Recipe for Disaster: The high cost of ‘tough on crime’ (Red Dirt Report)

SHAWNEE, Okla. — Oklahoma appears to be racing towards a disaster. With overcrowded and understaffed prisons, questions are being raised that may lead to judicial and prison reform. From the “tough on crime” laws that win elections to the way the judicial system is funded, a cycle of poverty and crime continues to threaten public safety and the promise of a prosperous future.

From 1980 to 2011, the prison population grew by 444.7 percent while the population only increased 27 percent, according to the Oklahoma Policy Institute. The Oklahoma Department of Corrections is 1,350 inmates over capacity, according to a population report.

Why the sharp rise in the prison population? Kris Steele, former Speaker of the House and author of the Justice Reinvestment Initiative, said the answer in part is due to political motivation.

“Every year the legislature adds to the list of crimes punishable by incarceration so we can go back in this election year and say, ‘we’re tough on crime’,” said Steele.

The JRI is a bill that diverts projected savings into prevention and rehabilitation programs and is proven to increase public safety, slashing prison populations and costs in other states who have implemented reinvestment legislation.

Although the bill passed into law in 2012, it remains unfunded.

In June, a bill introduced by State Rep. Bobby Cleveland (R-Slaughterville) would have saved the department $5 million. The bill allows qualifying prisoners earlier release time by a few months. It was voted down after Rep. Scott Biggs (R-Chickasha) called the bill ‘soft on crime.'”

Instead, the legislature seems to be headed in the opposite direction.

“We add to the maximum minimum sentences, which means, we add to the length of time a person is mandated to serve for a particular offense. But we don’t want to pay for it, we don’t staff it, and we don’t take care of our institutions,” said Steele.

One in 12 Oklahomans has a felony, which also means those Oklahomans are less likely to find a job after they serve their time, let alone one that brings them above poverty.

All too often inmates who were taxpaying citizens are serving harsh sentences for simple possession charges, losing their businesses, jobs, or careers.

A staff member at Lexington Assessment and Reception Center agreed to speak with the Red Dirt Report on condition of anonymity. The source interviews inmates and said Oklahoma is severely sentencing citizens for frivolous crimes.

“A business owner from Kansas City, Missouri was in Oklahoma visiting family. He was pulled over, and the passenger (in his car) had one ounce of marijuana in her purse. He was given two years for possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute, and eight years probation. Married with two children, an associate’s degree in business, in his 40’s with no addiction issues,” the source said.

Red Dirt Report also learned that another man was convicted of possession of a controlled substance in 2011; four years probation on a suspended sentence.

“One week before his probation was up he was sent to prison. He had his own business,” said our anonymous source.

Prisoners who don’t reoffend often end up consuming tax dollars on public assistance programs because they must declare their record on job applications. Those felons who can’t find a job to pay their fines go back to prison. Pew Research reported from 1999 to 2004, Oklahoma quadrupled the number of inmates sent back to jail for violations of their release, like failure to pay fines, instead of reoffending.

Taxpayers then pay again for that prisoner’s medical care, housing, and food. The daily cost per inmate is $38.25 to $87.01, according to an ODOC population summary for June. For FY 2015, corrections will siphon $475.1 million, funds which could be diverted to health care, mental health, or education.

Crime Pays

While crime doesn’t pay for those who sit behind bars, it appears to pay for a system which Ryan Kiesel, Executive Director of the ALCU of Oklahoma, said is feeding upon itself.

During a forum on “Expanding Opportunity in Oklahoma” by the Koch Institute, he said, “We have a criminal justice system that is creating a humanitarian crisis and a fiscal crisis, one that is completely unsustainable on both fronts. District attorneys now have financial interest and, in fact, [it] is needed because a majority of those offices receive less than 50 percent of their funding from the state. So they use bogus checks collections but, no one writes checks anymore, so their bogus check collections are down. They’ve increased their reliance on fees and asset forfeiture. So, we’ve created a system that is feeding upon itself.”

The legislature determines what costs, fines, and assessments are charged by the courts. Between 80 to 94 percent of district courts operating costs are funded by court collections, according to the Administration of the Courts Department.

Mike Evans, administrator for the courts, said, “We’re very dependent on our district court collections, there’s no question about that. Most states are dependent directly or indirectly on their collections for their operations.”

Adding to DA’s and district court’s need for more collections, the House of Representatives passed a measure in May to raise pay for district attorneys, associate and district judges, and special district judges but did not increase their state funding.

Kiesel said private prisons have profit motives. “They talk to shareholders about seeking out states like Oklahoma that don’t invest in education and health care and have a propensity to over criminalize their people. They know that’s the market they’re looking for. It’s about market for them.”

Tough on Crime Increases Crime

Tough on crime laws haven’t made Oklahoma safer. In 2011, Oklahoma’s violent crime rate rose 18 percent compared to the national average. In March, the Oklahoma Department of Corrections published a population summary showing 50.8 percent are non-violent offenders, 25.8 for drug related offenses, and 49.2 for violent offenses.

Steele interviewed dozens of inmates during his research for the JRI and discovered a cause for the hike in violent crime. “The research shows when we incarcerate non-violent offenders, they enter the public at greater risk to public safety because they picked up some bad habits along the way, and still have the same set of issues they were dealing with before, such as mental health, addiction, and lack of job training. We don’t address those issues, and they become institutionalized.”

