Private Prisons
January 31, 2012
Campaign finance watchdog highlights money behind Florida prison privatization move
The National Institute on Money in State Politics released a report yesterday that highlights the money behind the state’s renewed plans to privatize state prisons.
Even though a judge struck down the state’s plans to privatize prisons in some regions of the state last year, the Legislature has fast-tracked bills this session to allow them to take another stab at last year’s plans. In just a few weeks the state’s plans have passed through two committees and are ready for a floor vote...
LINK - FloridaIndependent.com
January 31, 2012
Barbs Fly in FL Private Prison Conflict
Florida correctional officers say a proposal to privatize some prisons amounts to the government picking winners and losers. They claim the losers will be correctional officers who would be unemployed or displaced, along with their families and communities. Proponents, including private prison operator GEO Group, counter that privately-managed prisons are money-savers for the state.
Captain Mike Riley, a corrections officer in Ocala, says private operators may throw current officers out the main prison gate...
LINK - PublicNewsService.org
January 20, 2012
Video: Meet a Town Bankrupted by Private Prisons
Real video from the town of Littlefield, Texas and the story of how the town was left with $10 million in debt by GEO Group after they built and abandoned a private prison in the community...
LINK - TheRealNews.com
January 18, 2012
Florida again seeks to privatize 29 state prisons
Florida lawmakers are reviving the largest prison privatization plan in the country, with a Senate committee Wednesday voting to file two bills that would turn over 29 correctional facilities in an 18-county region — including Southwest Florida — to private companies.
The vote by the Senate Rules Committee — which was opposed by two Democratic members — is aimed at reversing a court ruling last year that negated the Legislature's effort to carry out the massive privatization plan through the state budget.
Rules Chairman John Thrasher, R-Jacksonville, said the new legislation would "remedy" the objections raised by the courts, including the argument that lawmakers should have used separate legislation — not the budget bill — to authorize the private prisons...
LINK - TheLedger.com
January 17, 2012
Private Corrections Institute Opposes Prison Privatization Effort
The Private Corrections Institute, a Florida-based non-profit watchdog organization that actually opposes the privatization of correctional services, has -- as would be expected -- “sharply condemned” the latest state effort to privatize correctional facilities in 18 South Florida counties.
“While private prison companies will profit from expanded prison privatization contracts, should the legislature prevail in its mass prison privatization plan the loser will be Florida’s taxpayers, as public funds will be diverted from the state into the coffers of for-profit prison firms with no discernable (sic) benefit to the public,” Private Corrections Institute stated in a release...
LINK - SunshineStateNews.com
January 16, 2012
Legal Scholar: Jim Crow Still Exists In America
Under Jim Crow laws, black Americans were relegated to a subordinate status for decades. Things like literacy tests for voters and laws designed to prevent blacks from serving on juries were commonplace in nearly a dozen Southern states.
In her book The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, legal scholar Michelle Alexander writes that many of the gains of the civil rights movement have been undermined by the mass incarceration of black Americans in the war on drugs. She says that although Jim Crow laws are now off the books, millions of blacks arrested for minor crimes remain marginalized and disfranchised, trapped by a criminal justice system that has forever branded them as felons and denied them basic rights and opportunities that would allow them to become productive, law-abiding citizens...
LINK - NPR.org
January 14, 2012
Prison officials remain quiet on details of October riot in Sayre facility (by Calif. inmates)
A lack of charges filed against inmates involved in an Oct. 11 riot at the North Fork Correctional Facility highlights an ongoing issue between private prisons and authorities, a local prosecutor said.
More than three months after the riot, private prison officials have yet to release details about what exactly caused the melee.
The nature of the injuries suffered by dozens of inmates also remains a mystery...
LINK - NewsOK.com
January 10, 2012
U.S. Supreme Court won’t allow private prison employees lawsuit
The Supreme Court won't allow employees at a privately run federal prison to be sued by an inmate in federal court, despite his complaint that their neglect left him with two permanently damaged arms.
The high court ruled 8-1 to throw out the federal lawsuit by inmate Richard Lee Pollard against employees of the GEO Group, formerly known as Wackenhut Corrections Corp. Pollard wanted to sue for his treatment after he fell and fractured both of his elbows at the privately run Taft Correctional Institution in Taft, Calif...
LINK - MercuryNews.com
January 10, 2012
Calif. Inmate’s Perspective on Riot at CCA Prison in Oklahoma
In our struggle for freedom, that weapon has been and will continue to be Truth. I am a California prisoner who was sent involuntarily to NFORK CCA (the Corrections Corporation of America’s North Fork Prison), a private prison in Oklahoma, where I have been for over a year. California thought they could more effectively silence my protests and lawsuits by hurling me hundreds of miles away.
I am once again calling on the Bay View, i.e. Voice of the People:
On Oct. 11, 2011, a riot kicked off where Black inmates were fending off inmates from every other demographic. We faced insurmountable odds and some people were in critical condition afterwards, but the biggest odds against us has yet to be pointed out and is now working diligently to manufacture cover stories to conceal their liability; the odds I speak of is the role of CCA NFORK and COCF (Sacramento-based California Out-of-State Correctional Facility, a unit in CDCR, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation) in setting the stage for such a catastrophic event to take place...
LINK - SFBayView.com
January 8, 2012
Sheriff runs jail better than CCA with $1 million savings!
A new report shows the Hernando County Jail successfully passed its first Florida Model Jail Standards inspection since the sheriff's office took over operations in August 2010.
The inspection examined facility structures, housekeeping, sanitation, policies and procedures. A second inspection, by a certified medical professional inspector, examined inmate medical charts, medications dispensed, treatments rendered and protocols followed.
"Through diligence and hard work by a professional group of personnel, (we) were able to meet the necessary standards," Sheriff Al Nienhuis said in a memo to the county...
LINK - HernandoToday.com
December 29, 2011
Prison Transportation Officer Killed in Truck Accident
A prison transport officer died in a truck accident in Palm Bay on the early morning of December 20, according to WTSP.com. Reports indicate the 47-year-old male, Officer Jeffrey Farless, died after the van he was driving rear-ended a semi-truck on Interstate 95. The van, owned by a privately contracted company, was nor carrying any other passengers.
“He was dropping an inmate off at the Palm Beach County Jail and was on his way back here,” says US Transport owner Robert Downs. “We’re very saddened. It’s a tough day for us. I’ve known him for over 10 years...”
LINK - Orlando.InjuryBoard.com
December 21, 2011
Crowley (private) prison riot: New details of unheeded warnings emerge in epic lawsuit
Seven years ago inmates at a private prison in southeastern Colorado went on an all-night rampage, chasing the shorthanded staff from the premises, attacking suspected snitches, setting fires and causing millions of dollars in damages. Now documents filed in a long-running legal battle confirm what many prisoners have been saying all along -- that prison officials received ample warning of impending trouble but failed to take action in time.
The 2004 riot at the Crowley County Correctional Facility, operated by the Corrections Corporation of America, has emerged as a kind of case study in the multiple ways things can go wrong in a for-profit prison...
LINK - Westword.com
December 20, 2011
Republican Assm. Halderman advocates for private prisons, gets her numbers WRONG
Discounts are everywhere this holiday shopping season. For those willing to wait in line, there are sales on everything from dishwashers to iPods. Now, even convicted felons can join in on the savings. The California State Legislature has decided that criminals deserve a 20% credit for time served in prison.
California felons are already getting about a third of their sentences written off, but those discounts aren’t enough for Sacramento politicians. They recently decided that the best solution to crowded prisons was to open the floodgates and let convicted criminals walk free. It’s kind of like a clearance sale on crimes—two home invasion robberies for the price of one, or half off a grand theft auto...
