tear gas exposure and minor cuts. All seven inmates were treated at the prison, Randall said.

Associated Press writers Charles Wilson in New Castle, Ken Kusmer and Mike Smith in Indianapolis and Bob Christie in Phoenix contributed to this story.

    Riot Breaks Out at Indiana Prison, NYT, 25.4.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Prison-Riot.html

11 Jail Guards Are Indicted in 2 Beatings in Brooklyn

April 13, 2007
The New York Times
By ALAN FEUER

Eleven federal jail guards, including a captain and three lieutenants, were charged yesterday with beating two inmates at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, one so badly, officials said, that a pool of his blood and bits of his hair lay on the floor of his cell when it was over.

The guards were also charged with covering up the beatings by filing false reports that blamed the inmates for having instigated the attacks. Eight of them pleaded not guilty yesterday at arraignments in Federal District Court in Brooklyn and were released on bail. The three others are expected to be arraigned in federal court within days.

The attacks do not appear to be directly connected and occurred almost four years apart, court papers showed, the first in November 2002, the second a year ago.

Three of the jail guards charged yesterday, Capt. Salvatore LoPresti, Lt. Elizabeth Torres and Officer Scott Rosebery, are also accused of abuse in a class-action lawsuit filed on behalf of Muslim inmates who claim they were mistreated at the federal detention center after they were arrested in roundups following the Sept. 11 attacks.

The first assault in yesterday’s indictment took place on Nov. 13, 2002, court papers said, when Captain LoPresti was making rounds of the jail’s high-security special housing unit and ordered an inmate to remove a T-shirt he had wrapped around his head.

When the inmate refused, Captain LoPresti felt “disrespected” and returned with other guards to kick and punch the man so fiercely that “a pool of blood and clumps of the inmate’s dreadlocks” were left on the floor, the court documents said.

To cover up the beating, prosecutors said, Captain LoPresti and at least two others, Lt. Kelly Tassio and Officer Rosebery, took a sheet from the inmate’s bed and draped it from the window bars to make it seem as if the inmate had tried to hang himself. Two more guards, Officer Alfred Santana and Officer Steven Peterson, joined them in later submitting false reports claiming the inmate became enraged when they stopped him from committing suicide, prosecutors said.

Last June, during an investigation into the attacks, Lieutenant Tassio told federal agents that she had indeed written a false report on Captain LoPresti’s orders, prosecutors said. Five days later, however, she recanted, the government said, and insisted the report was accurate.

The second attack occurred on April 11, 2006, court papers said, when a fight broke out between an unnamed jail guard and a second inmate, who, like the first, was identified by prosecutors only as John Doe. Officer Rosebery stopped the fight, court papers said, then beat the inmate in his cell as Lieutenant Torres looked on, taunting from the hallway.

The guards then hauled the inmate to an elevator, the papers said, to take him to the special housing unit. In the elevator, they tripped the inmate and one guard, Officer Glen Cummings, “repeatedly stomped” him as he lay on the floor, court papers said, and Lieutenant Torres stood lookout in the hallway while the elevator door was open.

The beating in the elevator was caught by a surveillance camera, officials said. In this instance, the guards filed false reports claiming the inmate became “combative” on the way to the special housing unit, court papers said.

The Metropolitan Detention Center, near Gowanus Bay in Sunset Park, has housed some of Brooklyn’s most violent and troublesome federal inmates, from Bonanno family gangsters to Islamic terrorists.

But in recent years, it has come under scrutiny for its treatment of inmates, particularly those swept up after 9/11 as part of terror investigations.

In April 2002, the Center for Constitutional Rights, a nonprofit legal and educational group, filed a lawsuit, Turkmen v. Ashcroft, charging that at least five Arab and South Asian inmates at the jail had been subjected to abuse, including being kept in solitary confinement with the lights on 24 hours a day. Captain LoPresti, Lieutenant Torres and Officer Rosebery are defendants in the suit, as well as in a companion suit called El Magrabi v. Ashcroft.

In 2003, the inspector general for the United States Department of Justice issued two reports describing a pattern of mistreatment of detainees, and cited evidence that included videotapes of officers shoving unresisting, shackled detainees into walls and mocking them during body cavity searches. Turkmen v. Ashcroft accuses Officer Rosebery of repeatedly stepping on an inmate’s shackle chains in the elevator, and Lieutenant Torres is accused of forcing another to strip in front of her. While the suit does not accuse Captain LoPresti — one of the highest-ranking officers at the jail — of any specific act, it says he allowed an atmosphere of abuse to exist. The suit is now before the United States Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan.

“These names aren’t new to us,” said Rachel Meeropol, a lawyer for the Center for Constitutional Rights. “We are pleased that officials are finally being held accountable for a pattern of systematic physical and verbal abuse at the M.D.C.”

Captain LoPresti’s lawyer, Zachary Margulis-Ohnuma, declined to comment on the charges yesterday. The captain was also charged in the indictment with writing official letters to help guards at the jail obtain weapons for use off duty, in violation of federal Bureau of Prisons regulations.

The other guards charged in the indictment are Lt. Frank Maldonado and Officers Jaques Lamour, Jamie Toro and Angel Perez.

    11 Jail Guards Are Indicted in 2 Beatings in Brooklyn, NYT, 13.4.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/13/nyregion/13guards.html

Prison Says Inmate Escapes at Hospital

April 2, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 2:43 p.m. ET
The New York Times

HILLIARD, Ohio (AP) -- Police surrounded a house where a prison inmate was believed to be holed up Monday after overpowering an armed guard in a hospital and fleeing with a weapon and a guard's uniform.

Billy Jack Fitzmorris, 34, was believed to have escaped on foot from St. Elizabeth Hospital Medical Center in Youngstown, according to Corrections Corporation of America. The company runs the Northeast Ohio Correction Center in Youngstown, where Fitzmorris had been held since February for the U.S. Marshals Service.

Two nurses and several prison workers were briefly held in a hospital room during the escape, authorities said.

A few hours later, police surrounded a house in Hilliard, about 150 miles southwest of Youngstown, where Fitzmorris was believed to be hiding, police Lt. Everet Lambert said.

Television footage showed a man breaking into the house after abandoning a car nearby. A woman later climbed out a second story window and dropped to the ground as police arrived.

Corrections Corporation called Fitzmorris a pretrial inmate but did not provide details about why he was being held.

It also gave no details on why he was taken to the hospital on Saturday or how he overpowered the guard. He had been under observation in his room Monday morning when the confrontation occurred, the company said.