The Cost of Life

There are signs of trouble in overcrowded prisons. According to an ODOC department email leaked to the Red Dirt Report, it reports that “there has been an increase in suicide attempts and an increase in self-injurious behavior” in the prisons, while noting that since the beginning of the year there have been three suicides, with two of them happening in May.

Executive Director of Oklahoma Corrections Professionals, a statewide association for ODOC employees, Sean Wallace, said tensions are high. Overcrowded and understaffed prisons lead to compromised safety.

“James Crabtree Correctional had their first murder ever recently. A case manager at Joseph Harp Correctional was beaten up, and the only reason she survived was because she was able to fight him off and hit the panic button. She had one officer on a unit with 160 offenders. Five years ago there would have been six officers on that unit but now there’s two. We had a support staff person who was taken hostage with a knife at her throat and two inmates tried to get her to her car so they could drive off. Officers intervened there, but there are things going on that we don’t even hear about. ODOC tries to keep everything as quiet as possible because they see it as a reflection on them.”

In efforts to avoid lawsuits by sheriff’s departments and save the department money, ODOC Director Robert Patton cleared overcrowded jails of their backlog of state prisoners, but seemed to trade one problem for another. Although he saved $17 million dollars, as of March 24 ODOC was already 100.87 percent full. As of June 9, the population grew to 108.48 percent, crowding an extra 1,350 into prisons already overwhelmed and understaffed.

There’s a riot goin’ on?

As of June 12, ODOC employs only 1,262 correctional officers. The ratio of inmate to officer is 13.7:1, the worst ratio in the nation. Understaffing creates greater opportunity for inmates to commit violence on other inmates unobserved and even overwhelm officers in a bloody riot.

Kris Steele said current conditions are all too familiar. “With the understaffing of officers, one just has to look at history to understand where we are at and where we are headed. In 1973, there was an awful riot at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlister. We had very similar conditions then as we do now.”

The ’73 riot left 3 inmates dead, 12 buildings burned, and 21 inmates and officers injured.

According to an entry in the Oklahoma Historical Society’s Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture, similar conditions are present. Governor David Hall failed to sign parole recommendations for drug offenders and qualifying violent offenders, which aggravated overcrowding. There were not enough officers and, particularly, not enough well trained officers. The prison was over capacity by 1,100 inmates.

When prisons are overcrowded and understaffed, the threat of riot becomes a possibility.

According to studies that have examined riots, three main factors provoke riots: overcrowding, understaffing, and poor or inadequate food. Additional causes can also include inhumane treatment and living conditions, heat, and gangs or racial tensions.

In addition to overcrowding, understaffing, the food quality and portion sizes have deteriorated over the years according to a corrections officer works in several prisons. The officer, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation from his superiors, said the food is an issue. “When I first started ten years ago, the food was good but it’s really gotten bad. The amount of food they get isn’t enough for a man. They serve a lot of bologna, almost every day, and for some reason it’s green.”

A class action lawsuit, filed in 1978 over civil rights violations at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary, settled in 2001. Questions about civil rights are being raised today. With the sudden influx of prisoners and funding falling 6.9 percent since FY 2009 to FY 2015, how are inmates being fed, is medical care being administered, and does inhumane and extreme punishment exist in attempts to keep control?

Red Dirt Report has requested incident reports, grievance reports, and inspection reports in six overcrowded state prisons from the ODOC to examine conditions as documented by inmates, officers, staff, and internal affairs. At the time of publication, our Freedom of Information Act request had not yet been filled.

Hope for Reform

The JRI sits unfunded. A recent pay raise for corrections officers fell short from an additional 18 percent raise to 8 percent, less than $1 more an hour, making it unlikely to attract more officers.

Mental health, substance abuse, and education services fall short to reach most offenders. The funding mechanism forces the judicial and criminal system to treat crime as a business. It seems reform will be no easy task.

State Rep. Bobby Cleveland is the Vice Chair for Public Safety and has taken up the daunting cause. For the last two years Cleveland has put the judicial and prison system under a microscope, visiting prisons every month, talking to prisoners, employees, and examining data.

Cleveland plans to publish an internal study late summer.

“I don’t have the answer, but I know what we’re doing isn’t working,” said Cleveland.

He supports rehabilitation and prevention programs and agreed the sentencing mandates need to change. He also sees other common sense solutions. “One person can monitor 20 people on an ankle bracelet monitor. That guy can still keep a job and be monitored where he’s at. You can do that with certain non-violent offenders. I think drug court should be in every county. We have to look at the things we can do with inmates for rehabilitation that makes sense,” he said.

Because the legislature is responsible for passing criminal laws and decides how the criminal and judicial system is funded, it will be up to elected officials to implement effective tools to quell the crisis. Steele said, “It’s easy to say it’s the legislature’s fault, and it is; but we elect those men and women.”

In the meantime, watchdogs continue to sound the death knell.

Concluded the ACLU’s Kiesel: “We are at a point today where if we don’t get a handle on the prison population, I think that the state of Oklahoma is setting itself up for systematic failure in a way that is even more disastrous than the current situation.”

UPDATE: (Friday, June 27, 2014) Bomb threats were reportedly called into LARC and Joseph Harp Correctional Facility in Lexington, Oklahoma a day after this story ran. A source indicated that this may be due to rising tensions within the DOC and the prison system. 