LINK - FlashReport.org
[Note: CDCR’s population report dated December 7, 2011 states: 9,326 CA inmates housed in out-of-state private prisons]
December 19, 2011
CCA private prisoner transport van crashes, killing two
A prisoner and a corrections officer were killed on Monday when a prison van crashed in Lincoln County.
Officials said the van rolled into the median on Interstate 70 between Limon and Genoa.
There were 11 people in the van when the crash occurred -- nine prisoners and two guards...
LINK - TheDenverChannel.com
December 19, 2011
CCA private prison guard convicted of sexual assault gets 2 days in jail?
In September 2009 Tanya Guzman-Martinez was sent to Arizona's Eloy Detention Center for undocumented workers to await deportation back to Mexico. While in custody, Guzman-Martinez, who is transgendered, requested asylum under the Convention Against Torture; her argument was that she would be persecuted upon returning to Mexico for being biologically male but identifying as female. While Guzman-Martinez was eventually granted asylum in 2010, she nevertheless faced persecution and abuse as a result of being transgendered—just not from Mexican thugs.
According to a lawsuit filed earlier this month by the American Civil Liberties Union, Guzman-Martinez was harassed and assaulted by Corrections Corp. of America guards and inmates at Eloy between September 2009 and her release in May 2010. (CCA, which owns Eloy, contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to detain undocumented workers.)...
LINK - Reason.com
December 12, 2011
Private prison to pay $21 million to short-changed employees after FLSA violations
The Department of Labor and Management & Training Corporation reached an agreement to disperse back wages to current and former MTC employees located at the Willacy County Processing Center. Former employees will need a valid photo ID and their Social Security card.
In 2008, ICE, in consultation with the DOL, determined that the Service Contract Act was applicable to operations at the WCPC. As a result, SCA back wages were retroactively applied, awarding back wages to 1,716 current and former MTC employees at WCPC. The amount totaled approximately $21 million...
LINK - KRGV.com
December 10, 2011
Private prison officials say they have no cause they can release for Oct. prison riot in OK
A private prison in the western Oklahoma town of Sayre still does not have a cause it can release for a riot among inmates that occurred nearly two months ago, a spokesman for the facility says.
And the police chief said he has received no information from Corrections Corp. of America regarding the Oct. 11 riot at the North Fork Correctional Facility that resulted in 16 inmates being hospitalized...
LINK - TheRepublic.com
December 1, 2011
How private prisons game the system
The United States, with just 5 percent of the world’s population, currently holds 25 percent of the world’s prisoners, and for the last 30 years America’s business entrepreneurs have found a lucrative way to cash in on the incarceration surplus: private for-profit prisons.
While the implications of an industry that locks human beings in cages for profit is an old story, there is an important part of the history of private prisons that often goes untold...
LINK - Salon.com
November 26, 2011
Nashville prisoner sues CCA for millions after having miscarriage
Metro’s treatment of pregnant prisoners is being called into question again by a Nashville woman who claims that prison staff denied her requests to take a pregnancy test, assigned her a strenuous work schedule and then destroyed her fetus after she suffered a miscarriage.
Lisa Marie Allison has filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit in Davidson County Circuit Court alleging constitutional violations, negligence, medical malpractice, wrongful death and other claims.
Allison was sent to Metro’s Correctional Development Center on Harding Place in November 2010 for a probation violation and was given a pregnancy test at intake. Although Allison suspected she was pregnant, the test came back negative...
LINK - Tennessean.com
November 26, 2011
State ends contract with Desert View (private) prison in Adelanto, CA
The state has canceled its contract with the privately operated Desert View Modified Community Correctional Facility, putting about 150 workers out of a job.
Desert View's contract termination officially takes effect Wednesday, though prison employees told the Daily Press that The Geo Group Inc. has been preparing to deactivate the prison at Rancho and Aster roads since May.
The 643-bed medium-security prison is shuttering its doors as part of California’s realignment plan, which responds to federal orders to reduce state prison overcrowding by shifting responsibility for tens of thousands of low-level offenders to county governments...
LINK - VVDailyPress.com
November 18, 2011
CCA charging inmates $5.00 per minute for phone calls!
For inmates at one Georgia prison, a one minute phone call could cost them five times more than they earn for a day of work.
The Correction Corporation Of America's Stewart facility, a private prison in Lumpkin, Georgia, is forcing prisoners to pay five dollars per minute to use the phone, Alternet reports. The exorbitant rate would break most people's budget, but it's especially costly for inmates that the prison who make just one dollar per day to work at the facility...
LINK - HuffingtonPost.com
November 17, 2011
Convicted rapist, murderer attacked in GEO Group private prison
A man convicted of raping and murdering one UNM student and raping another back in the early 1980's is at UNM Hospital on life support after being attacked by fellow inmates in prison.
The Corrections Department said Michael Guzman was attacked by more than a dozen inmates just two days after he was moved to a private prison in Clayton.
His family wants answers about the attack...
LINK - KOB.com
November 17, 2011
Private prison company sued for age discrimination
A former employee of Civigenics, the company which provides prison management at the Columbiana County Jail filed a wrongful termination suit Tuesday in Columbiana County Common Pleas Court.
Stephen Crea, East Liverpool, claims age discrimination was behind the company releasing him on May 19. He was 60 years old when he was let go and the person who replaced him was under 40...
LINK - SalemNews.net
November 15, 2011
State fines private prison company $1.1 Million for contract violations
The Department of Corrections will collect $1.1 million from a private prison operator for contract violations related to understaffing, Secretary-designate Gregg Marcantel said Monday.
The GEO Group also has agreed to pump an additional $200,000 over the next year into recruiting staff for its Lea County Correctional Facility in Hobbs, Marcantel said.
The violations occurred since the beginning of this year, after Gov. Susana Martinez took office...
LINK - ABQJournal.com
November 14, 2011
More on GEO $1.1 Million fine for staffing shortages
A Florida company will pay New Mexico $1.1 million in penalties for not adequately staffing a private prison it operates in Hobbs, a state official said.
GEO Group, which manages three of New Mexico's four private prisons, agreed to pay the settlement last week following a meeting between the corrections agency and the company's top management, Corrections Secretary Gregg Marcantel said Monday.
"They've agreed on it," Marcantel said of GEO. "It's a very fair way of doing it. They are not completely happy. It needed to be done..."
LINK - SantaFeNewMexican.com
November 14, 2011
More on private prison costing more than public in Mississippi
Mississippi Corrections Commissioner Christopher Epps will save the state about $10.2 million a year with the closing of the privately run prison in Leflore County.
"I think I made the right decision," Epps said last week.
The Delta Correctional Facility originally closed Oct. 9, 2002. Then-Gov. Ronnie Musgrove said the state would shut down the prison, citing a lack of funding due to his veto of the Mississippi Department of Corrections budget for private prisons. A state judge later ruled the veto unconstitutional. At the time, the prison housed more than 800 inmates and employed 200 workers...
LINK - CommercialAppeal.com
November 10, 2011
Private prison to close because it can’t operate cheaper than state
Mississippi Corrections Commissioner Chris Epps says a privately run prison in Leflore County will close in January.
Epps says the state and Tennessee-based Corrections Corporation of America mutually agreed to cease operations. How the decision affects operations of the Leflore County jail at the same site is unclear.
Epps and CCA officials say plans are to cease operations of the 1,172-bed Delta Correctional Facility in Greenwood, Miss. on Jan. 15, 2012...