A call to the U.S. Marshals Service was not immediately returned.

''It's been a scary day for us here,'' hospital spokeswoman Tina Creighton told CNN.

She said she couldn't discuss why the inmate was at the hospital beyond saying that he was there for treatment.

''He overcame the guard; there was a corrections guard from the prison. He took the uniform and the weapon and made his escape,'' Creighton said.

    Prison Says Inmate Escapes at Hospital, NYT, 2.4.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Inmate-Escape.html

Woody Harrelson's Father Dies in Prison

March 21, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 11:21 a.m. ET
The New York Times

DENVER (AP) -- Actor Woody Harrelson's father, Charles Harrelson, died in the Supermax federal prison where he was serving two life sentences for the murder of a federal judge, officials said Wednesday.

Charles Harrelson, 69, was found unresponsive in his cell on March 15 and apparently died of natural causes, said Felicia Ponce, a Bureau of Prisons spokeswoman in Washington.

Ponce did not know the cause of death. Fremont County Coroner Dorothy Twellman did not immediately return a call.

Charles Harrelson was convicted of murder in the May 29, 1979, slaying of U.S. District Judge John Wood Jr. outside his San Antonio, Texas, home. Prosecutors said a drug dealer hired him to kill Wood because he did not want the judge to preside at his upcoming trial.

Charles Harrelson denied the killing, saying he was in Dallas, 270 miles away, when Wood was killed.

He was transferred to Supermax, the highest-security federal prison, after attempting to break out of an Atlanta federal prison in 1995.

Other inmates at Supermax, about 90 miles south of Denver, include Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski, Oklahoma City bombing coconspirator Terry Nichols and Olympic Park bomber Eric Rudolph.

    Woody Harrelson's Father Dies in Prison, NYT, 21.3.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/arts/AP-Obit-Harrelson.html

Stolen Diamond Found in Prison Bathroom

March 10, 2007
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 5:59 a.m. ET
The New York Times

ORANGE, Calif. (AP) -- A $25,000 diamond was found stuck in a shower drain at the prison housing the man accused of stealing it two years ago.

Bret Allen Langford, 39, allegedly asked the owner of a Jewelry Express store to show him a 2-carat colorless diamond in April 2005. Langford then grabbed the diamond and sped away, said sheriff's spokesman Jim Amormino.

Langford was arrested shortly after but the police did not retrieve the diamond. Langford was charged with commercial burglary and, after several transfers, ended up at Theo Lacy Branch Jail in Orange, where he awaited trial.

This week, an investigator representing Langford told jail officials to search the jailhouse drains if they wanted to find the diamond. Officials discovered the rock wedged in a screen beneath one of the facility's shower stalls.

Authorities said Langford told them he stole the diamond and swallowed and regurgitated the rock each time he was transferred. But 14 months ago, just as Langford was about to be searched he threw the diamond into a shower stall and it fell down the drain.

Amormino suspects Langford came forward as part of a bargain he made with prosecutors. Farrah Emami, a spokeswoman for the Orange County district attorney's office, would not confirm such a deal.

Langford's trial is set to begin May 7 and the diamond is expected to be a featured piece of evidence.

Then it will be cleaned and returned to the store.

    Stolen Diamond Found in Prison Bathroom, NYT, 10.3.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Bathroom-Diamond.html

A Record of Failure at Center for Sex Offenders

March 5, 2007
The New York Times
By ABBY GOODNOUGH and MONICA DAVEY

ARCADIA, Fla. — Inside a privately run treatment center here for pedophiles and rapists who have completed their prison sentences, where they are supposed to reflect on their crimes and learn to control their sexual urges, bikini posters were pinned to walls.

Two men took their shirts off, rubbed each other’s backs and held hands, while others disappeared together into dormitory rooms. Some of the sex offenders appeared to be drunk from homemade “buck” liquor secretly brewed and sold here.

And some of the center’s employees, who openly ignored the breaking of rules (“As long as they are happy, we let them go,” one explained), reported that a high turnover rate among staff members was mostly because of female employees leaving their jobs after having had sex with the offenders.

These and other observations were included in a memorandum composed in 2004 by six employees on loan here from Pennsylvania. They had been dispatched by the Liberty Behavioral Health Corporation, which ran the facility, the Florida Civil Commitment Center, and a facility in Pennsylvania.

Nineteen states have laws that allow them to confine or restrict sex criminals beyond prison in a trend that is expanding around the country, with legislators in New York last week announcing agreement on a new civil commitment law there.

The courts have upheld the constitutionality of such laws in part because they are meant to furnish treatment where possible. Most of the states run their own centers to hold and treat such predators, generally with meager results, but at a time when private solutions are popular for prisons, toll roads and other state functions, a few have teamed with private industry.

Yet as the story of the center here in Arcadia reveals, even a $19 million partnership between the state and a company that describes itself as “a national leader in the field of specialized sex offender treatment and management” failed to meet a central purpose: treating sex offenders so they would be well enough to return to society.

“It was like walking into a war zone,” Jared Lamantia, one of the visiting workers who signed the memorandum, recalled in an interview. “The residents in that place ran the whole facility.”

The memorandum is among thousands of pages of public and private documents about the Florida center reviewed by The New York Times, providing a rare window into the lives of civilly committed sexual predators and the people who guard and treat them. While programs like Florida’s are popular because they keep sex offenders locked away past their prison terms, they cost far more than prison — in the case of Florida, on average twice as much — with no measurable benefit beyond confinement.

For more than seven years, Liberty was in charge of almost every facet of the Florida center, where more than 500 men are held beyond their criminal sentences in a crowded former prison surrounded by cow pastures.

That ended last June in a cloud of claims and counterclaims, investigations and legislative hearings. By the end, after the state did not renew Liberty’s contract, the Florida Department of Children and Families was virtually at war with the company, with each side pinning blame on the other — the state accused of failing to properly finance the center, the company accused of failing to manage it.

“The place is a cesspool of despair and depression and drug abuse — of people being lost,” said Don Sweeney, a mental health counselor in St. Petersburg who treats some former residents of the center, reflecting on Liberty’s tenure there.

Many outside experts, even some of the center’s critics, said the state’s insufficient financing of the center made Florida as much to blame as Liberty for the many failings, many of which are common in other states. Florida spends less than $42,000 a year per resident, one of the lowest rates in the country.