– See more at: http://www.reddirtreport.com/red-dirt-news/recipe-disaster-high-cost-tough-crime#sthash.e3Q4vnte.dpuf

SHAWNEE, Okla. — Oklahoma appears to be racing towards a disaster. With overcrowded and understaffed prisons, questions are being raised that may lead to judicial and prison reform. From the “tough on crime” laws that win elections to the way the judicial system is funded, a cycle of poverty and crime continues to threaten public safety and the promise of a prosperous future.

From 1980 to 2011, the prison population grew by 444.7 percent while the population only increased 27 percent, according to the Oklahoma Policy Institute. The Oklahoma Department of Corrections is 1,350 inmates over capacity, according to a population report.

Why the sharp rise in the prison population? Kris Steele, former Speaker of the House and author of the Justice Reinvestment Initiative, said the answer in part is due to political motivation.

“Every year the legislature adds to the list of crimes punishable by incarceration so we can go back in this election year and say, ‘we’re tough on crime’,” said Steele.

The JRI is a bill that diverts projected savings into prevention and rehabilitation programs and is proven to increase public safety, slashing prison populations and costs in other states who have implemented reinvestment legislation.

Although the bill passed into law in 2012, it remains unfunded.

In June, a bill introduced by State Rep. Bobby Cleveland (R-Slaughterville) would have saved the department $5 million. The bill allows qualifying prisoners earlier release time by a few months. It was voted down after Rep. Scott Biggs (R-Chickasha) called the bill ‘soft on crime.'”

Instead, the legislature seems to be headed in the opposite direction.

“We add to the maximum minimum sentences, which means, we add to the length of time a person is mandated to serve for a particular offense. But we don’t want to pay for it, we don’t staff it, and we don’t take care of our institutions,” said Steele.

One in 12 Oklahomans has a felony, which also means those Oklahomans are less likely to find a job after they serve their time, let alone one that brings them above poverty.

All too often inmates who were taxpaying citizens are serving harsh sentences for simple possession charges, losing their businesses, jobs, or careers.

A staff member at Lexington Assessment and Reception Center agreed to speak with the Red Dirt Report on condition of anonymity. The source interviews inmates and said Oklahoma is severely sentencing citizens for frivolous crimes.

“A business owner from Kansas City, Missouri was in Oklahoma visiting family. He was pulled over, and the passenger (in his car) had one ounce of marijuana in her purse. He was given two years for possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute, and eight years probation. Married with two children, an associate’s degree in business, in his 40’s with no addiction issues,” the source said.

Red Dirt Report also learned that another man was convicted of possession of a controlled substance in 2011; four years probation on a suspended sentence.

“One week before his probation was up he was sent to prison. He had his own business,” said our anonymous source.

Prisoners who don’t reoffend often end up consuming tax dollars on public assistance programs because they must declare their record on job applications. Those felons who can’t find a job to pay their fines go back to prison. Pew Research reported from 1999 to 2004, Oklahoma quadrupled the number of inmates sent back to jail for violations of their release, like failure to pay fines, instead of reoffending.

Taxpayers then pay again for that prisoner’s medical care, housing, and food. The daily cost per inmate is $38.25 to $87.01, according to an ODOC population summary for June. For FY 2015, corrections will siphon $475.1 million, funds which could be diverted to health care, mental health, or education.

Crime Pays

While crime doesn’t pay for those who sit behind bars, it appears to pay for a system which Ryan Kiesel, Executive Director of the ALCU of Oklahoma, said is feeding upon itself.

During a forum on “Expanding Opportunity in Oklahoma” by the Koch Institute, he said, “We have a criminal justice system that is creating a humanitarian crisis and a fiscal crisis, one that is completely unsustainable on both fronts. District attorneys now have financial interest and, in fact, [it] is needed because a majority of those offices receive less than 50 percent of their funding from the state. So they use bogus checks collections but, no one writes checks anymore, so their bogus check collections are down. They’ve increased their reliance on fees and asset forfeiture. So, we’ve created a system that is feeding upon itself.”

The legislature determines what costs, fines, and assessments are charged by the courts. Between 80 to 94 percent of district courts operating costs are funded by court collections, according to the Administration of the Courts Department.

Mike Evans, administrator for the courts, said, “We’re very dependent on our district court collections, there’s no question about that. Most states are dependent directly or indirectly on their collections for their operations.”

Adding to DA’s and district court’s need for more collections, the House of Representatives passed a measure in May to raise pay for district attorneys, associate and district judges, and special district judges but did not increase their state funding.

Kiesel said private prisons have profit motives. “They talk to shareholders about seeking out states like Oklahoma that don’t invest in education and health care and have a propensity to over criminalize their people. They know that’s the market they’re looking for. It’s about market for them.”

Tough on Crime Increases Crime

Tough on crime laws haven’t made Oklahoma safer. In 2011, Oklahoma’s violent crime rate rose 18 percent compared to the national average. In March, the Oklahoma Department of Corrections published a population summary showing 50.8 percent are non-violent offenders, 25.8 for drug related offenses, and 49.2 for violent offenses.

Steele interviewed dozens of inmates during his research for the JRI and discovered a cause for the hike in violent crime. “The research shows when we incarcerate non-violent offenders, they enter the public at greater risk to public safety because they picked up some bad habits along the way, and still have the same set of issues they were dealing with before, such as mental health, addiction, and lack of job training. We don’t address those issues, and they become institutionalized.”