LINK - VCStar.com
October 31, 2011
U.S. Supreme Court to decide private prison worker liability for constitutional violations
The U.S. Supreme Court this week will examine a prisoner's treatment at a privately run facility in Taft. The outcome could either shield or render more vulnerable the fast-growing private prison industry.
On Tuesday, University of Richmond law professor John Preis, pro bono attorney for Richard Lee Pollard, will have 30 minutes to convince justices that inmates held in privately run prisons enjoy the same constitutional right to sue employees over cruel and unusual punishment as do inmates in facilities run directly by the government...
LINK - FresnoBee.com
October 18, 2011
Private prison industry grows despite critics
The biggest prison in the state of Idaho is also the toughest.
The Idaho Correctional Center—the ICC — was so violent that employees and inmates had a name for the place: Gladiator School.
“That was because of the assaults,” said Todd Goertzen, a former corrections counselor at the prison. “That's why they called it Gladiator School, because of that reason. If you're going to ICC, it's going to be fight or die, basically.”
This is the story of a dangerous business: the billions of dollars that flow into the American prison industry and the companies that profit from it...
LINK - Today.MSNBC.com
October 18, 2011
Oklahoma: 4 Cal CCA inmates still in hospital
Four inmates who were injured in a prison riot at the North Fork Correctional Facility last week remain hospitalized.
Corrections Corporation of America spokesman Mike Machak (MAY'-chak) said Tuesday the prisoners were still being treated at area hospitals. Machak said he couldn't elaborate on the inmates' medical conditions.
A total of 46 inmates were hurt during the riot between prisoners from California. Thirty were treated by prison medical staff and 16 initially were hospitalized...
LINK - MercuryNews.com
October 17, 2011
Two private prison documentaries to air tomorrow night
PBS-Frontline will air an investigative report titled, “Lost in Detention” October 18 at 6pm Pacific Time.
CNBC will premiere the documentary, “Billions Behind Bars: Inside the American Prison Industry.” at 9 pm Pacific time.
Please check local listings for any changes.
A brief summary of both documentaries is pasted below...
October 12, 2011
Reason Foundation (funded by private prison companies) says private prisons are good?
Massive debt and deficits at all levels of government are prompting policymakers to seek ways to keep the spiraling costs of correctional systems in check.
Sensible criminal justice reforms including easing drug penalties, using drug courts, expanding treatment programs and sentencing reforms are key changes. Lawmakers are also expanding their use of public-private partnerships to lower prison spending, improve performance and avoid major capital investment in new prisons.
Public-private partnerships are simply government contracts with private firms to provide services ranging from building and operating prisons to delivering inmate services (e.g., health care, food, rehabilitation services) and operational support functions (e.g., maintenance and transportation). Since the private corrections industry emerged in the 1980s, over 30 states — including California, Texas, Florida and Colorado — have embraced public-private partnerships. Today approximately 9 percent of federal and state inmates are held in privately-operated prisons...
LINK - CNBC.com
October 12, 2011
For-Profit Prisons: A Barrier to Serious Criminal Justice Reform
The imprisonment of human beings at record levels is both a moral failure and an economic one — especially at a time when state governments confront enormous fiscal crises caused largely by bloated and unnecessary prison spending. But mass incarceration provides a gigantic windfall for one special interest group: the private prison industry. As current incarceration levels harm the nation as a whole, for-profit prisons obtain taxpayer dollars in ever greater amounts. Private prison executives, meanwhile, bring in multi-million dollar compensation packages.
Today, the United States incarcerates 2.3 million individuals — more people, both per capita and in absolute terms, than any other nation in the world including Russia, China and Iran. The current incarceration rate deprives record numbers of individuals of their liberty, disproportionately affects people of color and has at best a minimal effect on public safety. The crippling cost of imprisoning more and more Americans — non-violent offenders in the majority of cases — saddles governments with escalating debt...
LINK - CNBC.com
October 12, 2011
Oklahoma inmates riot over food
A privately run Oklahoma prison was locked down Tuesday after about 100 inmates rioted over food complaints, leaving 22 injured, officials said.
Greg Williams of the state Corrections Department said seven of the prisoners at North Fork Correctional Facility in Sayre were taken to a hospital and 15 were treated for minor injuries in the prison infirmary, KFOR-TV, Oklahoma City, reported. No prison workers were injured.
Williams said the inmates had asked to speak with Warden Fred Figueroa about the quality of the food served in the medium-security men's prison...
LINK - UPI.com
October 12, 2011
Updated: CA inmates in private prison riot in Oklahoma
Beckham County Sheriff Scott Jay said Tuesday's riot at the North Fork Correctional Facility is the worst he has heard about since the private prison opened in 1999.
When he arrived at the scene, Jay said. “We saw mass fighting all over the yard.”
Sixteen inmates were taken to area hospitals to be treated for injuries, according to a statement released about 8 p.m. by the operator of the private prison, Corrections Corp. of America. One had been returned to the prison by evening. The statement also said that 30 inmates were treated at the facility...
LINK - NewsOK.com
October 11, 2011
Authorities responding to disturbance at private prison in Sayre
Law enforcement agencies responded Tuesday to a disturbance at the North Fork Correctional Facility in Sayre, officials said. The private prison is run by Nashville-based Corrections Corporation of America and houses offenders from California.
At 11:45 a.m. Tuesday, prison staff responded to multiple inmate fights in various areas of the facility, according to Steve Owen, CCA senior director of public affairs.
By 3:30 p.m., the fighting had ceased, Owen said...
LINK - TulsaWorld.com
October 11, 2011
Multiple people suffer injuries in Sayre prison riot
A Sayre Memorial Hospital spokeswoman said prisoners were taken to that hospital in the wake of a riot at North Fork Corrections Facility in Sayre, though she could not confirm what their injuries were or how many prisoners had been hospitalized.
Also, Bill Barrett, spokesman for Great Plains Regional Medical Center in Elk City, said multiple patients were taken to the hospital with injuries. He said some were sent to the emergency room and were being attended to by a comprehensive medical team.
Barrett said the hospital expected to receive more patients in the next few hours. Two helicopters were at the facility to quickly transport victims. It was unknown whether the patients are inmates or prison guards, he said...
LINK - NewsOK.com
October 11, 2011
Calif. inmates brawl at Okla. prison; 21 injured
Widespread fighting broke out at an Oklahoma prison Tuesday between black and Hispanic California inmates, sending at least 21 inmates to the infirmary or hospitals before police and prison guards were able to restore order, authorities said.
The fighting began shortly before noon at the North Fork Corrections Facility, a privately run medium-security prison in Sayre that houses 2,381 inmates from California. Greg Williams, an official with the Oklahoma Department of Corrections, told The Associated Press that the fighting appeared to have been between black and Hispanic inmates, but he didn't know if it was gang-related...
LINK - MercuryNews.com
October 11, 2011
California Inmates Rioting NOW in Oklahoma Private Prison!
Law enforcement agencies are responding to a disturbance at the North Fork Correctional Facility in Sayre, officials said.
The private prison is run by Corrections Corporation of America, which was not immediately available for comment.
"I have little information," said Joyce Jackson, Oklahoma Department of Corrections communications director. "Basically, there is supposed to be a disturbance with approximately 80 to 90 Hispanic offenders and they have barricaded themselves in the dining area..."
LINK - TulsaWorld.com
October 10, 2011
FBI & U.S. Atty investigating private prison deals in Florida
As legislative leaders continue the push to privatize 19 South Florida prisons, the state’s most ambitious private prison project in Northwest Florida is enmeshed in a grand jury investigation.