“There was no money to support that facility and to do what had to be done,” Dr. Robert Bellino, a psychiatrist who worked at the center here, said of the company. “It’s a political football. They were always turning the screws on Liberty — ‘Cut this, cut that, don’t spend this, don’t spend that.’ ”

Ambitious Private Contractors

As legislators across the nation have answered public outrage about heinous sex crimes with civil commitment laws, a bevy of companies and well-paid specialists have cropped up like constellations around the expanding demand.

Liberty Behavioral Health and Liberty Healthcare Corporation, affiliates with common ownership, have emerged as the most ambitious private contractors in the commitment center arena. As recently as last year, the affiliates had accumulated contracts worth up to $26 million a year in California, Illinois, Pennsylvania and Florida, which was the biggest both in terms of compensation and responsibility.

Growing out of a company that provided emergency room employees to hospitals starting in the mid 1970s, Liberty Healthcare Corporation was founded in 1986 as a provider of mental health, developmental disability and primary care services. In its earliest days, it had no experience treating sex offenders and, its officials said, there was never a particular moment when company officials said to one another, “Let’s go into the sex offender business.”

Yet as Shan Jumper, Liberty’s clinical director in Illinois, tells it, after “analyzing market trends and seeing what areas they could jump into,” Liberty executives apparently recognized the potential.

By 1998, the company, which is privately held and based in Bala Cynwyd, Pa., won its first contract to provide services inside a civil commitment center, in Illinois. Rick Robinson, executive vice president and chief operating officer of Liberty Healthcare, described the move as a natural outgrowth of its work, which included creating an adolescent sex offender unit in an Arkansas hospital in 1995.

The states that have hired private companies reason that outside experts have more background in the complex realm of detaining and treating sex offenders than most public workers, and in several states where Liberty holds contracts, officials say they have been impressed with the company’s expertise.

But at the Florida center, even beyond a string of embarrassing failures — an escape, the death of an offender after a fight with another over a bag of chips, a sit-in that the state ultimately quashed with hundreds of law enforcement officers — the treatment record was poor.

In Liberty’s tenure, only one of the hundreds of men here progressed far enough in therapy to earn a recommendation from company clinicians that he be released. At various points, many residents were not attending the group therapy specifically addressing sex offending; in May 2005, 35 percent of the center’s 484 residents fell into that category.

In written responses to questions from The New York Times, as well as court depositions, legislative testimony, e-mail messages, letters and memorandums, Liberty defended its treatment record, blamed Florida as insufficiently financing its commitment program and, for years, failing to define exactly what it expected of Liberty.

Early Praise and Promise

Liberty’s early tenure in Florida won praise from independent evaluators who said the treatment program showed promise. Over the first four years the state asked for few changes, and on matters such as the treatment of mentally ill residents, had a “just do the best you can” attitude, as Susan Keenan Nayda, vice president of operations for behavioral health programs at Liberty, said in a court deposition.

But problems began to surface publicly in June 2000 in dramatic fashion when a resident escaped in a helicopter that an accomplice had landed inside the center’s perimeter. The helicopter crashed after departing with the escapee, who was caught 26 hours later in a canal with the pilot, 2 handguns and 28 rounds of ammunition. The pilot, a longtime friend, had visited the escapee 10 times in the five months before the escape.

The bizarre incident raised worrisome questions and the first hints of a conflict over the center’s combined goals of security and treatment. Too few Liberty staff members were in the yard when the escape occurred, a report by state officials found, and the center’s director had ordered razor wire removed from a security fence because, he said, the wire was damaging volleyballs from a nearby court the residents used.

The report also complained about the state’s role, questioning why corrections officers, who were in charge of security on the perimeter, were unarmed. Commitment centers across the country have wavered between following the legal mandate to run a therapeutic program, as laid out by the courts, and the politically acceptable alternative of a more prisonlike one.

In Florida, the conflict emerged again and again. The state’s emphasis swung, at various points, toward and away from a “correctional” approach, company officials suggested. At one point, Ms. Nayda told a Florida State Senate committee that even she was not entirely sure what the center was trying to be.

“There’s a little bit of confusion,” Ms. Nayda said. “What is this place? Is it a prison? Is it a mental health center? A residential treatment facility where people are clients? What is it? We ask that question sometimes too. We really don’t have a lot of guidance around what it is the state wants the facility to be, and we would encourage the state to look at that.”

By the end of 2000, the state moved its civil commitment center from Martin County on the state’s East Coast to its current home here in Arcadia, a 14-acre compound with eight dormitories and other buildings.

From there, the population rose swiftly, even as staff levels mostly stayed put. Liberty repeatedly sought more money from the state for the center’s operations, for special treatment of its large severely mentally ill population and for creation of a supervised release program.

Asked to respond to Liberty’s complaints about financing, Rod Hall, director of the mental health program office for the state Department of Children and Families, said, “The funding provided to operate the facility was the amount negotiated and agreed upon by Liberty prior to its signing of the contracts.”

Liberty’s monthly reports began suggesting that the company was feeling the crunch. The reports noted frequent troubling incidents: residents having sex, assaulting staff members and each another, hiding knives in their rooms.

Liberty also said it faced an unusual challenge in Florida, where hundreds of the center’s residents are not formally committed, but awaiting trials for commitment. These “detainees,” the company said, often reject treatment to focus on their legal battles.

Some critics, meanwhile, began questioning the treatment. Ted Shaw, a forensic psychologist who evaluates civilly committed sex offenders, complained that Liberty held men back in treatment as punishment for minor infractions.

Liberty officials deny the allegations, but Michael Canty, a child molester who was detained at the center but was never formally committed, concurred with Dr. Shaw, saying Liberty staff members would “harass, taunt — try to get you in trouble so you would get kicked out of treatment.”

Rising Tensions, and Violence

By the time the six workers from Liberty’s facility in Pennsylvania arrived here in 2004, tensions inside the center and with the state authorities were reaching a peak.

In April of that year, a mentally ill man jumped off the center’s roof and was injured after staff members rushed at him to get him down. In June, a resident stabbed another 12 times and the staff had residents mop up the blood, destroying evidence before outside law enforcement officials arrived, an internal report showed.

“It was basically a free-for-all prison, out of control,” said Josh Stiles, another of the visiting workers from Pennsylvania.

Liberty officials said they investigated and immediately took “appropriate actions” regarding all that their Pennsylvania employees reported. But they also said the atmosphere in the center at the time was “probably very conducive for allegations that were either unfounded or exaggerated,” and noted that a second group from the Pennsylvania facility, including its director, returned to Florida several weeks later and reported no similar problems.