The Cost of Life

There are signs of trouble in overcrowded prisons. According to an ODOC department email leaked to the Red Dirt Report, it reports that “there has been an increase in suicide attempts and an increase in self-injurious behavior” in the prisons, while noting that since the beginning of the year there have been three suicides, with two of them happening in May.

Executive Director of Oklahoma Corrections Professionals, a statewide association for ODOC employees, Sean Wallace, said tensions are high. Overcrowded and understaffed prisons lead to compromised safety.

“James Crabtree Correctional had their first murder ever recently. A case manager at Joseph Harp Correctional was beaten up, and the only reason she survived was because she was able to fight him off and hit the panic button. She had one officer on a unit with 160 offenders. Five years ago there would have been six officers on that unit but now there’s two. We had a support staff person who was taken hostage with a knife at her throat and two inmates tried to get her to her car so they could drive off. Officers intervened there, but there are things going on that we don’t even hear about. ODOC tries to keep everything as quiet as possible because they see it as a reflection on them.”

In efforts to avoid lawsuits by sheriff’s departments and save the department money, ODOC Director Robert Patton cleared overcrowded jails of their backlog of state prisoners, but seemed to trade one problem for another. Although he saved $17 million dollars, as of March 24 ODOC was already 100.87 percent full. As of June 9, the population grew to 108.48 percent, crowding an extra 1,350 into prisons already overwhelmed and understaffed.

There’s a riot goin’ on?

As of June 12, ODOC employs only 1,262 correctional officers. The ratio of inmate to officer is 13.7:1, the worst ratio in the nation. Understaffing creates greater opportunity for inmates to commit violence on other inmates unobserved and even overwhelm officers in a bloody riot.

Kris Steele said current conditions are all too familiar. “With the understaffing of officers, one just has to look at history to understand where we are at and where we are headed. In 1973, there was an awful riot at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlister. We had very similar conditions then as we do now.”

The ’73 riot left 3 inmates dead, 12 buildings burned, and 21 inmates and officers injured.

According to an entry in the Oklahoma Historical Society’s Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture, similar conditions are present. Governor David Hall failed to sign parole recommendations for drug offenders and qualifying violent offenders, which aggravated overcrowding. There were not enough officers and, particularly, not enough well trained officers. The prison was over capacity by 1,100 inmates.

When prisons are overcrowded and understaffed, the threat of riot becomes a possibility.

According to studies that have examined riots, three main factors provoke riots: overcrowding, understaffing, and poor or inadequate food. Additional causes can also include inhumane treatment and living conditions, heat, and gangs or racial tensions.

In addition to overcrowding, understaffing, the food quality and portion sizes have deteriorated over the years according to a corrections officer works in several prisons. The officer, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation from his superiors, said the food is an issue. “When I first started ten years ago, the food was good but it’s really gotten bad. The amount of food they get isn’t enough for a man. They serve a lot of bologna, almost every day, and for some reason it’s green.”

A class action lawsuit, filed in 1978 over civil rights violations at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary, settled in 2001. Questions about civil rights are being raised today. With the sudden influx of prisoners and funding falling 6.9 percent since FY 2009 to FY 2015, how are inmates being fed, is medical care being administered, and does inhumane and extreme punishment exist in attempts to keep control?

Red Dirt Report has requested incident reports, grievance reports, and inspection reports in six overcrowded state prisons from the ODOC to examine conditions as documented by inmates, officers, staff, and internal affairs. At the time of publication, our Freedom of Information Act request had not yet been filled.

Hope for Reform

The JRI sits unfunded. A recent pay raise for corrections officers fell short from an additional 18 percent raise to 8 percent, less than $1 more an hour, making it unlikely to attract more officers.

Mental health, substance abuse, and education services fall short to reach most offenders. The funding mechanism forces the judicial and criminal system to treat crime as a business. It seems reform will be no easy task.

State Rep. Bobby Cleveland is the Vice Chair for Public Safety and has taken up the daunting cause. For the last two years Cleveland has put the judicial and prison system under a microscope, visiting prisons every month, talking to prisoners, employees, and examining data.

Cleveland plans to publish an internal study late summer.

“I don’t have the answer, but I know what we’re doing isn’t working,” said Cleveland.

He supports rehabilitation and prevention programs and agreed the sentencing mandates need to change. He also sees other common sense solutions. “One person can monitor 20 people on an ankle bracelet monitor. That guy can still keep a job and be monitored where he’s at. You can do that with certain non-violent offenders. I think drug court should be in every county. We have to look at the things we can do with inmates for rehabilitation that makes sense,” he said.

Because the legislature is responsible for passing criminal laws and decides how the criminal and judicial system is funded, it will be up to elected officials to implement effective tools to quell the crisis. Steele said, “It’s easy to say it’s the legislature’s fault, and it is; but we elect those men and women.”

In the meantime, watchdogs continue to sound the death knell.

Concluded the ACLU’s Kiesel: “We are at a point today where if we don’t get a handle on the prison population, I think that the state of Oklahoma is setting itself up for systematic failure in a way that is even more disastrous than the current situation.”

UPDATE: (Friday, June 27, 2014) Bomb threats were reportedly called into LARC and Joseph Harp Correctional Facility in Lexington, Oklahoma a day after this story ran. A source indicated that this may be due to rising tensions within the DOC and the prison system. 

