a public defender

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I’m sorry, I have to say it. She’s freakin’ scary now. I think she’s lost it and I can almost picture her sitting in a darkened room, illuminated by frequent lightning, hair standing up, rubbing her hands together, eyes pointing in separate directions, cackling, laughing maniacally as she imagines these proposals.

The Governor, as part of her budget and state of the state speech yesterday, proposed these changes to the criminal justice system. Are you ready?

I will be submitting legislation to require a mandatory minimum sentence for Burglary in the Second Degree and to change Burglary in the First Degree to include burglary of an occupied dwelling, day or night.

I wonder if she reads the current statutes before making these proposals: “By Jove! I’ve got a brilliant idea! Let’s outlaw one man killing another!”

I would also like to put in place a three-strikes law for those convicted of three violent felony offenses.

And to satisfy those who thought mistakenly there was an “out” in the original proposal, I am removing the possibility of a case review after 30 years. Now it’s three strikes for violent felony convictions and you’re truly out.

There you go. “Original” three-strikes. Completely ineffective and counter productive. I’m also particularly tickled by the “to satisfy those…” comment. American Idol Governor, indeed.

I am also proposing legislation to significantly toughen our laws dealing with sex offenders.

All too often we hear or read about a predator attempting to entice a child online or about a sex offender failing to register as required.

One simple fix I am proposing is to bar offenders from legally changing their names to escape police attention or to avoid registration.

Again with this recidivism nonsense and this shows real ignorance on the topic. Yeah, we hear about MySpace predators because every single time it happens, there’s a media frenzy. Yet, 90-ish % of “predators” will be within the family. They don’t need myspace.

This name changing this is also odd. Why can’t they be allowed to change their name, as long as they register? To change your name, you have to get an order from Court, no? So if you’re on the sex offender registry, it should be pretty easy for someone to figure that out and make the change in the registry.

But I want to go further. I want to require offenders to report in person to police and to provide the name and address of their employers and the license plate number and description of their cars.

And they will also have a special imprint on their driver’s licenses.

Further than need be… This is scarlet letter territory we’re entering into here. Why should the sex offender have to provide the name of his employer? Do we want to further outcast these people? Look at my post from the other day, about the sex offender who can’t be located because he’s been kicked around like a football, or the sex offenders living under the bridge in Miami, one of whom has decided to disappear. Yeah, that’s public safety.

And in the name of public protection, I am calling for another significant change: I want all persons arrested for an A or B felony the most serious of criminal charges to provide DNA samples immediately upon arraignment.Those convicted of lesser felonies and certain misdemeanors must provide a DNA sample at conviction.

These samples will be processed to see if there are any matches related to unsolved crimes.

Incredibly, the law on the books only requires DNA samples to be taken at the end of the inmate’s sentence.

This is where one eye starts spinning uncontrollably, some cats enter the picture and fade to black.

This is just frightening. Absolutely frightening. Presumption of innocence? Them’s just fancy terms. Don’t mean nothing. You’re arrested so you’re guilty. Give up your damn DNA. Heck, I got a better idea. Why wait for people to be arrested. Let’s just have the police go to everyone’s homes. We can all stand in our yards in a line and the police can walk by, taking our DNA. You know, because innocent people don’t exist. Diogenes was right. There isn’t an honest man.

By the way, the statute calls for DNA to be collected after conviction. DOC can choose to collect that sample upon initial entry and they don’t always collect it prior to release.

She’s absolutely lost it and has no idea what to do and what not to do. Pandering is scary enough. This delusional law-making is scarier.

More from CTLP, CT News Junkie.

Disclaimer: This is my opinion. I don’t really think she looks like that in her home. That was my poor attempt at satire. Also, I don’t know what the public defender’s office’s official position would be. This is just mine.

Now that stricter home invasion laws have been enacted, Governor Rell indicated at a press conference today that she will be considering whether to lift the parole ban this weekend. This will certainly be good news for a correctional system that is barely hanging on by a thread and is bursting at the seams (hah! TWO in a row!).

At a ceremony Friday, in which Mrs. Rell signed into law the new criminal justice reforms passed earlier this week by the legislature, she said she needs to make sure a few more things are in place before she lifts the ban. However, “I hope to have that decision over the weekend,” she said.

Cathy Osten, a lieutenant and president of CSEA/SEIU Local 2001’s correctional supervisors, said Friday morning that all the state’s correctional facilities are overcrowded. She said she’s been with the department more than 18 years and it’s been overcrowded almost half of that time. She said the current population increase is a result of the governor’s ban on parole.