Nonetheless, Lynda Sommers, a consultant hired by the state to monitor the facility over a number of years, also found it in disarray in the period after the second Pennsylvania group.

Ms. Sommers reported suspected sexual relationships between staff members and offenders, staff members who slept on the job, crumbling facilities, and vague policies on punishing troublemakers and treating the mentally ill.

Liberty’s own internal investigator, Kenneth Dudding, was also deeply critical of hiring decisions for low-level staff members, whose salaries started at a base rate of $12.89 an hour.

“You could have worked at Wal-Mart last week, they put you in front of a computer to read policy for a few hours, then they send you to a dorm and let you go,” said Mr. Dudding, who left after clashing with Liberty’s management.

As for female security workers, Mr. Dudding said they were easily manipulated by the sex offenders. “It’s like putting candy in front of a baby,” he said.

Mr. Dudding said he ultimately called a state whistle-blower’s hot line.

The inspector general of the Department of Children and Families investigated and issued stinging reports, saying that the facility’s safety director had tried to cover up wrongdoing by tampering with evidence, that an employee was suspected of selling marijuana, and that alcohol was being made and sold there.

Liberty officials said the safety director was fired for “failure to properly function in her role” before they received the inspector general’s critique, and they said they fired the worker suspected of drug sales — on whom no contraband was found — for an unrelated reason.

Then a group of residents, angry when the fire marshal demanded that they not have so many personal items, moved into a yard. For months, the staff could not persuade them to go back to their rooms, creating a scene one law enforcement officer called “Woodstock gone amok.”

Liberty said it first asked for help from the Department of Corrections and was turned down, only to ultimately get a response the company called “excessive.” In February 2005, several hundred corrections and law enforcement officers in riot gear arrived and restored order.

That spring, Liberty’s requests to the state grew more insistent. The company asked for $31.1 million for the next fiscal year; it received $18.7 million, the same as the year before.

By April, having described an “alarming” set of “chronic and serious” issues at the facility, the state was preparing to end its relationship with Liberty.

New Company Takes Over

In the end, the struggle between security and treatment may help explain Liberty’s doomed tenure at the Florida center.

“I had imagined that we would be trying to do research or publish or be innovative or at least use state-of-the-art equipment,” said Dean Cauley, a former therapist at the center. “When I arrived, the equipment wasn’t being used, tests were outdated and treatment was very much secondary to maintaining security.”

Liberty officials said that treating patients had always been their company’s reason for being. Most of the company leaders, including Dr. Herbert T. Caskey, the founder, were originally clinicians, not business people.

If states wanted simply to lock up, not treat, the worst sexual predators, Kenneth Carabello, Liberty’s director of regional operations for California and the western United States, said, “We’d let somebody else do this.”

Despite the center’s history, Don Ryce, the father of Jimmy Ryce, the 9-year-old boy whose 1995 rape and murder spurred the Florida Legislature to adopt a civil commitment law in his name three years later, said the law’s “overall intention” had been accomplished.

“There are a lot of people who are confined who otherwise I guarantee you would be out there reoffending,” Mr. Ryce said, though he added, “I’m not going to pretend there aren’t serious problems that need to be addressed.”

As Liberty departed, Florida picked another private company, the GEO Group Inc., to run the center here.

The GEO Group, once known as Wackenhut Corrections Corporation, has more than 23 years of experience running prisons. Of 63 centers GEO operates worldwide, 58 are correctional and detention facilities.

Last fall, under GEO’s watch, a new glimpse of turmoil began emerging. Early one morning, a resident said he was attacked by another in his bunk. His screaming, kicking and banging on his door went unanswered for almost 15 minutes before staff members responded, other residents said.

GEO officials said workers from the company and the Department of Corrections “responded promptly” to what GEO described as a “resident upon resident” fight, an assessment echoed in a DeSoto County sheriff’s report.

But some 100 residents signed a letter calling for an end to the practice of housing two residents in a single room. The center “is supposed to be a mental health facility, not a prison,” the residents wrote. “We are to be treated as patients, not state convicts.”

Next: The difficult science of treating sex offenders.

    A Record of Failure at Center for Sex Offenders, NYT, 5.3.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/05/us/05civil.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

Doubts Rise as States Hold Sex Offenders After Prison Terms

March 4, 2007
The New York Times
By MONICA DAVEY and ABBY GOODNOUGH

The decision by New York to confine sex offenders beyond their prison terms places the state at the forefront of a growing national movement that is popular with politicians and voters. But such programs have almost never met a stated purpose of treating the worst criminals until they no longer pose a threat.

About 2,700 pedophiles, rapists and other sexual offenders are already being held indefinitely, mostly in special treatment centers, under so-called civil commitment programs in 19 states, which on average cost taxpayers four times more than keeping the offenders in prison.

In announcing a deal with legislative leaders on Thursday, Gov. Eliot Spitzer, a Democrat, suggested that New York’s proposed civil commitment law would “become a national model” and go well beyond confining the most violent predators to also include mental health treatment and intensive supervised release for offenders.

“No one has a bill like this, nobody,” said State Senator Dale M. Volker, a Republican from western New York and a leading proponent in the Legislature of civil confinement.

But in state after state, such expectations have fallen short. The United States Supreme Court has upheld the constitutionality of the laws in part because their aim is to furnish treatment if possible, not punish someone twice for the same crime. Yet only a small fraction of committed offenders have ever completed treatment to the point where they could be released free and clear.

Leroy Hendricks, a convicted child molester in Kansas, finished his prison term 13 years ago, but he remains locked up at a cost to taxpayers in that state of $185,000 a year — more than eight times the cost of keeping someone in prison there.

Mr. Hendricks, who is 72 and unsuccessfully challenged his confinement in the Supreme Court, spends most days in a wheelchair or leaning on a cane, because of diabetes, circulation ailments and the effects of a stroke. He may not live long enough to “graduate” from treatment.

Few ever make such progress: Nationwide, of the 250 offenders released unconditionally since the first law was passed in 1990, about half of them were let go on legal or technical grounds unrelated to treatment.

Still, political leaders, like those in New York, are vastly expanding such programs to keep large numbers of rapists and pedophiles off the streets after their prison terms in a response to public fury over grisly sex crimes.

In Coalinga, Calif., a $388 million facility will allow the state to greatly expand the offenders it holds to 1,500. Florida, Minnesota, Nebraska, Virginia and Wisconsin are also adding beds.