– See more at: http://www.reddirtreport.com/red-dirt-news/recipe-disaster-high-cost-tough-crime#sthash.e3Q4vnte.dpuf

SHAWNEE, Okla. — Oklahoma appears to be racing towards a disaster. With overcrowded and understaffed prisons, questions are being raised that may lead to judicial and prison reform. From the “tough on crime” laws that win elections to the way the judicial system is funded, a cycle of poverty and crime continues to threaten public safety and the promise of a prosperous future.

From 1980 to 2011, the prison population grew by 444.7 percent while the population only increased 27 percent, according to the Oklahoma Policy Institute. The Oklahoma Department of Corrections is 1,350 inmates over capacity, according to a population report.

Why the sharp rise in the prison population? Kris Steele, former Speaker of the House and author of the Justice Reinvestment Initiative, said the answer in part is due to political motivation.

“Every year the legislature adds to the list of crimes punishable by incarceration so we can go back in this election year and say, ‘we’re tough on crime’,” said Steele.

The JRI is a bill that diverts projected savings into prevention and rehabilitation programs and is proven to increase public safety, slashing prison populations and costs in other states who have implemented reinvestment legislation.

Although the bill passed into law in 2012, it remains unfunded.

In June, a bill introduced by State Rep. Bobby Cleveland (R-Slaughterville) would have saved the department $5 million. The bill allows qualifying prisoners earlier release time by a few months. It was voted down after Rep. Scott Biggs (R-Chickasha) called the bill ‘soft on crime.'”

Instead, the legislature seems to be headed in the opposite direction.

“We add to the maximum minimum sentences, which means, we add to the length of time a person is mandated to serve for a particular offense. But we don’t want to pay for it, we don’t staff it, and we don’t take care of our institutions,” said Steele.

One in 12 Oklahomans has a felony, which also means those Oklahomans are less likely to find a job after they serve their time, let alone one that brings them above poverty.

All too often inmates who were taxpaying citizens are serving harsh sentences for simple possession charges, losing their businesses, jobs, or careers.

A staff member at Lexington Assessment and Reception Center agreed to speak with the Red Dirt Report on condition of anonymity. The source interviews inmates and said Oklahoma is severely sentencing citizens for frivolous crimes.

“A business owner from Kansas City, Missouri was in Oklahoma visiting family. He was pulled over, and the passenger (in his car) had one ounce of marijuana in her purse. He was given two years for possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute, and eight years probation. Married with two children, an associate’s degree in business, in his 40’s with no addiction issues,” the source said.

Red Dirt Report also learned that another man was convicted of possession of a controlled substance in 2011; four years probation on a suspended sentence.

“One week before his probation was up he was sent to prison. He had his own business,” said our anonymous source.

Prisoners who don’t reoffend often end up consuming tax dollars on public assistance programs because they must declare their record on job applications. Those felons who can’t find a job to pay their fines go back to prison. Pew Research reported from 1999 to 2004, Oklahoma quadrupled the number of inmates sent back to jail for violations of their release, like failure to pay fines, instead of reoffending.

Taxpayers then pay again for that prisoner’s medical care, housing, and food. The daily cost per inmate is $38.25 to $87.01, according to an ODOC population summary for June. For FY 2015, corrections will siphon $475.1 million, funds which could be diverted to health care, mental health, or education.

Crime Pays

While crime doesn’t pay for those who sit behind bars, it appears to pay for a system which Ryan Kiesel, Executive Director of the ALCU of Oklahoma, said is feeding upon itself.

During a forum on “Expanding Opportunity in Oklahoma” by the Koch Institute, he said, “We have a criminal justice system that is creating a humanitarian crisis and a fiscal crisis, one that is completely unsustainable on both fronts. District attorneys now have financial interest and, in fact, [it] is needed because a majority of those offices receive less than 50 percent of their funding from the state. So they use bogus checks collections but, no one writes checks anymore, so their bogus check collections are down. They’ve increased their reliance on fees and asset forfeiture. So, we’ve created a system that is feeding upon itself.”

The legislature determines what costs, fines, and assessments are charged by the courts. Between 80 to 94 percent of district courts operating costs are funded by court collections, according to the Administration of the Courts Department.

Mike Evans, administrator for the courts, said, “We’re very dependent on our district court collections, there’s no question about that. Most states are dependent directly or indirectly on their collections for their operations.”

Adding to DA’s and district court’s need for more collections, the House of Representatives passed a measure in May to raise pay for district attorneys, associate and district judges, and special district judges but did not increase their state funding.

Kiesel said private prisons have profit motives. “They talk to shareholders about seeking out states like Oklahoma that don’t invest in education and health care and have a propensity to over criminalize their people. They know that’s the market they’re looking for. It’s about market for them.”

Tough on Crime Increases Crime

Tough on crime laws haven’t made Oklahoma safer. In 2011, Oklahoma’s violent crime rate rose 18 percent compared to the national average. In March, the Oklahoma Department of Corrections published a population summary showing 50.8 percent are non-violent offenders, 25.8 for drug related offenses, and 49.2 for violent offenses.

Steele interviewed dozens of inmates during his research for the JRI and discovered a cause for the hike in violent crime. “The research shows when we incarcerate non-violent offenders, they enter the public at greater risk to public safety because they picked up some bad habits along the way, and still have the same set of issues they were dealing with before, such as mental health, addiction, and lack of job training. We don’t address those issues, and they become institutionalized.”