The federal probe into the Blackwater River Correctional Facility has a broad sweep, touching former House Speaker Ray Sansom, R-Destin, the economic development arm of Santa Rosa County, and incoming Senate President Don Gaetz, R-Niceville.
Since March, the Pensacola-based grand jury has issued more than six subpoenas seeking documents and testimony into the $121 million state contract that cleared the way for the Boca Raton-based GEO Group to build a prison near the Panhandle city of Milton...
LINK - MiamiHerald.TypePad.com
October 9, 2011
CCA-run prison remains Idaho’s most violent lockup
In the last four years, Idaho's largest privately run prison has faced federal lawsuits, widespread public scrutiny, increased state oversight, changes in upper management and even an ongoing FBI investigation.
Yet the Corrections Corp. of America ( CXW - news - people )-run Idaho Correctional Center remains the most violent lockup in Idaho.
Records obtained by The Associated Press show that while the assault rate improved somewhat in the four-year period examined, ICC inmates are still more than twice as likely to be assaulted as those at other Idaho prisons...
LINK - Forbes.com
October 7, 2011
Cost of cornfield manhunt near Tower City roughly $55,000
Local law enforcement agencies spent roughly $55,000 on the 22-hour manhunt earlier this week for the sex offender who escaped from a private prison transport van near Tower City.
And after speaking this morning with the owner of Extradition Transport of America LLC, Cass County Sheriff Paul Laney said the public safety agencies that were involved in the search believe they’ll get paid for those costs...
LINK - InForum.com
October 7, 2011
Former Bureau of Prisons Director Comes Out of Retirement For Private Prison
Bureau of Prisons (BOP) Director Harley Lappin (55) enjoyed a 25 year career of distinguished service when he announced that May 7, 2011 would mark the beginning of his retirement. He had been director for about 8 years. That announcement also came at around the same time as a revelation that Lappin had been arrested for driving under the influence near his home in Annapolis, MD. According to numerous news sources, the BOP has stated that Lappin’s resignation had nothing to do with the DUI event. Okay, we’ll give him that...
LINK - Forbes.com
October 5, 2011
Corn Field Mowed Down to Find Escaped Sex Offender
Farmers are cutting down a massive North Dakota corn field today in an effort to flush out a convicted sex offender who bolted from a prison transport van and dashed into the field of eight-foot high corn stalks.
Joseph Megna, 29, escaped from the prison van around 4 p.m. Tuesday while the seven-passenger van had pulled over at a rest stop. The van was en route to Washington state where Megna was facing charges of child molestation. He was previously convicted on sex offense charges, and was being transported from Florida to face the new charges, police said...
LINK - ABCNews.go.com
October 5, 2011
Idaho: AP asks judge to open CCA secret settlement
The Associated Press is asking a federal judge to unseal the settlement agreement between an Idaho inmate and private prison company Corrections Corp. of America.
The confidential settlement between Marlin Riggs and CCA was reached last month in a widely publicized lawsuit that alleged rampant violence at a CCA-run prison near Boise. Riggs originally asked for $55 million in damages, saying the prison was nicknamed "Gladiator School" and that guards knew he was about to be attacked but failed to protect him. Riggs said he suffered serious injuries in the attack, and required facial surgery to allow him to breathe normally...
LINK - TheRepublic.com
October 5, 2011
More on escaped sex offender - private van en route to California before escape
Several dozen officers have zeroed on a farm field about five miles northwest of here in the second large-scale search for a suspect in eight days.
Barnes County Chief Deputy Don Fiebiger said 40 to 50 officers have surrounded a 1,000-acre cornfield after a deputy spotted 29-year-old Joseph Megna, a convicted high-risk sex offender who fled a transport van Tuesday afternoon, near a propane tank at a farm about 8 this morning.
An airplane and helicopter are also being used to search for Megna, who is not wearing any restraints...
LINK - InForum.com
October 5, 2011
Another inmate escapes private prisoner tranport company (CCA subsidiary TransCor)
Authorities are closing in on a convicted sex offender who escaped custody from a private company’s transport van west of here Tuesday afternoon.
"Right now, they spotted him back inside of a field, and we've got it saturated with people trying to collapse the perimeter," Cass County Sheriff Paul Laney said at about 8:45 a.m.
The Barnes County field is located about three miles north and two miles west of Tower City, in an area the Red River Valley SWAT team was working overnight, Laney said...
LINK - DL-Online.com
October 4, 2011
More on influence and privatization
Private prison companies lost one chance for a big profit last week when one of the largest known privatization campaigns in the country was blocked by a Florida judge for being unconstitutional. But private prison players like The GEO Group and the Corrections Corporation of America, which would have won big from privatization, and the tactics they use to ensure they stay in good graces with lawmakers have remained in the shadows even as the future of the legislation remains in question.
The plan to privatize 29 correctional facilities across 18 counties in South Florida was introduced by state legislators as an amendment to a budget bill, which, according to Thursday’s ruling, didn’t allow for full consideration of the costs of the planned mass privatization. GEO Group and the Corrections Corporation of America were set to perhaps see a large windfall from the privatization deals, but lobbying records show the companies invested in lawmakers long before any lucrative contracts were proposed...
LINK - FloridaIndependent.com
October 4, 2011
Another academic questions prison privatization
The prison privatization debate again has ascended into prominence in Florida, with some policymakers advocating for privatizing 29 prison facilities and others arguing against it. The debate is likely to continue — recent circuit court decisions notwithstanding — and so it makes sense to step back and examine the debate and the opportunities it provides.
Prison privatization is literally a growth industry. From 2000 to 2009, the latest year for which national data exist, the number of inmates held in state and federal private prisons grew 48 percent, from 87,369 to 129,336. Florida ranks among the top contributors, along with California and Texas, to this growth. (All three belong to the exclusive group of states that house more than 100,000 inmates.) In 2009, Florida housed 9,812 inmates in private prisons, or approximately 10 percent of all inmates held in state-contracted private prisons...
LINK - Tallahassee.com
October 3, 2011
National: GEO case before the Supreme Court
Douglas v. California Pharmacists Association, presents the issue of whether a claim for preemption can be brought directly under the Constitution in the absence of a statute authorizing such suits. If the Supreme Court finds that such suits cannot be brought, it will significantly lessen the ability to ensure state and local compliance with federal law. In Pollard v. GEO Group, Inc., the court will consider whether a cause of action exists to sue guards at private prisons for violating inmates’ constitutional rights...
LINK - ABAJournal.com
October 2, 2011
Court corrects overreach on prison privatization
A circuit judge's clear-cut ruling in Tallahassee on Friday that Florida's massive plan to privatize state prisons is unconstitutional sent another powerful message to Gov. Rick Scott and the Republican-controlled Legislature. They are not above the law, and they are going to lose in court when they exceed the constitutional restraints on their authority.
Leon County Circuit Judge Jackie Fulford found that a plan to privatize 29 state prisons in South Florida is unconstitutional because lawmakers wrote the change into the state budget instead of passing separate legislation. Governors from both political parties and legislatures controlled by either Republicans and Democrats similarly have been overruled by the courts over the past 40 years for using the state budget to slip in significant changes to state law. That often happens when those policy changes can't stand up to public scrutiny or don't have enough support among rank-and-file lawmakers to be approved on their own merits...
LINK - TampaBay.com
October 2, 2011
Former Schwarzenegger budget chief (Arduin) at center of privatization effort in Florida
The biggest privatization move in Florida history began when a nationally known government cost-cutter told the Senate's budget committee chief that, for the right kind of inmates, turning prisons over to for-profit corporations could save a lot of money.