At the federal level, President Bush has signed a law offering money to states that commit sex offenders beyond their prison terms, and the Justice Department is creating a civil commitment program for federal prisoners.

Even with the enthusiasm among politicians, an examination by The New York Times of the existing programs found they have failed in a number of areas:

¶Sex offenders selected for commitment are not always the most violent; some exhibitionists are chosen, for example, while rapists are passed over. And some are past the age at which some scientists consider them most dangerous. In Wisconsin, a 102-year-old who wears a sport coat to dinner cannot participate in treatment because of memory lapses and poor hearing.

¶The treatment regimens are expensive and largely unproven, and there is no way to compel patients to participate. Many simply do not show up for sessions on their lawyers’ advice — treatment often requires them to recount crimes, even those not known to law enforcement — and spend their time instead gardening, watching television or playing video games.

¶The cost of the programs is virtually unchecked and growing, with states spending nearly $450 million on them this year. The annual price of housing a committed sex offender averages more than $100,000, compared with about $26,000 a year for keeping someone in prison, because of the higher costs for programs, treatment and supervised freedoms.

¶Unlike prisons and other institutions, civil commitment centers receive little standard, independent oversight or monitoring; sex among offenders is sometimes rampant, and, in at least one facility, sex has been reported between offenders and staff members.

¶Successful treatment is often not a factor in determining the relatively few offenders who are released; in Iowa, of the nine men let go unconditionally, none had completed treatment or earned the center’s recommendation for release.

¶Few states have figured out what to do when they do have graduates ready for supervised release. In California, the state made 269 attempts to find a home for one released pedophile. In Milwaukee, the authorities started searching in 2003 for a neighborhood for a 77-year-old offender, but have yet to find one.

Supporters of the laws offer no apologies for their shortcomings, insisting that the money is well spent. Born out of the anguish that followed a handful of high-profile sex crimes in the 1980s, the laws are proven and potent vote-getters that have withstood constitutional challenges.

“There has to be a process in place that prevents someone from rejoining society if they’re still dangerous,” said Jeffrey Klein, a Democratic member of the New York State Senate who has pushed for civil confinement there.

Martin Andrews, 47, of Woodbridge, Va., who was abducted, buried in a box and repeatedly sexually assaulted for a week when he was 13, also supports the laws.

“If they can’t control themselves,” Mr. Andrews said, “we need to do it for them.”

But the myriad problems have concerned some advocates for victims of sexual abuse, who suggest the money is being wasted and that other options for dealing with dangerous sex offenders — such as giving them longer prison terms, preventing sentencing deals with prosecutors and mandating treatment during incarceration — would be more effective.

“Civil commitment is a huge, huge assignment of resources,“ said Anne Liske, the former executive director of the New York State Coalition Against Sexual Assault, a victims’ advocacy group. “This wholesale warehousing — without using the proper assessment tools and with throwing treatment in when they are not people who can be treated — has already proven not to be working, so why would we do it more?”

A Series of Convictions

Leroy Hendricks was a likely candidate for commitment as he prepared to leave a Kansas prison in 1994.

Mr. Hendricks’s most recent crime, for which he had been convicted a decade earlier, had been “indecent liberties” with two 13-year-old boys in an electronics shop where he worked. All told, his convictions left a painful trail reaching back to 1955: exposing himself to young girls; molesting 7- and 8-year-old boys at a carnival where he was the ride foreman; molesting a 7-year-old girl; playing strip poker with a 14-year-old girl; preying on his own family members, including a boy with cerebral palsy.

Like Mr. Hendricks was, thousands of soon-to-be-released prisoners are screened for commitment each year by state corrections departments, prosecutors and panels. The process varies widely from state to state, as do standards for the evaluators, but in most states, those recommended for commitment have trials before judges or juries.

Mr. Hendricks may have sealed his own fate when he testified in 1994 that he could not “control the urge” to molest when he got “stressed out.” He said his mother, Violet, had wanted a girl when he was born and had dressed him as one when he was growing up.

“I sure don’t want to hurt anybody again,” he told the court, but then conceded that he could not ensure the safety of children in his presence. “The only way to guarantee that is to die,” he said.

More often, these cases come down to contentious duels between psychologists over how best to analyze an offender’s history and likelihood of repeating crimes. In most states, commitment is for an indefinite period, but offenders are allowed to have their cases reviewed by a court periodically.

The results of the screening process are inconsistent. Some offenders are passed up for civil confinement, only to commit vicious crimes again; others’ physical ailments alone make them unlikely repeat predators.

Even though Minnesota prison officials had classified Alfonso Rodriguez Jr., a convicted rapist, in a category of sex offenders most at risk to commit more crimes, Mr. Rodriguez went home when his term ended in May 2003. That November, he kidnapped and killed Dru Sjodin, a North Dakota college student who was beaten and raped.

Likewise, Jerry Buck Inman was charged with raping and strangling a college student in South Carolina last June, nine months after his release from a Florida prison after serving 17 years for rape and other crimes. The authorities in Florida looked at his records but decided not to seek commitment.

Meanwhile, some prosecutors seek commitment for others convicted of noncontact crimes like public exposure. In Florida, prosecutors tried unsuccessfully to civilly commit a man who was imprisoned for driving drunk even though his last sex arrest was decades earlier.

“The population that is being detained is a very, very mixed group,” said Richard Wollert, a psychologist in Portland, Ore., who evaluates civilly committed offenders. “There are cases that are appalling in terms of being kept in custody at the taxpayers’ expense when there are probably alternative placements for them.”

Predicting who is likely to commit future sex crimes has become more of a science over the last decade, but many still find the methods questionable.

Actuarial formulas — akin to the tables used for life insurance — play a central role in deciding who is dangerous enough to be committed. They calculate someone’s risk of offending again by looking at factors such as the number of prior sex offenses and the sex of the victims. Men with male victims are graded as higher risk, for example, because statistics show they are more often repeat offenders.

“The danger is that these numbers will blind people,” said Eric Janus, a professor at William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul who has challenged Minnesota’s civil commitment law in court.

Politics and emotion also factor heavily into who gets committed, with decisions made by elected judges or juries who may be more affected by the raw facts of someone’s offense history or the public spectacle over their crimes than the dry science of risk prediction.

“It’s so emotional for them,” said Stephen Watson, an assistant public defender who represented an offender in Florida. “They don’t even want to hear the research.”