The Cost of Life

There are signs of trouble in overcrowded prisons. According to an ODOC department email leaked to the Red Dirt Report, it reports that “there has been an increase in suicide attempts and an increase in self-injurious behavior” in the prisons, while noting that since the beginning of the year there have been three suicides, with two of them happening in May.

Executive Director of Oklahoma Corrections Professionals, a statewide association for ODOC employees, Sean Wallace, said tensions are high. Overcrowded and understaffed prisons lead to compromised safety.

“James Crabtree Correctional had their first murder ever recently. A case manager at Joseph Harp Correctional was beaten up, and the only reason she survived was because she was able to fight him off and hit the panic button. She had one officer on a unit with 160 offenders. Five years ago there would have been six officers on that unit but now there’s two. We had a support staff person who was taken hostage with a knife at her throat and two inmates tried to get her to her car so they could drive off. Officers intervened there, but there are things going on that we don’t even hear about. ODOC tries to keep everything as quiet as possible because they see it as a reflection on them.”

In efforts to avoid lawsuits by sheriff’s departments and save the department money, ODOC Director Robert Patton cleared overcrowded jails of their backlog of state prisoners, but seemed to trade one problem for another. Although he saved $17 million dollars, as of March 24 ODOC was already 100.87 percent full. As of June 9, the population grew to 108.48 percent, crowding an extra 1,350 into prisons already overwhelmed and understaffed.

There’s a riot goin’ on?

As of June 12, ODOC employs only 1,262 correctional officers. The ratio of inmate to officer is 13.7:1, the worst ratio in the nation. Understaffing creates greater opportunity for inmates to commit violence on other inmates unobserved and even overwhelm officers in a bloody riot.

Kris Steele said current conditions are all too familiar. “With the understaffing of officers, one just has to look at history to understand where we are at and where we are headed. In 1973, there was an awful riot at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlister. We had very similar conditions then as we do now.”

The ’73 riot left 3 inmates dead, 12 buildings burned, and 21 inmates and officers injured.

According to an entry in the Oklahoma Historical Society’s Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture, similar conditions are present. Governor David Hall failed to sign parole recommendations for drug offenders and qualifying violent offenders, which aggravated overcrowding. There were not enough officers and, particularly, not enough well trained officers. The prison was over capacity by 1,100 inmates.

When prisons are overcrowded and understaffed, the threat of riot becomes a possibility.

According to studies that have examined riots, three main factors provoke riots: overcrowding, understaffing, and poor or inadequate food. Additional causes can also include inhumane treatment and living conditions, heat, and gangs or racial tensions.

In addition to overcrowding, understaffing, the food quality and portion sizes have deteriorated over the years according to a corrections officer works in several prisons. The officer, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation from his superiors, said the food is an issue. “When I first started ten years ago, the food was good but it’s really gotten bad. The amount of food they get isn’t enough for a man. They serve a lot of bologna, almost every day, and for some reason it’s green.”

A class action lawsuit, filed in 1978 over civil rights violations at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary, settled in 2001. Questions about civil rights are being raised today. With the sudden influx of prisoners and funding falling 6.9 percent since FY 2009 to FY 2015, how are inmates being fed, is medical care being administered, and does inhumane and extreme punishment exist in attempts to keep control?

Red Dirt Report has requested incident reports, grievance reports, and inspection reports in six overcrowded state prisons from the ODOC to examine conditions as documented by inmates, officers, staff, and internal affairs. At the time of publication, our Freedom of Information Act request had not yet been filled.

Hope for Reform

The JRI sits unfunded. A recent pay raise for corrections officers fell short from an additional 18 percent raise to 8 percent, less than $1 more an hour, making it unlikely to attract more officers.

Mental health, substance abuse, and education services fall short to reach most offenders. The funding mechanism forces the judicial and criminal system to treat crime as a business. It seems reform will be no easy task.

State Rep. Bobby Cleveland is the Vice Chair for Public Safety and has taken up the daunting cause. For the last two years Cleveland has put the judicial and prison system under a microscope, visiting prisons every month, talking to prisoners, employees, and examining data.

Cleveland plans to publish an internal study late summer.

“I don’t have the answer, but I know what we’re doing isn’t working,” said Cleveland.

He supports rehabilitation and prevention programs and agreed the sentencing mandates need to change. He also sees other common sense solutions. “One person can monitor 20 people on an ankle bracelet monitor. That guy can still keep a job and be monitored where he’s at. You can do that with certain non-violent offenders. I think drug court should be in every county. We have to look at the things we can do with inmates for rehabilitation that makes sense,” he said.

Because the legislature is responsible for passing criminal laws and decides how the criminal and judicial system is funded, it will be up to elected officials to implement effective tools to quell the crisis. Steele said, “It’s easy to say it’s the legislature’s fault, and it is; but we elect those men and women.”

In the meantime, watchdogs continue to sound the death knell.

Concluded the ACLU’s Kiesel: “We are at a point today where if we don’t get a handle on the prison population, I think that the state of Oklahoma is setting itself up for systematic failure in a way that is even more disastrous than the current situation.”

UPDATE: (Friday, June 27, 2014) Bomb threats were reportedly called into LARC and Joseph Harp Correctional Facility in Lexington, Oklahoma a day after this story ran. A source indicated that this may be due to rising tensions within the DOC and the prison system. 