Ironically, her new bill might get its first test on the first day! The wife of the Assistant Deputy House Speaker walked in on two robbers in her home today (Morons). Will it matter what time she actually signed the bill into law?

Gov. Rell also indicated that she would try and raise a three-strikes bill again, because the people of CT want it or some such nonsense. Except that the most recent QU poll showed that they don’t. I guess she’s the American Idol Governor only when it suits her ideas.

is here. I’m going to go join the legislators and stick my head in the sand. (From CTLP)

Update: It seems that a “three-strikes” provision has been defeated.

Second Update:  Home invasion is now a crime, not requiring proof of knowledge of persons present; three-strikes is not on the books. However, the persistent offender law has been re-written to make it easier for prosecutors to seek harsher penalties.

Prosecutors seeking to convict someone as a “persistent offender” will no longer have to prove that an offender has “a history and character that … indicate that extended incarceration will best serve the public interest.” Instead, prosecutors will simply have to show that the defendant has the requisite number of previous convictions necessary to apply a longer sentence.

This, however, still leaves them with the discretion of whether to charge someone as a persistent offender.

Some of the other provisions that were passed:

•Expanding global positioning system monitoring of 300 more criminals out on parole and believed to be the most likely to commit more crimes. The state would have to hire 10 new parole officers to monitor the parolees.

•Providing more residential treatment beds for sex offenders.

•Creating an automated system to notify victims of court hearings and make it easier to allow state agencies to share information about victims.

•Requiring a state-of-the-art computer system.

•Adding a forensic psychologist and two victim advocates to work full-time for the parole board.

•Providing a video link between each prison and the parole board, costing about $250,000 overall, for parole hearings.

•Requiring the courts to provide often-secret juvenile and youthful-offender records to the parole board and Department of Correction.

No measure concerning building prisons or improving rehabilitation were taken up. Those might be addressed in the general session next month.

The legislature’s special session is set for tomorrow, when they will debate reforms to the “horribly broken” criminal justice system. Earlier in the week, reports stated that both parties had agreed on almost all the reforms. Not true, it seems. There are still some sticking points. The Republicans, taking the hard line stance, want a three-strikes law which would mandate life sentences for anyone convicted of a third violent felony. The Dems, showing some good sense for a change, are resisting that.

Republicans have been calling for an automatic sentence of life imprisonment for any criminal who is convicted of three violent felonies, but some Democrats have rejected that concept as an overly simplistic solution that would take sentencing discretion away from judges.

On top of that, they want to make home invasion a “per se” crime.

Cafero and Senate Republican leader John McKinney of Fairfield are both concerned about a loophole in a 34-page draft bill concerning the wording of the proposed home-invasion law. Currently, the invasion of an occupied home is not considered a violent crime, and lawmakers in both parties want to change that. The Republicans say a loophole in the draft bill would prevent prosecutors from pursuing a charge of home invasion if the criminal claimed that he did not know the house was occupied.

I have no problem with classifying burglary as a violent offense. The second part of this quote is just plain wrong. Prosecutors can charge defendants with whatever the hell they want (and often do). It’s the proving part that’s difficult (burden of proof and all that). Not only does it remove the intent requirement - that is, intentionally enter a house knowing some is in there - and makes all acts of entering a home the same.

Derek Slap, a spokesman for Senate President Pro Tem Donald Williams, D-Brooklyn, said Williams agrees with Republicans that wording in the draft bill should be changed. The Senate president feels strongly that if you break into somebody’s home, and they are home, it’s home invasion,” Slap said.

Or burglary. But whatever.

“In addition, he doesn’t have a problem with the governor’s proposal that if you break into somebody’s home at night — whether they are home or not — that’s home invasion.”

I still have a problem with this. This essentially removes incentive for burglars (let’s be honest: this is not going to stop burglaries) to ensure that no one’s home. This does not deter.

The Governor’s proposal is also meeting resistance from youth advocates. Part of her proposal called for opening up access to juvenile records, which are currently sealed and unavailable.

[S]ome youth advocates fear that opening the files undermines the basic principles of juvenile justice and is unfair to individuals who shouldn’t be punished for their reckless behavior when they were young. “This really eviscerates the purpose of juvenile court, which is to provide rehabilitation in a confidential setting,” said Martha Stone, executive director of the Center for Children’s Advocacy at the University of Connecticut School of Law.

Stone and other juvenile advocates point to recent scientific research showing that adolescents’ brains continue to develop through their early 20s and that teenagers are not able to fully appreciate the wrongfulness of their acts until their bodies have fully matured.

At the very least, they say, this proposal should be put off till the regular session, so there can be testimony and public debate.

