Recently in Corrections Category

Source: Nashville Business Journal - 12:09 PM CST Friday, February 24, 2006

Corrections Corp. of America has signed a deal with the city of Eloy, Ariz., to house U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainees through an agreement between the federal government and the city. The agreement enables ICE to hold detainees in CCA's 1,500-bed Eloy Detention Center. As of Feb. 23, that prison had a total population of 920 inmates. In January, the Federal Bureau of Prisons notified Nashville-based CCA (NYSE: CXW) that it would not renew an option to have inmates held at the Eloy facility. Eloy has housed federal inmates as well as immigration detainees. The detainees were held through an agreement between ICE and the Bureau of Prisons. The way this new agreement works, ICE contracts with the city which, in turn, contracts with CCA to house the detainees. The company expects that the facility "will be substantially occupied" by ICE detainees.

CCA operates 63 correctional facilities, including 39 it owns, in 19 states and Washington D.C.

Source: By Deirdre Cox Baker, Quad City Times (IA), Feb 22, 2006

An annual contract for food and laundry services at the Scott County Jail may switch from area firms to a national company based in Philadelphia. Scott County Sheriff Dennis Conard said Tuesday that the change to Aramark Correctional Services Inc. will provide a cost savings to the county and include several other advantages. But a county employee said the change may cost her job, and a representative of Thoms Proestler Co., Rock Island, said food costs would be less with the area firm. ..... Further, Aramark can provide food transportation to the jail annex at 46th and Tremont streets in Davenport, work that is handled now by county staff. Laundry services now managed by a Scott County correctional officer would be managed by an Aramark employee, and Conard said additional savings should come from bulk purchases made by the Aramark, which has services across North America and in Europe.

Source: By KAREN KELLER, HERALD NEWS (NJ), Wednesday, February 22, 2006

Passaic County Jail inmate prayers -- and stomach rumblings -- have been heard. Sheriff Jerry Speziale is firing the jail's meal provider, Aramark, and inmates will take charge of the kitchen come May, Speziale spokesman Bill Maer said. "We can do it as well as them at this point," he said. The company's $1.7 million annual contract is being terminated based on poor "quality, service, attentiveness," Maer said. Jail officials haven't estimated how much they will save by cooking in-house, but the financial aspect is secondary, Maer said. Inmates said the food is cold, measly in portion size, not varied enough and served on dirty trays, forcing some to pay as much as $200 a month on prepackaged food from the jail's commissary.

Source: By POLLY ROSS HUGHES, Houston Chronicle, Feb. 16, 2006, 3:03AM

AUSTIN - A civil rights lawsuit announced Wednesday blames the private corrections system for the 2004 suicide of a South Texas woman found hanging in her cell after reporting that a male inmate raped her. ...... The lawsuit, filed in the federal district court for the Western District of Texas in San Antonio, names GEO Group Inc., the nation's second-largest private prison company, among the defendants.

Source: By JONI JAMES, St. Petersburg Times (FL), February 14, 2006

TALLAHASSEE - A former Florida prison official has pleaded guilty to stealing nearly $225,000 in state money nearly three years after he used the cash to help buy houses for him and his girlfriend. Alan Brown Duffee, the former executive director of a defunct board that oversaw Florida's private prison contracts, admitted Thursday in Tallahassee to one count each of mail fraud, wire fraud and money laundering. Duffee, 40, faces up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. He is to be sentenced in April. ...... A plea agreement filed in U.S. District Court in Tallahassee shows Duffee admitted that he moved money in 2003 from a bank account for the Florida Correctional Privatization Commission to another bank account to which only he had access.

Source: By Joe Follick, The Ledger (FL), Wednesday, February 15, 2006

TALLAHASSEE -- A controversial pharmaceutical company is losing its job of supplying prescription drugs to Department of Corrections inmates in South Florida. The company, Tallahassee-based TYA Pharmaceuticals, was chosen to dispense prescription drugs to inmates in DOC Region IV, which includes 18 counties. Prison Health Services, a Tennessee-based company that has received a DOC contract to supply health care needs for inmates in that region, selected TYA for the job. ..... The Florida Auditor General has criticized TYA's contracts with the Department of Corrections for the splitting and repackaging of pills. The audits found myriad problems of lax oversight and accounting. After lawmakers criticized the two no-bid contracts the Department of Corrections gave to TYA, the agency is considering an end to the outsourcing of pill splitting and repackaging.

Source: By SUZANNE GAMBOA, Associated Press, 02/02/2006

The post-Sept. 11 push to lock up immigrants is creating a detention bed "gold rush" without the equivalent enforcement to ensure detainees' legal and human rights are protected, a panel of immigration advocates said Thursday. Private prison corporations and local governments are benefiting from Congress' rush to crack down on immigrants as some lawmakers look to score political points by getting tough on immigration, the advocates said. ..... The private prison industry has attributed its industry rebound, in part, to the rapid increase in immigration detentions. Many detainees are housed at facilities run by Corrections Corporation of America and GEO Group, formerly Wackenhut. Some groups consider Texas "ground zero" for what they call the immigration detention boom. The state has at least 7,000 recently built or proposed private prison beds for housing immigrant detainees for ICE or the U.S. Marshals.

Source: By Tina Moore, Philadelphia Inquirer (DE), Fri, Feb. 03, 2006

A Colwyn man who was imprisoned for 44 days last year after Delaware County jail officials refused to check his repeated, and true, claim that they had the wrong person has netted a cash settlement, court records show. James J. Johnson, 28, filed a lawsuit in federal court alleging that correctional officers missed opportunities to verify his identity and threatened to charge him with additional crimes if he did not stop claiming that he was not Shawn Carter, the name on the arrest warrant used to jail him. ..... The county jail is run by the GEO Group, formerly known as Wackenhut Corrections Corp., of Boca Raton, Fla., and is the only privately run prison in the state. The company, not the county, is responsible for all settlements and court awards.

Source: By Jonathan Abel, St Petersburg Times (FL), January 27, 2006

An inmate at the Hernando County Jail was found hanging in his cell early Friday. It was the third death at the facility since November. The man was discovered about 6:30 a.m. Police are withholding his identity until they notify the next of kin. "We're shocked," said Ken Bouldin, executive vice president of Corrections Corp. of America, which runs the jail. Bouldin was in Hernando to address complaints about two recent suicides at the jail, which currently houses about 550 inmates.

Source: By J.L. MILLER, The News Journal (DE), 01/26/2006

DOVER -- Lee McMillan, whose husband nearly died in prison after flesh-eating bacteria attacked his body, wants to know why the state won't release an audit of Delaware's prison health care system. So do some legislators, who are backing a bill that would require the state to release the audit and similar reports -- as long as confidential information such as personal medical records is withheld. House Bill 320, sponsored by Rep. Nancy Wagner, R-Dover North, would make reports that are paid for with public funds open to the public under the Freedom of Information Act.

..... In defending his record, Correction Commissioner Stan Taylor pointed to the audit, prepared by the National Commission on Correctional Health Care, but denied a Freedom of Information request for the report by the newspaper. Taylor and former Attorney General M. Jane Brady ruled the accreditation report was not a public document. Taylor, though, said the audit was critical of the work of First Correctional Medical, a Tucson, Ariz., company. In July, Gov. Ruth Ann Minner and Taylor awarded a $25.9 million no-bid contract to Correctional Medical Services of St. Louis to pick up the provision of medical care in Delaware's prisons.