Now, the state's plan to privatize 29 prison facilities in 18 counties is the hottest political, management and legal issue of Gov. Rick Scott's young administration. And he didn't even ask for it.
The Department of Corrections was scheduled to open bids this week to operate prisons in its vast Region IV — everything south of Hillsborough, Polk, Osceola and Brevard counties — but a circuit court judge last week stopped the move. The state has not decided whether to appeal Circuit Judge Jackie Fulford's findings that the Legislature illegally slipped the privatization mandate into proviso language of the budget...
LINK - Tallahassee.com
September 30, 2011
Florida private prison plan blocked by judge, privateer stock takes a dive
Geo Group Inc., the Florida-based private prison operator, fell as much as 5 percent after a judge blocked the state’s plan to pursue privatization at as many as 29 prisons in 18 counties.
The state legislature’s move to bury key details on privatization in the state budget is “unconstitutional,” Leon County Circuit Court Judge Jackie Fulford in Tallahassee ruled. The 2012 budget provision changes the statutory process for privatizing facilities and directs the Department of Corrections to replace state employees at particular prisons with private operators...
LINK - BusinessWeek.com
September 30, 2011
Tennessee: CCA guard charged for drugs
A corrections officer is now behind bars inside the very prison where she works. The Hamilton County Sheriff's Department has charged 20-year-old officer Jesse Wedell with smuggling marijuana into Silverdale.
Wedell sat in a jail cell, likely second guessing her risky move early Thursday morning.The Hamilton County Sheriff's department says Wedell hid about three quarters of an ounce of marijuana in her private area...
LINK - NewsChannel9.com
September 26, 2011
Private prison giant CCA seeking CA inmates for empty prisons in Minnesota, Colorado
It’s been almost two years since the privately-run prison in Appleton has held prisoners. But in early 2012, the prison’s owner, Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), expects to fill Appleton’s Prairie Correctional Facility and another facility in Colorado with 3,256 inmates from California.
In the last ten years, the revenue of CCA, the country’s biggest private prison company, has almost doubled, according to their annual reports. Critics say that CCA’s success, and even the likely reopening of the prison in Appleton, stems from their use of lobbying and campaign donations to push through tougher crime laws and increase detainment of illegal immigrants...
LINK - MinnesotaIndependent.com
September 24, 2011
Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry of Texas and his ties to private prisons
He has the talk. No doubt: “And I’m just not real sure you’re a bunch of right-wing extremists,” the Governor of the Lone Star State had told a crowd in 2009, “but if you are, I’m with ‘ya!” The crowd roared, and Perry was quickly embedded inside the American psyche. Many who were paying attention saw this as his first step towards the 2012 Election.
Yet it must be realized: Perry’s swagger is nothing more than the same tired neo-conservative rhetoric now disguised as populist libertarianism. In fact, a closer inspection of Perry’s record yields familiar attributes of a typical Washington politician in the 21st Century. That is to say, he has a tendency to deviate from his stated principles. In his state of Texas, the longest-ever serving governor has been sleeping cozily with the largest concentration of private prisons in the country, while also signing executive orders mandating little girls to be vaccinated against their will...
LINK - CenturyCityNews.com
September 23, 2011
Private prison still having problems 1 year after escapes in Arizona
The Arizona Department of Corrections has toughened its oversight of private prisons since a well-publicized breakout last year and has made other security improvements, but potentially dangerous security lapses in state-run and privately operated facilities remain, auditors reported Friday.
The July 30, 2010 breakout from the medium-security Arizona State Prison in Golden Valley sparked a three-week national manhunt. All three were captured, but authorities said two of the inmates killed an Oklahoma couple in New Mexico while they were on the run...
LINK - TheRepublic.com
September 20, 2011
CCA agrees to follow state regs in suit over violent prison conditions?
A potential class-action lawsuit against the nation’s largest private prison company over allegations of violence at the Idaho Correctional Center has been settled in federal court.
The agreement between the inmates and Nashville, Tenn.-based Corrections Corporation of America was filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Boise.
In it, CCA doesn’t acknowledge the allegations but agrees to increase staffing, investigate all assaults and make other sweeping changes at the lockup south of Boise. If the company fails to make the changes, the inmates can ask the courts to force CCA to comply...
LINK - WashingtonPost.com
September 19, 2011
CNBC - “Billions Behind Bars: Inside America’s Prison Industry” to air in October
“Billions Behind Bars: Inside America’s Prison Industry,” a CNBC original documentary, goes behind the razor wires to investigate the profits and inner-workings of the multi-billion dollar corrections industry.
With more than 2.3 million people locked up, the U.S. has the highest incarceration rate in the world. One out of 100 American adults is behind bars – while a stunning one out of 32 is on probation, parole or in prison. This reliance on mass incarceration has created a thriving prison economy. The states and the federal government together spend roughly $74 billion a year on corrections, and nearly 800,000 people work in the industry...
LINK - CNBC.com
September 16, 2011
Private prison issues in Arizona
Whether more private prison beds will be added in Arizona — including perhaps here in the Yuma area — remains uncertain in the wake of a court ruling earlier this week.
Awarding of bids for private companies to build prisons to house thousands of prisoners are pending by the Arizona Department of Corrections. Among the bidders are two companies proposing to build prisons in Yuma County.
The American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) asked a judge early this week to immediately halt awarding of bids pending completion of a study of the effectiveness of private prisons. The judge declined to do so, but did schedule a hearing next week on the issue...
LINK - YumaSun.com
September 14, 2011
Lawmakers looking into private prison abuses
Allegations of poor treatment of prisoners in the private prison in Shelby Montana are to be investigated by Montana lawmakers. It has been alleged that prisoners were being held after being eligible for parole and that each prisoner is issued with two rolls of toilet paper per week, no more. Rudy Stock, a businessman from Helena added to the list of shortcomings. He has been visiting his son in the Crossroads Correctional Center run by Corrections Corporation of America(CCA) since February. If an audit of the facilities supports the allegations, the prison would not meet American Correctional Association standards.
Spokesperson for the Department of Corrections, Bob Anez, has said he is working on responses for the December meeting. The state pays CCa a per diem fee of $53.84 per person incarcerated.Ref. Montana Watchdog...
LINK - AllVoices.com
September 14, 2011
CCA settles (another) multi-million $$ lawsuit by police officer shot 5 times by CCA escapees
Former Metro Police Sgt. Mark Chesnut has settled a lawsuit against a private prison company that housed an inmate who escaped and then shot him five times.
Chesnut sued Corrections Corporation of America, accusing the company of being negligent in its supervision of Joseph Jackson Jr., a Mississippi prisoner who escaped during a medical visit. Chesnut’s lawsuit asked for $16.5 million in damages resulting from physical and emotional pain for him and his wife.
Chesnut’s attorney, David Raybin, said the former sergeant would not comment and he declined to discuss the amount of the settlement...
LINK - Tennessean.com
September 14, 2011
CCA pays off brutalized inmate in multi-million-dollar lawsuit
An inmate who sued a privately run Idaho prison over allegations of extreme violence and medical neglect has reached a settlement with the private prison company Corrections Corp. of America.
Meanwhile, dozens of other inmates who also sued the Nashville, Tenn.-based CCA in federal court are in settlement talks with the company that could end the potentially class-action case by the close of the week...
LINK - TheRepublic.com
September 13, 2011
Montana lawmakers seek audit of CCA private prison
Three state lawmakers said they will request a legislative audit of a contract between the Department of Corrections [1] [1](DOC) and the company that operates the private prison in Shelby following allegations which included inmates being held beyond their parole and a claim prisoners are given two rolls of toilet paper a week and told by guards to use their hands if they run out.