Finally, the Governor’s office is still playing denial games in regards to prison overcrowding. DOC continues to maintain that the population is “manageable”, while DOC employees keep reminding us that it is not.

“We have over 800 inmates sleeping in unconventional areas — dorms, closets, bigger utility closets with three or four people sleeping on the floor,” said David Testa, president of Local 387 of the correction officers’ union. “We think 800 inmates sleeping on the floor is an emergency. … The system we have presently isn’t working.”

In the nomenclature of the Department of Correction, the inmates in “nontraditional housing” are considered as the “overflow” of prisoners who do not have traditional beds. To the union, that means criminals sleeping in plastic sleds on gymnasium floors and in converted closets.

DOC is still in full denial mode, however. Sorry Mr. Garnett. I’ll believe my clients over you, thanks.

Curiously, they have re-assigned a number of COs from “less essential” posts to “dormitories, cell blocks and other priority areas crowded with prisoners”. The result?

To staff those posts, the department leaves less essential ones vacant on a day-to-day basis, he said. Those might include posts in a laundry room or school classrooms. Those programs, including educational lessons, are shut down for the day if no is guard present, Garnett said.

Great. Not only are the sleeping on floors and sharing a sink with 50 other inmates, but the few classes and programs that are available to them are closed because of this overcrowding.

Rep. Michael P. Lawlor, an East Haven Democrat who is co-chairman of the legislature’s influential judiciary committee, tells another story. He says there is only one sink for a group of 55 prisoners at the Whalley Avenue jail in New Haven. Inmates in that group use it to wash their hands and their clothes, Lawlor says. The same 55 criminals, he says, regularly stand in line to use one toilet — in a jail that is sometimes hot and stifling with a powerful stench.

“Some are mentally ill,” Lawlor said. “Some are HIV positive. Some have tuberculosis. Everybody’s mad and angry. No privacy. No quiet.”

It’s pretty damn obvious to everyone that prisons are overflowing, that tensions are high and there’s absolutely no productive outlet for the inmates. The Gov. talks a good talk, but it’s becoming painfully obvious that she has no clue what she’s talking about or how to really handle a growing problem. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like many others in the lege do either.

A graphic from the Courant showing current population levels [it's in PDF format for some reason]. What’s really striking (and worrisome) about those numbers is that most facilities are overflowing and all medium to maximum facilities are above their capacity (bar Northern).

After yesterday’s press release by the Guv, apparently outlining her own proposals for criminal justice reform, the task force she appointed to make recommendations released theirs.

Initial recommendations from Gov. M. Jodi Rell’s task force on changing the parole system did not include a “three strikes” law for automatic life sentences, but focused instead on programs for ex-offenders that would cost tens of millions of dollars annually.

Funny how none of the stories covering the Dems or the Guv’s proposals mentioned cost. At least the task force understands that rehab is a big portion of crime prevention.

The task force called for expanding counseling services, housing and drug treatment for offenders leaving prison.

The recommendations included special housing for sex offenders; mental health screenings for an increased number of offenders upon release; more job training for all former offenders; and a Center for Excellence in the Management of Problem Sexual behavior that would study sex offenders.

You’d be forgiven for thinking that someone finally has common sense and has suggested sensible proposals. But you’d be wrong:

The two sets of recommendations contain many of the same proposals — creating a full-time parole board, hiring more parole officers and creating a new crime of home invasion to cover burglaries of occupied dwellings.

I don’t know how else to say this: “Home invasion” is already a crime. It is known by it’s less ritzy name “burglary”.

Oh well. I guess the Guv couldn’t care that much about her own task force that she had to release her personal recommendations - or more appropriately, she doesn’t give a damn about rehabilitation.

Edit: CTLP has more.

If it’s January, it must be time to get ready for the special session of the legislature. The only focus, as everyone probably knows, is how to fix the state’s criminal justice system which is so horribly broken. I mean, it’s in tatters. So much so that it’s almost a miracle that the wheels haven’t come off, inmates aren’t roaming the streets of our city in packs hunting little babies for Satanic rituals and the plague isn’t upon us.

So the Democrats released their proposals yesterday and the Governor followed up with her own today. I’ll mention the choice ones:

1. A new crime of home invasion, which would be a violent crime. It basically reads like this: “A home invasion occurs when an individual unlawfully enters or remains in a dwelling which is occupied and such dwelling is located in any of Connecticut’s affluent suburbs. For the rest of you, it’s still a burglary.”