New Laws Follow Publicized Cases

Earlier in the 20th century, many states had sexual psychopath laws that allowed them to hospitalize offenders deemed too sick for prison. But by the 1980s most such laws had been repealed or fallen into disuse.

But a handful of horrific and highly publicized cases in the 1980s and ’90s spurred lawmakers to act again. Washington State adopted the first civil commitment law in 1990 after men with predatory histories killed a young woman in Seattle and sexually mutilated a boy in Tacoma.

After state courts upheld Washington’s law, Kansas, Minnesota and Wisconsin passed versions in 1994, followed by California in 1996.

Then, in a 5-to-4 decision in 1997, the United States Supreme Court found civil commitment to be constitutional in Kansas v. Hendricks, the same Mr. Hendricks still confined in Kansas.

In the ruling, the justices found that a “mental abnormality” like pedophilia was enough to meet a standard to qualify someone for commitment, not the different standard of “mental illness” that had been traditionally used. The court also rejected the notion that civil commitment amounted to double jeopardy (a second criminal punishment for a single crime) or an ex post facto law (a new punishment for a past crime), noting that Kansas’s statute was not meant to punish committed men but, like other acceptable civil commitment statutes, intended “both to incapacitate and to treat” them therapeutically.

“We have never held that the Constitution prevents a state from civilly detaining those for whom no treatment is available, but who nevertheless pose a danger to others,” Justice Clarence Thomas wrote for the majority, later adding, “By furnishing such treatment, the Kansas Legislature has indicated that treatment, if possible, is at least an ancillary goal of the act, which easily satisfies any test for determining that the act is not punitive.”

Since then, state officials, civil liberties advocates and lawyers have wrestled with exactly what that treatment requirement means.

“There’s no question about it,” Professor Janus of William Mitchell College said, “it’s a very murky area of the law.”

Since the Hendricks ruling, the courts have indicated that states have “wide latitude” when it comes to treatment for the civilly confined, meaning that unsuccessful treatment alone or an untreatable patient would not be enough to undo the laws.

In 2001, the Supreme Court, in Seling v. Young, decided the case of Andre Brigham Young, a committed man in Washington State who argued that the conditions he was being held under were so punitive and the treatment so inadequate as to amount to a second criminal sentence. The court ruled against Mr. Young.

A year later, in 2002, the Supreme Court made clear the limits of who may be committed by states, saying the authorities must prove not just that an offender is still dangerous and likely to commit more crimes but also that he or she has a “serious difficulty in controlling behavior.”

Some civil libertarians and prisoner advocates, who still object to the laws, have not given up on finding a challenge that the Supreme Court might view favorably. Despite the court rulings, these groups insist civil commitment amounts to a second sentence for a crime.

Even the look of commitment centers reflects the dichotomy at the core of their stated reason for being — to lock away dangerous men (only three women are civilly committed) but also to treat them.

Most of the centers tend to look and feel like prisons, with clanking double doors, guard stations, fluorescent lighting, cinder-block walls, overcrowded conditions and tall fences with razor wire around the perimeters.

Bedroom doors are often locked at night, and mail is searched by the staff for pornography or retail catalogs with pictures of women or children. Most states put their centers in isolated areas. Washington State’s is on an island three miles offshore in Puget Sound.

Yet soothing artwork hangs at some centers, and cheerful fliers announce movie nights and other activities. The residents can wander the grounds and often spend their time as they please in an effort to encourage their cooperation, including sunbathing in courtyards and sometimes even ordering pizza for delivery. The new center in California will have a 20,000-book library, badminton courts and room for music and art therapy.

Diseases like hepatitis and diabetes are common among the committed, and severe mental illness — beyond the mental “abnormalities“ described by the Supreme Court — a scourge. A survey in 2002 found that 12 percent of committed sex offenders suffered from serious psychiatric problems like schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

Most severely mentally ill men cannot participate in sex offender treatment and receive few services besides medication. Verwayne Alexander, a self-described paranoid schizophrenic who has been detained at the Florida Civil Commitment Center since 2003, has sliced himself so many times with razor blades that a guard often watches him around the clock, lawyers said. Mr. Alexander has sought unsuccessfully to be moved to a psychiatric hospital.

Those who choose to participate in sex offender treatment spend an average of less than 10 hours a week doing so, but the hours differ vastly from state to state. The structure of therapy, too, varies widely, a reflection, perhaps, of the central question still looming in the field: Can treatment ever really work for these offenders?

Admitting to previous crimes is a crucial piece of a broad band of treatment, known as relapse prevention, that is used in at least 15 states and has been the most widely accepted model for about 20 years.

Some of the institutions, too, devote time to other therapies and activities that seem to have little bearing on sexual offending. In Pennsylvania, young residents take classes to improve their health and social habits called “Athlete’s Foot,” “Lactose Intolerance,” “Male Pattern Baldness,” “Flatulence” and “Proper Table Manners.”

In California, they can join a Brazilian drum ensemble or classes like “Anger Management Through Art Therapy” and “Interpersonal Skills Through Mural Making.”

But many of those committed get no treatment at all for sex offending, mainly by their own choice. In California, three-quarters of civilly committed sex offenders do not attend therapy. Many say their lawyers tell them to avoid it because admission of past misdeeds during therapy could make getting out impossible, or worse, lead to new criminal charges.

For those who decline treatment — sometimes including hundreds of “detainees” awaiting commitment trials — boredom, resentment and hostility to those in treatment lead to trouble. Some sneak in drugs, alcohol and cellphones, sometimes with the help of staff members, or beat up other residents, sometimes coercing them into having sex.

“There’s rampant sexuality going on in there,” said Natalie Novick Brown, a psychologist who has evaluated 250 men at Florida’s center.

The people who run civil commitment centers say that a constant, nagging question hangs over them: How to keep order while not treating argumentative, sometimes violent offenders like prisoners? The low-level staff members are not prison guards and tend to be poorly educated, trained and paid. Their job titles — in Illinois, security therapy aide — reflect the awkward balance they must achieve between security and therapy.

Because civil commitment centers are neither prisons nor traditional mental health programs, no specialized oversight body exists. None has been created, in part because its base of financial support, the 19 civil commitment programs around the country, would be too small, several experts who study the programs said. But the need, they said, is urgent.

“They ought to be reviewed by an independent entity with the highest possible standards,” said Dr. Fred Berlin, founder of the Johns Hopkins Sexual Disorders Clinic in Baltimore.

Few Signs of Progress

Around the country, relatively few committed sex offenders finish treatment and are released.