The three, members of the Legislature’s Law and Justice Interim Committee [2], said they would request the audit after hearing the claims made Friday regarding the DOC and the Corrections Corporation of America [3](CCA) by Helena businessman Rudy Stock, who said he has visited his son at the Crossroads Correctional Center [4]nearly 80 times since Feb. 1...
LINK - Montana.Watchdog.org
September 12, 2011
Quakers file suit against private prison contracts
A Quaker group filed suit Monday to block the state from awarding any more contracts for private prisons, at least for the time being.
The lawsuit points out the Department of Corrections is supposed to award a contract for 5,000 additional private prison beds as early as the end of the week. Four companies have been chosen as finalists.
GEO Group, whose world headquarters is located in Boca Raton, Fla., has a bid for sites at the Yuma Prison for 2,000 or 3,000 beds. Management and Training Corp., from Centerville, Utah, has a bid for sites in Yuma for 3,000 beds...
LINK - YumaSun.com
September 9, 2011
Private prisons profitting from 9/11
On a conference call with investors less than two months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Wall Street executive Steve Logan predicted a new era of unbridled growth for his industry: the for-profit prison business.
"It is clear that since Sept. 11, there's a heightened focus on detention, both on the borders and in the U.S.," Logan, the chief executive of publicly-traded prison corporation Cornell Companies, told analysts on a quarterly earnings call. "More people are gonna get caught. ... So I would say that's positive."
Logan's upbeat assessment of the post-9/11 world would prove true, as the federal government has embarked on an unprecedented campaign to round up, detain and eventually deport illegal immigrants under the guise of bolstering national security. Since Congress brought immigration enforcement under the Department of Homeland Security in 2003, the number of immigrants locked up each year has nearly doubled to more than 390,000, creating a lucrative opportunity for private corporations hired to build and supervise detention centers across the country...
LINK - HuffingtonPost.com
September 8, 2011
CA to remove all inmates from Michigan private prison (GEO Group)
California’s changing plans for its inmates will cost about 144 jobs in Lake County as The GEO Group prepares to transport the 270 Californian prisoners who are currently there back west.
Paul Griffith, executive director of Michigan Works! West Central, said the inmates are Californian prisoners who were previously housed in Arizona, so he is not sure where they will ultimately be sent when they leave Michigan.
Griffith said about 161 people are currently working at GEO’s Lake County prison, which is named the North Lake Correctional Facility and is located near Baldwin in Webber Township...
LINK - LudingtonDailyNews.com
September 8, 2011
Private prison (CCA) supervisor pleads guilty to molesting female detainees
A former residential supervisor at the T. Don Hutto Residential Center in Taylor pleaded guilty this week to molesting women he was transporting them from the center to the airport or bus terminal.
Donald Dunn pleaded guilty to two federal deprivation of rights charges, according to a press release from the U.S. attorney’s office.
Dunn admitted to touching illegal female immigrants “in a sexual manner” between December 2009 and May 2010, the release said. He said that he would stop the vehicle along the way, order them to get out and convince them he was conducting a legitimate search, it said...
LINK - Statesman.com
September 7, 2011
Do private prisons save money?
Private-prison detractors have long accused businesses in the incarceration-for-profit game of cutting corners to boost revenue. With dozens of for-profit corrections facilities across Texas housing a mix of federal convicts, undocumented immigrants, juvenile offenders, and local inmates, there’s ample anecdotal evidence to support their claims, including regular complaints of squalid facilities, wrongful deaths, shoddy medical care, and sexual abuse at the hands of private-prison guards.
Still, many counties have continued to turn to private prisons because of the supposed cost savings. As Bexar County Commissioner Kevin Wolff eyes the local jail, officials in Harris County, home to the state’s largest lockup with nearly 10,000 inmates, are also studying privatization...
LINK - Sacurrent.com
September 5, 2011
New GEO private prison in Adelanto, CA
A detention center to house immigrant detainees set to open in Adelanto raises many important concerns for immigrants and their advocates in the community. While the facility could potentially keep detainees closer to their families and legal counsel, the so-called public-private partnership that produced this facility shows that immigration law isn't just a divisive political issue - it's big business.
The expansion of for-profit prisons to incarcerate non-citizens held under the government's civil, not criminal, authority is both a symptom and a cause of an increasingly criminalized and dehumanized immigration process. Immigrants who have broken no criminal laws are being held in prison-like conditions that have themselves come under scrutiny by nonprofit groups and federal agencies over the past two years...
LINK - SBSun.com
September 4, 2011
Prison privatization is hard to swallow
It's hard to find anything positive for Marion in the prison privatization deal announced by the state Thursday.
It is nothing like the deal that was described in the spring.
While we were apprehensive about the selling of state property in the community, we were bolstered by the possibility of opening a closed facility and the likelihood of adding a considerable amount of valuable property to the tax rolls...
LINK - AZCentral.com
September 4, 2011
Arizona prison businesses are big political contributors
Corrections Corp. of America, the country's largest private-prison operator, says it thrives by offering better service at a lower cost than state-run prisons. It's an argument echoed by the three smaller rivals bidding on a 5,000-bed private-prison contract with the state of Arizona.
But when it comes to other ways of winning business, such as employing platoons of lobbyists, doling out campaign contributions and working through political connections, CCA stands head and shoulders above its competitors, in Arizona and across the country...
LINK - AZCentral.com
September 2, 2011
Ky. jailers push state to end private prison deals
Members of the Kentucky Jailers Association are pushing the state to cancel contracts with a pair of private prisons next summer and transfer some of the inmates to county jails, a move that would also redirect millions of state dollars to the jails.
The jailers say that since the state Department of Corrections pays local jails to house state inmates, the move could help jails across Kentucky reduce budget deficits...
LINK - KnoxNews.com
September 1, 2011
Columnist: A cautionary tale about private prison shift
As Florida enters the uncharted territory of a huge expansion of private, for-profit prisons, this story serves as a cautionary tale.
A citizen walks into a prison and says, Hello, I'd like to look at the visitors' sign-in log, which is a public record under state law.
No, a prison official says...
LINK - TampaBay.com
August 26, 2011
Florida Gov asks state prison director to resign over privatization, other problems
Florida's prison chief was forced to abruptly resign Wednesday after a series of clashes with Gov. Rick Scott.
Edwin Buss, who had been head of the Indiana prison system before coming to Florida, had been on the job six months. But in a statement, the Scott administration said that "differences in philosophy and management styles arose which made the separation in the best interests of the state."
In recent weeks, Buss had come under fire for how the Department of Corrections was handling some of its privatization efforts as well as a decision to approve a contract granting a cable network access to a state prison for a prison reality series. The contract for MSNBC's "Lockup" was put on hold by the governor's office...
LINK - MiamiHerald.com
August 26, 2011
Lawsuit filed over Ohio plan to privatize 5 state prisons
A liberal policy group that previously sued over Gov. John Kasich's privatization of Ohio's economic development functions has filed a similar lawsuit challenging privatization of five state prisons.
ProgressOhio and several prison employees filed the action Thursday in Franklin County.
The lawsuit alleges selling state-owned prisons to private contractors is unconstitutional. It seeks to prevent the state from proceeding with the sales or to block layoffs. It also wants workers at privatized prisons declared public employees...
LINK - BusinessWeek.com
August 23, 2011
Private prison guard accused of having sex with out-of-state inmate
A former corrections officer at a privately run prison in Hudson is under investigation for allegations that she had sex with an inmate.