– See more at: http://www.reddirtreport.com/red-dirt-news/recipe-disaster-high-cost-tough-crime#sthash.e3Q4vnte.dpuf

SHAWNEE, Okla. — Oklahoma appears to be racing towards a disaster. With overcrowded and understaffed prisons, questions are being raised that may lead to judicial and prison reform. From the “tough on crime” laws that win elections to the way the judicial system is funded, a cycle of poverty and crime continues to threaten public safety and the promise of a prosperous future.

From 1980 to 2011, the prison population grew by 444.7 percent while the population only increased 27 percent, according to the Oklahoma Policy Institute. The Oklahoma Department of Corrections is 1,350 inmates over capacity, according to a population report.

Why the sharp rise in the prison population? Kris Steele, former Speaker of the House and author of the Justice Reinvestment Initiative, said the answer in part is due to political motivation.

“Every year the legislature adds to the list of crimes punishable by incarceration so we can go back in this election year and say, ‘we’re tough on crime’,” said Steele.

The JRI is a bill that diverts projected savings into prevention and rehabilitation programs and is proven to increase public safety, slashing prison populations and costs in other states who have implemented reinvestment legislation.

Although the bill passed into law in 2012, it remains unfunded.

In June, a bill introduced by State Rep. Bobby Cleveland (R-Slaughterville) would have saved the department $5 million. The bill allows qualifying prisoners earlier release time by a few months. It was voted down after Rep. Scott Biggs (R-Chickasha) called the bill ‘soft on crime.'”

Instead, the legislature seems to be headed in the opposite direction.

“We add to the maximum minimum sentences, which means, we add to the length of time a person is mandated to serve for a particular offense. But we don’t want to pay for it, we don’t staff it, and we don’t take care of our institutions,” said Steele.

One in 12 Oklahomans has a felony, which also means those Oklahomans are less likely to find a job after they serve their time, let alone one that brings them above poverty.

All too often inmates who were taxpaying citizens are serving harsh sentences for simple possession charges, losing their businesses, jobs, or careers.

A staff member at Lexington Assessment and Reception Center agreed to speak with the Red Dirt Report on condition of anonymity. The source interviews inmates and said Oklahoma is severely sentencing citizens for frivolous crimes.

“A business owner from Kansas City, Missouri was in Oklahoma visiting family. He was pulled over, and the passenger (in his car) had one ounce of marijuana in her purse. He was given two years for possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute, and eight years probation. Married with two children, an associate’s degree in business, in his 40’s with no addiction issues,” the source said.

Red Dirt Report also learned that another man was convicted of possession of a controlled substance in 2011; four years probation on a suspended sentence.

“One week before his probation was up he was sent to prison. He had his own business,” said our anonymous source.

Prisoners who don’t reoffend often end up consuming tax dollars on public assistance programs because they must declare their record on job applications. Those felons who can’t find a job to pay their fines go back to prison. Pew Research reported from 1999 to 2004, Oklahoma quadrupled the number of inmates sent back to jail for violations of their release, like failure to pay fines, instead of reoffending.

Taxpayers then pay again for that prisoner’s medical care, housing, and food. The daily cost per inmate is $38.25 to $87.01, according to an ODOC population summary for June. For FY 2015, corrections will siphon $475.1 million, funds which could be diverted to health care, mental health, or education.

Crime Pays

While crime doesn’t pay for those who sit behind bars, it appears to pay for a system which Ryan Kiesel, Executive Director of the ALCU of Oklahoma, said is feeding upon itself.

During a forum on “Expanding Opportunity in Oklahoma” by the Koch Institute, he said, “We have a criminal justice system that is creating a humanitarian crisis and a fiscal crisis, one that is completely unsustainable on both fronts. District attorneys now have financial interest and, in fact, [it] is needed because a majority of those offices receive less than 50 percent of their funding from the state. So they use bogus checks collections but, no one writes checks anymore, so their bogus check collections are down. They’ve increased their reliance on fees and asset forfeiture. So, we’ve created a system that is feeding upon itself.”

The legislature determines what costs, fines, and assessments are charged by the courts. Between 80 to 94 percent of district courts operating costs are funded by court collections, according to the Administration of the Courts Department.

Mike Evans, administrator for the courts, said, “We’re very dependent on our district court collections, there’s no question about that. Most states are dependent directly or indirectly on their collections for their operations.”

Adding to DA’s and district court’s need for more collections, the House of Representatives passed a measure in May to raise pay for district attorneys, associate and district judges, and special district judges but did not increase their state funding.

Kiesel said private prisons have profit motives. “They talk to shareholders about seeking out states like Oklahoma that don’t invest in education and health care and have a propensity to over criminalize their people. They know that’s the market they’re looking for. It’s about market for them.”

Tough on Crime Increases Crime

Tough on crime laws haven’t made Oklahoma safer. In 2011, Oklahoma’s violent crime rate rose 18 percent compared to the national average. In March, the Oklahoma Department of Corrections published a population summary showing 50.8 percent are non-violent offenders, 25.8 for drug related offenses, and 49.2 for violent offenses.

Steele interviewed dozens of inmates during his research for the JRI and discovered a cause for the hike in violent crime. “The research shows when we incarcerate non-violent offenders, they enter the public at greater risk to public safety because they picked up some bad habits along the way, and still have the same set of issues they were dealing with before, such as mental health, addiction, and lack of job training. We don’t address those issues, and they become institutionalized.”

