June 24, 2010
May - June Privatization Update
OVERALL PRIVATIZATION ISSUES
• The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that employees of private prison companies hired to run federal prisons can be sued for allegedly violating an inmate’s constitutional rights. An inmate at a federal prison run by the GEO Group slipped on a cart left in a doorway and injured both elbows. As GEO employees were preparing to transport him to an outside hospital, the inmate said they made him wear a jumpsuit and wrist restraints, despite causing him excruciating pain. The inmate is suing GEO and its employees for allegedly violating the Eighth Amendment, which bans cruel and unusual punishment. (Courthouse News)
• A new study by a longtime privatization proponent claims that sending 25,000 California inmates to out-of-state, for-profit prisons could save the state up to $1.8 billion over a five year period. The report by The Reason Foundation-Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Foundation states that California spends $162 per inmate per day vs. $42 in Texas, based on data from the American Correctional Association (ACA).
However, the Reason Foundation, a self-described “non-profit think tank dedicated to advancing free minds and free markets,” missed the mark in their report -- according to privatization opponent Private Corrections Working Group -- when the study's authors came up with these numbers by simply dividing the state's Corrections budget by its prison population, grossly misrepresenting the actual costs of incarceration. Calculated in this way, the report inaccurately includes parole supervision and administrative costs, PCWG reported on their website, www.privateci.org.
(PCWG also reported that the Reason Foundation study fails to mention that ACA, a private, self-regulated organization composed of former and current corrections officials, receives revenue from private prison companies that also sponsor ACA's conferences.)
The same Foundation report states that “Studies have consistently shown that privately-run correctional facilities typically save a conservative range of 5 to 15 percent over state-run prisons,” and -- here’s the fun part -- “while offering the same level of security and service.”
Well, if that were true we wouldn’t have any entries to run in the Privatization feature you are currently reading, now would we?
CORRECTIONS CORPORATION OF AMERICA
• Idaho is demanding CCA pay thousands of dollars for contract violations and to fix problems with their drug and alcohol treatment programs. Ten of the 13 drug and alcohol counselors were found to be unqualified to provide treatment under CCA’s contract with the state. A medical audit revealed the private prison has extensive problems giving medical care, including keeping inadequate records and delays in administering medications, plus a lack of follow-up care when inmates are returned to lockup after being hospitalized. Idaho state officials are ordering CCA to create a plan to fix the medical care problem, and are imposing damages for violating its contract with the state by failing to hire qualified counselors. The fees amount to $2,600 a day until CCA meets the minimum qualifications. So far, CCA owes Idaho more than $40,000 for the violations. (www.google.com)
• CCA has settled a 2009 censorship lawsuit with Prison Legal News, which claimed that CCA’s Saguaro Correctional Center only allowed prisoners to order books from Amazon or Barnes and Noble. CCA said that the mail policy was the reason prisoners could not receive copies from PLN. Under the settlement, the publication will not be placed on a prohibited vendor list or a blanket ban by CCA staff. (www.waaytv.com)
• The ACLU dropped Idaho from a $155 million federal lawsuit against CCA at the Idaho Correctional Center near Boise, a facility owned by the state but operated by CCA. The civil rights group alleges the company allowed and encouraged violence against inmates. In March, the ACLU filed the class action lawsuit against CCA and the state, saying the company put profit before inmate safety by reducing the number of officers to unsafe levels.
Now, the state says it will aggressively enforce potential federal court orders to reduce violence at the prison, but ACLU says that even though the state has been dropped from the lawsuit, it will continue to monitor the state's performance. CCA maintains it meets the highest standards.
And according to an Associated Press report, amid these allegations of violence at the Idaho facility, CCA has relocated the warden and assistant warden to other posts. Phillip Valdez, former warden at the troubled 2,104-bed Idaho facility, has been named assistant warden at the Leavenworth Detention Center, a federal prison run by CCA. Former ICC assistant warden, Dan Prado, has been named assistant warden at the new Nevada Southern Detention Center, a 1,072-bed facility currently being built at Pahrump, Nevada, for the Office of Federal Detention Trustee, a U.S. Department of Justice agency. (www.boston.com)
• Two Hawaii inmates are facing capital punishment charges for the stabbing death of a fellow Hawaii inmate at the CCA-operated Saguaro Correctional Center in Arizona. If convicted, they could face the death penalty. The two inmates are the first to face capital punishment for a crime committed in a private prison since Hawaii started housing inmates out of state. Legal advocates say the case could be unprecedented in the nation, especially because Hawaii has no death penalty. Hawaii Department of Public Safety officials say they are monitoring the case, but will most likely not step in to urge Arizona to take the death penalty off the table. (Star Advertiser)
THE GEO GROUP
• The GEO Group announced the purchase of a 650-bed correctional facility in Adelanto, California. GEO purchased the facility from the city for $28 million, and plans on retrofitting the facility before marketing it to local, state and federal correctional agencies. (Marketwatch)
• The GEO Group, which formerly operated the Delco Prison in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, has settled a federal lawsuit involving strip searches of incoming inmates charged with minor crimes. About 10,000 prisoners from six GEO facilities who were strip searched between Jan. 30, 2006, and Jan. 30, 2008, will be eligible for a portion of the $2.9 million settlement. GEO has since changed their strip-search policies as a direct result of the lawsuit. (www.philly.com)
MANAGEMENT and TRAINING CORPORATION
• Arizona prison officials are investigating a riot at Arizona State Prison, Kingman, that involved black inmates and white inmates. The riot at the facility managed by MTC lasted 45 minutes and left eight inmates injured. It was unknown what started the riot. (Arizona Daily Sun)
• Ten former guards at Willacy County Regional Detention Facility in Texas have filed a wrongful termination lawsuit against Management and Training Corporation. The attorney for 10 of the 11 guards who were fired said his clients lost their jobs for refusing to sign statements saying other guards were gambling while on duty. None of the guards has ever been disciplined and several were promoted to supervisory positions within the MTC facility. The lawsuit seeks back pay, future pay and compensation for mental anguish, and punitive damages for what the lawsuit alleges was “intentional, unlawful employment practices.” (Valley Morning Star)
WACKENHUT
• The U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs announced that Wackenhut has entered into a consent decree to settle findings of hiring discrimination at one of their facilities in Colorado. The decree settles OFCCP’s allegations that Wackenhut engaged in hiring discrimination against 446 rejected African American applicants over a two-year period. Wackenhut will pay a total of $290,000 in back pay and interest to the rejected applicants and will hire 41 of them into security positions. (OFCCP Press Release)