Amber Gunter, 26, of Brighton, said she never had sex with the inmate, a convicted murderer form Anchorage, Alaska. Instead, she told the Tribune, she’s the victim of an ex-roommate’s revenge.
Gunter worked as a corrections officer for a year and two months at the Hudson Correctional Facility, a 1,250-bed, privately run prison in southern Weld County. The prison has contracted with the state of Alaska to house 850 prisoners there...
LINK - GreeleyTribune.com
August 23, 2011
Prison expert rips florida’s privatization plans
TALLAHASSEE -- A University of North Florida criminology expert who specializes in prison privatization issues is blasting the state's privatization plans for facilities in an 18-county area of South Florida.
Michael Hallett, chair of UNF's criminology program and author of Private Prisons in America, completed an unsolicited assessment of the state's call for vendors, which he then sent to Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, chair of the Senate Criminal Justice Appropriations subcommittee and an opponent of privatization.
"There are so many serious problems with this RFP that it is not easy to digest in one document," he wrote in the memo he sent to Fasano...
LINK - Sun-Sentinel.com
August 23, 2011
Riot at GEO private prison in Oklahoma
LAWTON, Okla. – A huge fight at Lawton's GEO Prison has left a number of people injured. It happened around 4:30 p.m., at least 15 people are injured, six of which have been taken to the hospital. The prison is on lockdown.
A 7News crew has seen three ambulances leave the prison. There is a fourth still parked outside. We are not sure how many people were involved in the fight or where it took place. But police suspect the fight was gang-related...
LINK - NewsChannel110.com
August 22, 2011
Top 10 Lies Told By Private Prison Corporations at the Arizona Hearings
It’s been a hot summer in Arizona, but there were a lot of private prison corporate executives whose pants were on fire over the past two weeks. On the plus side, our crop yields will set records this year due to the amount of b.s. that we just got showered with.
Over the past two weeks, the Arizona Dept. of Corrections (ADC) conducted public hearings on proposed private prisons in 5 Arizona towns: Eloy, Goodyear, Winslow, San Luis/Yuma, and Coolidge. At each hearing, the ADC gave a presentation on the bidding process, the Corporation gave a (sometimes quite lengthy) presentation on how awesome they think they are, and members of the public got 5 minutes apiece to raise concerns, ask questions, or, in many cases, beg them for jobs...
LINK - TucsonCitizen.com
August 20, 2011
Prison privatization plan in Florida may stop if no cost savings
Gov. Rick Scott says a massive South Florida prison privatization plan won't fly if it doesn't save the state money.
Scott on Friday also downplayed the cost of laying off state employees at those prisons.
The Republican governor discussed the plan for privatizing 29 facilities in 18 counties during an interview with The Associated Press in Miami...
LINK - MiamiHerald.com
August 19, 2011
Private prison companies GEO and MTC in the hot seat in AZ
Scandal involving two private prison companies seeking a contract to build and operate a new complex near San Luis followed them to Yuma County.
The two companies, GEO Group and Management and Training Corp. (MTC), are competing for Arizona Department of Corrections (DOC) monies provided by the Arizona Legislature to build up to 5,000 new private prison beds.
DOC is considering five sites in Eloy, Coolidge, San Luis, Winslow and Goodyear as possible prison locations, and was in Yuma this week to hear public comment...
LINK - YumaSun.com
August 19, 2011
Prison privatization costs taxpayers more
There is a natural tendency among politicians new to Tallahassee to assume that when they encounter resistance to change it is because of inertia rather than informed experience. The latest debacle involves the bold and quick decision by the Republican-led Legislature to privatize 30 state prison facilities in 18 South Florida counties. A minor detail not discussed at the time: up to $25 million in public money to provide severance pay to more than 4,000 Department of Corrections workers.
Corrections staffers say they told the legislative staff about the expense, but it was never discussed openly nor addressed in this year's state budget. Now it appears the agency will need to find the money - a prospect the corrections secretary warned "may just cripple the agency" - or seek special dispensation from the Joint Legislative Budget Commission...
LINK - TampaBay.com
August 16, 2011
Hidden costs of prison privatization under fire
The chairman of a Senate budget subcommittee said Monday he wants to hold hearings next month on the costs of privatizing Florida prisons in South Florida.
State Sen. Mike Fasano, a New Port Richey Republican, said the possible $25-million cost of employee turnover was hidden from state lawmakers during the 2011 legislative session.
But Senate budget chief JD Alexander, R-Lake Wales, denied there was any politically driven effort to ram the privatization through without adequate analysis of its cost...
LINK - Tallahassee.com
August 14, 2011
Beware for-profit justice
When you march up to the front gate of a medium-security prison and find no one, you've got a problem. When you ring the alert button and no one answers, that's a problem, too. When you shine a flashlight at the security camera and no one notices, that's trouble.
This rapture-like scenario is not hypothetical. As The Post's Dara Kam reported, it's what state officials found after arriving at South Bay Correctional Institution, a private prison, for a surprise inspection in June. As Florida readies one of the largest prison privatizations in history, it's hard to ignore the implications.
Next year, Florida plans to privatize at least 13 prisons in the southern third of the state, shuttering Belle Glade's Glades Correctional Institution in the process. This overhaul supposedly will save the state at least $19 million a year. But the price of any savings could prove high. For while proof that private prisons cut long-term costs is still scant, there's ample evidence that their existence invites corporations to manipulate the criminal justice system for their own gain...
LINK - PalmBeachpost.com
August 13, 2011
Private prison firms in hot water
Two private prison companies — GEO Group and Management and Training Corp. — involved in proposals for a prison expansion in San Luis, Ariz., are embroiled in legal battles.
GEO Group, the second-largest private prison company in the country, is currently a defendant in a federal class-action lawsuit filed by the Southern Poverty Law Center and the American Civil Liberties Union for violations at its juvenile detention center in Walnut Grove, Miss.
The lawsuit contends the prison's management caused a culture of violence and exploitation by selling drugs inside the facility and entering into sexual relationships with the inmates...
LINK - YumaSun.com
August 11, 2011
Judge given 28 years for bribes from private prison company, sending youth there to fill it up
A former juvenile court judge in Pennsylvania was sentenced to 28 years in prison on Thursday for his part in an alleged “kids for cash” scam considered one of the worst judicial scandals in US history.
Mark Ciavarella Jr., 61, a former judge in Luzerne County, was also ordered to pay $1.17 million in restitution.Mr. Ciavarella was convicted in federal court in Scranton, Pa., in February on charges that he and a second judge, Michael Conahan, ran the local court system as a racketeering enterprise...
LINK - CSMonitor.com
August 11, 2011
A history of problems at MTC-run private prisons - Eagle Mtn, CA mentioned
Critics and supporters of the private company that runs the Kingman prison agree that last year’s escapes don’t give the complete picture about Management and Training Corp.
It’s the rest of the picture on which they differ.
Critics express astonishment that, less than a year after two of the Kingman escapees allegedly murdered an Oklahoma couple, MTC is a finalist for a contract to provide up to 5,000 more private-prison beds to Arizona’s Department of Corrections. They point to a broader record of problems at MTC facilities as showing a company that doesn’t learn from its mistakes...
LINK - TucsonCitizen.com
August 10, 2011
Louisiana private prison company problems detailed
Arnol Suazo and Olvin Aguilar carefully destroyed all their mail to avoid leaving any names or addresses in their cells that authorities might use to track them. Then, just before 4 a.m. on July 5, while taking out the trash during breakfast kitchen detail at the Jackson Parish Correctional Center, they dashed for the fence, scrambled over razor wire and disappeared into the Louisiana woods.