The Cost of Life

There are signs of trouble in overcrowded prisons. According to an ODOC department email leaked to the Red Dirt Report, it reports that “there has been an increase in suicide attempts and an increase in self-injurious behavior” in the prisons, while noting that since the beginning of the year there have been three suicides, with two of them happening in May.

Executive Director of Oklahoma Corrections Professionals, a statewide association for ODOC employees, Sean Wallace, said tensions are high. Overcrowded and understaffed prisons lead to compromised safety.

“James Crabtree Correctional had their first murder ever recently. A case manager at Joseph Harp Correctional was beaten up, and the only reason she survived was because she was able to fight him off and hit the panic button. She had one officer on a unit with 160 offenders. Five years ago there would have been six officers on that unit but now there’s two. We had a support staff person who was taken hostage with a knife at her throat and two inmates tried to get her to her car so they could drive off. Officers intervened there, but there are things going on that we don’t even hear about. ODOC tries to keep everything as quiet as possible because they see it as a reflection on them.”

In efforts to avoid lawsuits by sheriff’s departments and save the department money, ODOC Director Robert Patton cleared overcrowded jails of their backlog of state prisoners, but seemed to trade one problem for another. Although he saved $17 million dollars, as of March 24 ODOC was already 100.87 percent full. As of June 9, the population grew to 108.48 percent, crowding an extra 1,350 into prisons already overwhelmed and understaffed.

There’s a riot goin’ on?

As of June 12, ODOC employs only 1,262 correctional officers. The ratio of inmate to officer is 13.7:1, the worst ratio in the nation. Understaffing creates greater opportunity for inmates to commit violence on other inmates unobserved and even overwhelm officers in a bloody riot.

Kris Steele said current conditions are all too familiar. “With the understaffing of officers, one just has to look at history to understand where we are at and where we are headed. In 1973, there was an awful riot at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlister. We had very similar conditions then as we do now.”

The ’73 riot left 3 inmates dead, 12 buildings burned, and 21 inmates and officers injured.

According to an entry in the Oklahoma Historical Society’s Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture, similar conditions are present. Governor David Hall failed to sign parole recommendations for drug offenders and qualifying violent offenders, which aggravated overcrowding. There were not enough officers and, particularly, not enough well trained officers. The prison was over capacity by 1,100 inmates.

When prisons are overcrowded and understaffed, the threat of riot becomes a possibility.

According to studies that have examined riots, three main factors provoke riots: overcrowding, understaffing, and poor or inadequate food. Additional causes can also include inhumane treatment and living conditions, heat, and gangs or racial tensions.

In addition to overcrowding, understaffing, the food quality and portion sizes have deteriorated over the years according to a corrections officer works in several prisons. The officer, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation from his superiors, said the food is an issue. “When I first started ten years ago, the food was good but it’s really gotten bad. The amount of food they get isn’t enough for a man. They serve a lot of bologna, almost every day, and for some reason it’s green.”

A class action lawsuit, filed in 1978 over civil rights violations at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary, settled in 2001. Questions about civil rights are being raised today. With the sudden influx of prisoners and funding falling 6.9 percent since FY 2009 to FY 2015, how are inmates being fed, is medical care being administered, and does inhumane and extreme punishment exist in attempts to keep control?

Red Dirt Report has requested incident reports, grievance reports, and inspection reports in six overcrowded state prisons from the ODOC to examine conditions as documented by inmates, officers, staff, and internal affairs. At the time of publication, our Freedom of Information Act request had not yet been filled.

Hope for Reform

The JRI sits unfunded. A recent pay raise for corrections officers fell short from an additional 18 percent raise to 8 percent, less than $1 more an hour, making it unlikely to attract more officers.

Mental health, substance abuse, and education services fall short to reach most offenders. The funding mechanism forces the judicial and criminal system to treat crime as a business. It seems reform will be no easy task.

State Rep. Bobby Cleveland is the Vice Chair for Public Safety and has taken up the daunting cause. For the last two years Cleveland has put the judicial and prison system under a microscope, visiting prisons every month, talking to prisoners, employees, and examining data.

Cleveland plans to publish an internal study late summer.

“I don’t have the answer, but I know what we’re doing isn’t working,” said Cleveland.

He supports rehabilitation and prevention programs and agreed the sentencing mandates need to change. He also sees other common sense solutions. “One person can monitor 20 people on an ankle bracelet monitor. That guy can still keep a job and be monitored where he’s at. You can do that with certain non-violent offenders. I think drug court should be in every county. We have to look at the things we can do with inmates for rehabilitation that makes sense,” he said.

Because the legislature is responsible for passing criminal laws and decides how the criminal and judicial system is funded, it will be up to elected officials to implement effective tools to quell the crisis. Steele said, “It’s easy to say it’s the legislature’s fault, and it is; but we elect those men and women.”

In the meantime, watchdogs continue to sound the death knell.

Concluded the ACLU’s Kiesel: “We are at a point today where if we don’t get a handle on the prison population, I think that the state of Oklahoma is setting itself up for systematic failure in a way that is even more disastrous than the current situation.”

UPDATE: (Friday, June 27, 2014) Bomb threats were reportedly called into LARC and Joseph Harp Correctional Facility in Lexington, Oklahoma a day after this story ran. A source indicated that this may be due to rising tensions within the DOC and the prison system. 

– See more at: http://www.reddirtreport.com/red-dirt-news/recipe-disaster-high-cost-tough-crime#sthash.e3Q4vnte.dpuf