2. Re-working the “three strikes law” to make it more…workable. The Governor goes further and provides for a mandatory life sentence for third time violent felony offenders, which cannot be reviewed until 30 years have passed. The Dems want to make it a 25 year minimum, putting it on par with murder. There goes incentive not to kill.

3. The Dems want to establish tougher and more secure re-entry procedures for offenders returning to the community as they complete their sentence. The Governor doesn’t think re-entry is important enough to be considered during the special session, so she leaves it for the regular session. Good job. If we don’t ever let ‘em out, we don’t have to worry about re-entry!

4. The Governor then goes overboard with some bizarre victim amendments, like victims have to be notified before a plea offer is made and family members of the victim are also now officially victims. Whatever.

By the way, I don’t see a single proposal for increasing funding for Corrections (not that it isn’t the biggest money hog ever) or Correctional officers or more training or… I know…prevention. No, no. That’s too damn liberal. Sorry.

So there you have it. A whole lot of nonsense that still leaves a horrible taste in my mouth because this “urgency” came about only because three white people from an affluent suburb were killed. Yeah, I said it.*

I’m considering turning comments off for this post, but I’ll leave them on for now. Be warned, though. I have an itchy trigger finger on this one. I will close comments if I feel like it, without warning. It’s my blog. Deal with it.

*Now before any of you go saying “Oh you don’t care about people you killerhugger” and “how can you say that. three people died! it’s horrible!”, let me re-iterate (meaning I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again) that I don’t condone violence or crime. Obviously. No one does. But that’s not what I’m talking about here. So please understand that.

The Bureau of Justice Statistics released a new study [pdf] over the weekend, this one reporting on sexual victimization in Federal and State prisons. The results:

• An estimated 60,500 inmates (or 4.5% of all State and Federal inmates) experienced one or more incidents of sexual victimization involving other inmates or staff.
• Nationwide, about 2.1% of inmates reported an incident involving another inmate and 2.9% reported an incident involving staff.
• Among the 146 prison facilities in the 2007 NIS, 6 had no reports of sexual victimization from the sampled inmates; 10 had an overall victimization rate of at least 9.3%.
• Among the 10 facilities with the highest overall prevalence rates, 3 had prevalence rates of staff sexual misconduct that exceeded 10%.

The study itself is worth a read. Prison sexual assault is quite prevalent and needs to be addressed. Combined with the prevalence of STDs in prisons, at the very least States should make condoms available.

The New Haven Independent, which has very interesting coverage, recently interviewed a man who spent 3 days in New Haven Correctional (also known as Whalley Ave.).

Ventura’s tale offers a peek at the day-to-day impact of the state’s prison overcrowding problem.

He said the overcrowding had worsened drastically since he was in jail two years ago. He said cots have been set up in the cafeteria, the visiting room, the kitchen, the hallways. Fifty to 75 people were sharing one bathroom.

Ventura also charged that the overcrowding is a potential fire hazard, that inmates are sometimes given prison garb that is ripped or dirty, and that some of them are not getting proper medication. He complained that recreation is often canceled, that inmates don’t get enough food, and that he didn’t have a toothbrush or toothpaste while he was inside the jail.

A few days after that story was published, lawmakers toured a “sanitized” Whalley Ave.

“When you have inmates on the floor they have nowhere to lock up their personal property,” [a union rep] said. “The inmates are fighting over the bathrooms — when you have one toilet and 50 inmates, you can see it when they come back from chow — it’s an immediate run for the bathroom and a lot of times we have fights.”

Reporters were able to speak to inmates, although no cameras or recording devices were allowed past the front waiting area. Prisoners complained of unsanitary conditions, poor food, lack of recreation, and in many cases, lack of medical treatment.

But hearing tales of dirty linens and dirty, ripped uniforms — and seeing them firsthand — heightened concerns about MRSA, the antibiotic-resistant strain of staph infection that is spread in crowded, unsanitary conditions, and can be fatal. [The union rep] said it’s “running rampant” inside the jail.

All this comes on the heels of the Gov.’s parole ban and the swift explosion in the number of incarcerated inmates. Next week, the judiciary committee will start its public hearings on the the reform bills. It’s going to be an interesting week.

The Courant has this article today, seeking to make much of the under-utilized persistent felony statutes in Connecticut. All it does, instead, is underline the need for more rehabilitation programs.

Meet Richard D. Halapin Jr., a small-time career burglar and thief who earlier this year broke into his sister’s home and stole the family’s jewelry - including a wedding ring and her three children’s golden baptism crucifixes. The cherished items were sold to get money for a drug fix.