The two convicted robbers were the 15th and 16th escapees over the past seven years from private prisons run by LaSalle Southwest Corrections, of Ruston, La. LaSalle, which operates 12 prisons in Texas and Louisiana, is the smallest of the four companies bidding for a contract with the Arizona Department of Corrections...
LINK - TucsonCitizen.com
August 9, 2011
Private prison problems exposed
When Florida inspectors arrived June 13 for a surprise audit of Geo Group Inc.’s South Bay prison in Palm Beach, they couldn’t get anyone to let them in. For 20 minutes, the state inspectors pressed an alert button to signal the prison’s control room, flashed lights at the security cameras, and tried to get the attention of someone – anyone – at the facility. Finally, they gave up and left.
Geo Group, of Boca Raton, Fla., is one of four companies bidding for a contract with the Arizona Department of Corrections to provide up to 5,000 new private-prison beds. Public hearings are being held this week and next to gauge community sentiment. Geo is proposing to build a new prison with 2,000 or 3,000 beds in San Luis, south of Yuma, or a new one with 2,000 to 5,000 beds near the existing Perryville state prison in Goodyear...
LINK - TucsonCitizen.com
August 8, 2011
Uninformed television VP/general manager advocates for private prisons?
When it comes to our prison system, California is one big spender.
We pay about 50-thousand per prisoner annually, ranking us near the top of all fifty states. In contrast, we spend only eight thousand per student, putting us squarely near the bottom at number forty-three. And a new legal ruling is forcing the state to deal with overcrowded prisons, but little’s being done about our overcrowded schools.
So just how did our priorities get so out of whack?...
LINK - MyFoxLA.com
August 7, 2011
Oversight lacking for private prisons
The private company that operates the Kingman prison publicly took full responsibility for last year’s breakout, in which escapees were charged with the murder of an Oklahoma couple.
But behind the scenes, Management & Training Corp. clashed with the state over a litany of problems revealed after the escapes: How to improve lax security. Whether the state should pay the company for empty beds after the state, responding to the breakout, removed high-risk prisoners and quit sending new inmates there...
LINK - TucsonCitizen.com
August 6, 2011
Security records mixed for private prison firms
An escape from a privatized prison in Kingman, Ariz., last year left two people dead and raised questions among some whether the same nightmare scenario could happen in Ohio.
The company that operates the Arizona State Prison Complex at Kingman is Utah-based Management and Training Corp., one of three for-profit corrections companies seeking to buy and operate five Ohio facilities under Gov. John Kasich’s prison privatization plan.
Escapes can and do happen at publicly operated prisons too. But a stunning lack of administrative oversight before the July 30, 2010, escape at Kingman has opponents of the Ohio plan calling it a textbook example of what can go wrong when private companies operate public corrections institutions...
LINK - DaytonDailyNews.com
August 5, 2011
Private prison guard guilty of sexual assault
A former Texas detention center guard is about to get a different view of lockup after he pleaded guilty to engaging in sexual abuse of a female detainee, the Justice Department announced this week. Contract security Officer Edwin Rodriguez, 30, was assigned to pick up meal trays from the various housing “pods” inside the detention center. Rodriguez encountered the victim outside one of the pods as she dropped off empty trays from her pod. Rodriguez pulled the woman into the guard’s bathroom located adjacent to the victim’s pod and assaulted her. The female detainee immediately reported the sexual abuse to two individuals, including a former female contract security officer supervising the pod. The abuse occurred at the Willacy Detention Center in Raymondville...
LINK - Star-Telegram.com
August 3, 2011
CCA boasts of increased profits from Calif paying for more out-of-state inmates (AB 109)
Total management revenue for the second quarter of 2011 increased 5.6% to $430.7 million from $407.7 million during the second quarter of 2010, primarily driven by a 5.4% increase in average daily inmate populations. Management revenue from our federal partners increased 4.7% to $185.9 million generated during the second quarter of 2011 compared with $177.5 million generated during the prior year period.
Management revenue from our state partners increased 6.9% to $216.4 million during the second quarter of 2011 compared with $202.5 million during the second quarter of 2010. State revenue increased primarily as a result of higher inmate populations from the state of California...
LINK - MarketWire.com
August 1, 2011
ALEC, prison labor, private prisons
This article is part of a Nation series exposing the American Legislative Exchange Council, in collaboration with the Center For Media and Democracy. John Nichols introduces [1] the series.
The breaded chicken patty your child bites into at school may have been made by a worker earning twenty cents an hour, not in a faraway country, but by a member of an invisible American workforce: prisoners. At the Union Correctional Facility, a maximum security prison in Florida, inmates from a nearby lower-security prison manufacture tons of processed beef, chicken and pork for Prison Rehabilitative Industries and Diversified Enterprises...
LINK - TheNation.com
July 27, 2011
Private Prison Beatings Continue, Men Say
Guards for Corrections Corporation of America, the nation's biggest private prison company, continue to abuse prisoners who sought a protective injunction after CCA guards stripped, beat, kicked and threatened to kill them, and "the warden himself" threatened their families, according to a new complaint in Federal Court.
Five Hawaiian inmates serving their sentences on the mainland say the co-defendant Hawaii Department of Public Safety is failing to protect Hawaiian prisoners from brutal private prison guards.
The five inmates at CCA's Saguaro prison in Eloy, Ariz., say they have suffered continuing retaliation and physical abuse from CCA guards, after the July 2010 prison fight that led to the original lawsuit...
LINK - CourthouseNews.com
July 21, 2011
Private prison plan “unsafe”
The head of a prison officers union suing to stop the largest privatization in Florida history said Wednesday the plan will jeopardize public safety and not save taxpayers any money.
But Department of Corrections Secretary Ed Buss said he must press ahead with contracting, probably with a single operator, in order to get the 30 separate sites — including 12 major prisons — into private operation by the Jan. 1 deadline set by the Legislature.
The Florida Police Benevolent Association filed suit last week to stop the privatization. Among other things, the suit alleges that the Legislature illegally made substantive policy changes in the text of a state budget, which is prohibited by the Constitution...
LINK - Tallahassee.com
July 20, 2011
Private prison “pay-to-play” scandal in Arizona
Much has been made of Governor Brewer’s intimate ties to Corrections Corporation of America. Her Chief of Staff, Paul Senseman, is a former CCA lobbyist, and his wife is currently a lobbyist for the company. Brewer’s campaign manager and senior policy advisor, Chuck Coughlin, runs a consulting firm that also lobbies for CCA in Arizona. Brewer accepted a total of $60,000 in contributions from people associated with CCA for her campaign and the tax increase initiative that she was pushing last year. The scandal made waves after the passage of SB1070, raising questions about CCA’s role in drafting legislation that would potentially provide the company with millions more in contracts for immigrant detention facilities in Arizona...
LINK - TucsonCitizen.com
June 27, 2011
More on private prisons and JPI report
A new report by the Justice Policy Institute (JPI) outlines how private prison companies have pushed punitive policies over the last few years–policies, the report says, aimed at increasing the demand for private prisons.
According to JPI, in 2009, there were about 129,000 people in private correctional facilities in the United States–a number that’s jumped 120 percent in federal and 33 percent in state facilities since 2000 . And while private prison companies ”may try to present themselves as just meeting existing demand for prison beds and responding to current market conditions, in fact they have worked hard over the past decade to create markets for their product.” A lucrative product: in 2010, revenues for the top two companies, Corrections Corporation of American and GEO group, exceeded $2.9 billion.
JPI reports on three strategies these two companies, which account for the majority of the market, have used to grow business...
LINK - KALWNews.org