“Every year I go to his hearing, and every year there’s no progress in his case,” said Armand R. Cingolani III, a lawyer with a client in Pennsylvania who was committed in 2004 after being adjudicated as a juvenile for sexual assault on two different minors. “It doesn’t seem that anyone gets better.”

Nearly 3,000 sex offenders have been committed since the first law passed in 1990. In 18 of the 19 states, about 50 have been released completely from commitment because clinicians or state-appointed evaluators deemed them ready. Some 115 other people have been sent home because of legal technicalities, court rulings, terminal illness or old age.

In discharging offenders, Arizona, the remaining state, has been the exception. That state has fully discharged 81 people; there, the facility’s director said records were not available to indicate the reason for those discharges.

An additional 189 people have been released with supervision or conditions (excluding Texas, where there is no commitment center and those committed are treated only as outpatients). And an additional 68 (including 58 in Arizona) are in a higher, “transitional” phase of the program, but still technically committed and often living on state land.

The backlogs have led to an aging population. Inside many facilities, wheelchairs, walkers, high blood pressure and senility are increasingly expensive concerns. Florida’s center filled 229 prescriptions for arthritis medication one recent month, and 300 for blood pressure and other heart problems.

More than 400 of the men in civil commitment are 60 or older, and a number of studies indicate a significant drop in the recidivism rate for this group, many of whom have health problems after years in prison. David Thornton, treatment director of Wisconsin’s center and an expert on recidivism rates, said the decline was increasingly well-documented.

The growth of the committed population has become a political quagmire. No legislator wants to insist on the release of sex offenders, but few are able to swallow the mounting costs of civil commitment. The costs of aging and sick offenders, such as Mr. Hendricks in Kansas, are especially high in part because of their special needs and physical ailments.

From 2001 to 2005, the price of civil commitment in Kansas leapt to nearly $6.9 million from $1.2 million, a state audit there found. “Unless Kansas is willing to accept a higher level of risk and release more sexual predators from the program,” the audit said, “few options exist to curb the growth of the program.”

But as more states consider granting some offenders supervised release, the cost is turning out to be nearly as prohibitive.

For $1.7 million, Washington converted a warehouse in Seattle into a home for men on conditional release. It has 26 cameras monitoring residents, a dozen workers, a surveillance booth overseeing the living area and a 1,700-pound magnetic door.

Two men live there so far.

With the logjams and frustrations mounting, many states have lengthened prison sentences for sex offenders. Virginia last year increased the minimum sentence for certain sexual acts against children to 25 years, from 10, though it also sharply expanded the number of crimes that qualify an offender for civil commitment.

Ida Ballasiotes, whose daughter’s rape and murder in 1988 helped spur the first civil commitment law, in Washington State, said that no sexual predator should walk free and that longer prison sentences should “absolutely” be considered.

“I don’t believe they can be treated, period,” Ms. Ballasiotes said.

After Release, Objections

Even for those sex offenders considered safe enough to be released, going home is no simple process. Kansas authorities decided two years ago that Mr. Hendricks, who was the first person that state committed under its law and who after a decade had progressed to one of the highest phases of treatment, should be moved from Larned State Hospital to a group home in a community where he would be watched around the clock.

Mr. Hendricks would not be allowed onto the home’s porch or patio without an escort, according to court documents. Besides, his medical problems, including poor hearing and eyesight, meant he could not walk down the 40-yard gravel driveway outside the house without falling, the documents said.

But as with many men with his history, the community balked. In California, so many towns object to men leaving civil commitment that some of those released have to live in trailers outside prisons.

“You can’t just sneak them in,” said John Rodriguez, a recently retired deputy director in the California Department of Mental Health. “You’ve got hearings, the court announces it, it’s all over the press.”

In Mr. Hendricks’s case, residents of Lawrence, where he was initially to be moved, collected petitions. “You can tell me that he’s old, but as long as he can move his hands and his arms, he can hurt another child,” said Missi Pfeifer, 37, a mother of three who led the petition drive with her two sisters and mother.

Then officials in Leavenworth County, picked as an alternative, said the choice violated county zoning laws. Mr. Hendricks lasted two days there, in a house off a road not far from a pasture of horses, before a judge ordered him removed.

State officials said they had no choice but to move Mr. Hendricks back to a facility on the grounds of a different state hospital, where he still is.

Through a spokeswoman for the state Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services, Mr. Hendricks declined to speak to The New York Times.

Two years ago, he told The Lawrence Journal-World that he would be living in a group home “if somebody hadn’t opened their damn mouth,” adding, “I’m stuck here till something happens, and I don’t know when that will be.”

Next: Inside the troubled center for sex offenders in Florida.

    Doubts Rise as States Hold Sex Offenders After Prison Terms, NYT, 4.3.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/04/us/04civil.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

Inmates Will Replace Wary Migrants in Colorado Fields

March 4, 2007
By DAN FROSCH
The New York Times

DENVER, March 3 — As migrant laborers flee Colorado because of tough new immigration restrictions, worried farmers are looking to prisoners to fill their places in the fields.

In a pilot program run by the state Corrections Department, supervised teams of low-risk inmates beginning this month will be available to harvest the swaths of sweet corn, peppers and melons that sweep the southeastern portion of the state.

Under the program, which has drawn criticism from groups concerned about immigrants’ rights and from others seeking changes in the criminal justice system, farmers will pay a fee to the state, and the inmates, who volunteer for the work, will be paid about 60 cents a day, corrections officials said.

Concerned about the possible shortage of field labor, Dorothy B. Butcher, a state representative from Pueblo and a supporter of the program, said, “The workers on these farms do the weeding, the harvesting, the storing, everything that comes with growing crops for the market.”

“If we can’t sustain our work force, we’re going to be in trouble,” said Ms. Butcher, a Democrat.

The program will make its debut in Pueblo County, where farmers have been hit hard by the labor shortage. Frank Sobolik, director of a Colorado State University extension program that works with farmers in Pueblo County, said he expected that about half of the 300 migrant workers employed by area farms might not return this season.

“There’s a feeling, a perception that these laborers won’t be back because it’s safer for them to find work in other states,” Mr. Sobolik said. “The farmers are really concerned. These are high-value crops we’re talking about here with a high labor requirement.”

Last year, the Colorado General Assembly passed tough legislation that included giving local law enforcement broader powers to check immigration status and restricting access to social services for workers without proper documentation.

The Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition estimates that there are 150,000 illegal immigrants in Colorado, many of them involved in agriculture. Migrant workers typically travel here from Mexico, Texas and New Mexico for the crop season, where their labor can last from May through the late fall, before returning home to their families. But those numbers could soon be reduced drastically, as workers who are in the country illegally are unwilling to risk exposing their status.

Joe Pisciotta Jr., who owns a 700-acre produce farm in Pueblo County, said he had about 20 workers and expected to lose half of them. Mr. Pisciotta, a third-generation farmer, worried that such a reduction would undercut his ability to supply buyers with the watermelons, onions and pumpkins he grows.

“It’s very frustrating,” he said. “I’m definitely going to lose customers. We’ve never had an issue like this. With all of us trying to get enough workers on our farms, I’m worried this is going to turn into farmer against farmer.”

Although chain gangs and prison farms have long been staples of American correctional culture, the concept of inmates working on private farms is unusual. But there are signs that other states are following suit. The Iowa Department of Corrections is considering a similar program because of a migrant labor shortage in that state.

Several Iowa farmers called recently to request inmates in lieu of migrant workers, said Roger Baysden, the director of the state’s prison industries program. One farmer asked for as many as 200 inmates, Mr. Baysden said.

In Colorado, Ms. Butcher said she hoped that the program, which could send up to 100 inmates to Pueblo County farmers, would remedy a situation that might otherwise turn into an economic disaster.

Immigrant rights group, however, said the Colorado program was myopic.

“Many immigrants are leaving Colorado for other states that will actually embrace their contributions as good citizens and hard workers,” said Julien Ross, state coordinator for the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition. “This exodus from Colorado has profound negative consequences on our economy and the very fabric of our society.”

Mr. Ross said his group was organizing a weeklong boycott of Colorado businesses beginning March 25 to demonstrate the workers’ impact on the regional economy.

A group calling for changes in sentencing, the Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition, is also uneasy about the program. The group views the inmates’ pay as problematic.

“This feels like the re-invention of the plantation,” said Christie Donner, the group’s executive director. “You have a captive labor force essentially working for their room and board in order to benefit the employer. This isn’t a job training program. It’s an exploitative program.”

But Ari Zavaras, executive director of the Colorado Department of Corrections, said the merit of a hard day’s work outdoors was invaluable to an inmate.

“They won’t be paid big bucks, but we’re hoping this will help our inmates pick up significant and valuable job skills,” Mr. Zavaras said. “We’re also assisting farmers who, if they don’t get help, are facing an inability to harvest their crops.”

With the start of the farming season looming, Colorado’s farmers are scrambling to figure out which crops to sow and in what quantity. Some are considering turning to field corn, which is mechanically harvested. And they are considering whether they want to pay for an urban inmate who could not single out a ripe watermelon or discern between a weed and an onion plant.

“This is not a cure-all,” Mr. Pisciotta said. “What our farm laborers do is a skill. They’re born with it, and they’re good at it. It’s not an easy job.”

    Inmates Will Replace Wary Migrants in Colorado Fields, NYT, 4.3.2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/04/us/04prisoners.html

Study predicts rise in inmate populations

Updated 2/14/2007 8:34 AM ET
USA Today
By Kevin Johnson

WASHINGTON — The number of inmates in U.S. prisons likely will rise nearly 13% during the next five years, costing states up to $27.5 billion in new operating and construction expenses, according to a new analysis by the Pew Charitable Trusts.
The Pew report, to be released today, projects the nation's prison population will be about 1.72 million by 2011, up from an estimated 1.53 million at the end of last year. Such an increase would roughly equal the current population of the federal prison system.

Pew analysts said the growth is being fueled by mandatory minimum sentences that have stretched prison terms for many criminals, declines in inmates granted parole and other policies that states have passed in recent years to crack down on crime.

In some states, the study said, high rates of repeat offenders also have been a factor in boosting prison populations.

Prison authorities in Montana, Arizona, Alaska, Idaho and Vermont could see their prison systems grow by one-third or more if there are no changes to the states' sentencing and release policies, the study said.

"The projected growth is phenomenal," says Sue Urahn, managing director of Pew's state policy programs. "But whether it comes to this is up to the states. They determine who goes to prison and for how long."

Pew, a Philadelphia-based philanthropic organization that funds research into a variety of issues, based its findings on population forecasts gathered from the federal Bureau of Prisons and 42 states.

Researchers calculated estimates for the eight states that did not provide projections, based on the states' most recent prison admission and release data.

The report estimated the projected prison costs over the next five years as a "staggering" $27.5 billion — nearly half the amount now spent on American prisons each year.

The report also predicted that the number of female inmates will rise at a faster rate (16%) than males (12%). "Don't picture this parade of prisoners as an exclusively male group," it said. Among the report's other findings:

•By 2011, Florida's prison system is expected to become the third state system to surpass 100,000 inmates, joining California and Texas. California's projected inmate population for 2011 is 188,772; Texas' is 166,327.

•In Louisiana, which has the nation's highest rate of incarceration with 835 prisoners per 100,000 residents, the incarceration rate is projected to reach 859 by 2011.

•Nearly two-thirds of the more than 600,000 people admitted to prison each year have failed to satisfy terms of probation or parole.

Richard Berk, a professor of criminology and statistics at the University of Pennsylvania who reviewed Pew's analysis, called it a "cautious" attempt to forecast and account for the dramatic growth in prison populations.

The Pew report highlights recent crime problems and state responses that have helped increase prison populations, including the prosecution of methamphetamine-related offenses and sex offenders.

In Montana, which is projected to have the nation's largest percentage in inmates — 41% — over the next five years, at least half of all new prison admissions today are for meth-related crimes, Montana Department of Corrections spokesman Bob Anez says.

One in four prisoners in Montana's 2,812-inmate system is a sex offender and 46% of the population has a mental illness, Anez says. Montana is examining alternative sentencing and treatment programs to handle the increasing population, he says.

Later this year, two meth treatment centers — an 80-bed facility for men and a 40-bed one for women — are scheduled to open. Montana's Legislature is considering a proposal for a 120-bed treatment center for mentally ill offenders.

The state also has added 169 beds to its halfway houses in the past two years to try to better prepare released offenders for life outside prison and reduce a recidivism rate in which nearly half of all offenders have are returning to prison.

"We're at the end of the pipeline here," Anez says. "Once they get here, we have to think about things we can do to prepare them so they don't come back."

    Study predicts rise in inmate populations, UT, 14.2.2007, http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-02-13-prisons_x.htm