The perfect lead in, you’d think, to an article examining the rehabilitation programs in prison that help inmates like Halapin kick their habit and go on to lead productive lives upon release. Of course, the Courant, which is going the politician’s course and trying to look “tough on crime”, doesn’t walk through the open door. Instead they give us this: “[H]e may be the best living proof that an entire category of Connecticut laws - designed to increase punishment for “persistent offenders” - is under-used, at best, and at worst, useless.”

What a novel idea for a story! I’d imagine the pitch went something like this:

Journalist: “Boss, I found this woman in Naugatuck whose brother stole from her.”

Editor: “HOME INVASION! OMG! HEADLINES FOR ANOTHER MONTH!”

Journalist: “He’s a druggie and spent most of his life in jail.”

Editor: “OMFG! VIOLENT CRIMINAL! STATE LAW IS TEH SUCK!”

Okay, so not quite like that. But I’ve always wanted to use “teh suck” in a post.

Halapin’s sister and the state’s victim advocate say that he’s a symbol of failings in the state justice system.

Yeah, the failing being that the root of the problem is almost never addressed. Drug dependent inmates plead to non-drug dependent crimes, drug rehab programs in prisons are scarce and spaces are limited and it is left to the inmates to seek treatment upon release. Not to mention that they get jacksquat upon release.

It’s sad that the Courant missed this opportunity to examine the real problem leading to re-offending and instead chose to focus on the worn drum.

Previous posts on the topic of rehabilitation while incarcerated:

• What should the State’s responsibility be?
• Solving the revolving door of parole
• There are other reforms too
• Re-entry problems
• Gate pay for inmates a reality

Stan Simpson has this fine piece in the Courant today, urging legislators to learn from the State’s past and resist the urge to simply expand prisons as a solution to reforming the criminal justice system.

The last time the state went on a massive prison expansion escapade, it spent $1 billion to build 12 new prisons - the last in 1996. The overcrowding problem got worse, not better. Inmates were sent to out-of-state facilities.

Prison expansion was costly and largely ineffective. The state Department of Correction’s budget ballooned, from $92.4 million in 1985, with 5,379 inmates, to $605 million this year. In recent years, Connecticut got smarter and embraced prison-diversion alternatives for nonviolent offenders.

This recent enlightenment is what led to Connecticut being reported favorably in a private report released by the Pew Charitable Trusts back in February. Connecticut was one of two states, the other being Delaware, that was projected to have no increase in its prison population. That, obviously, no longer holds true. The policies that the State put in place and followed, however, are still valid.

“When an event as tragic as the Petits’ occurs, obviously, the first response is to identify why it happened and to do everything to prevent it from happening again,” said Ryan King, policy analyst for The Sentencing Project, a Washington, D.C.-based prison reform advocacy organization. “Unfortunately, that response has traditionally been longer sentences of some kind, restricting parole release, those sorts of things. And the fact of the matter is there’s been very little empirical evidence that any of them have had the advertised effect.”

“The conversation that can’t be lost in this dynamic is that at the end of the day, creating and maintaining comprehensive re-entry services for individuals is a better way of increasing safer communities,” said Maureen Price-Boreland, a member of the governor’s task force and executive director of Community Partners in Action, which runs re-entry programs for former offenders.

Stan suggests that legislators should not overreact, but instead invest in job training, drug counseling and housing assistance programs, reserving prison beds for the “true incorrigibles”.

Now, will legislators listen?

Meanwhile, there was a community meeting in Hartford last night, where ex-offenders and their families confronted Gov. Rell Commissioner Lantz about the negative effects of the parole ban.

The Clean Slate Committee also made demands of Lantz. They asked her to guarantee that by Nov. 30, every inmate released from incarceration would be given a state-issued identification document and that the state review of all parolees and inmates eligible for community release programs would be completed by Nov. 21. They also asked that the governor establish a commission - to include former inmates, their families, advocates, public officials and two members of Clean Slate - that would work on parole and community re-entry.

Lantz agreed to establish such a commission, but said she could not meet the deadlines on the other two demands.

In light of yesterday’s prison tour, Judiciary Committee co-chair Mike Lawlor has issued a statement asking Gov. Rell to provide more resources to the DOC. He renews his disbelief over Comm’r Lantz’s assertions before the judiciary committee that they have the prison population under control.

Yesterday I toured the Willard-Cybulski Correctional Institution in Enfield at the request of the corrections officers who work there. After seeing the institution myself and having one-on-one conversations with many officers, there is no question that the situation there and elsewhere in the Department of Corrections is nearing a crisis stage due to the recent surge in inmate population.

Two weeks ago, Commissioner Lantz appeared before the Judiciary Committee in your place and told us that her department needs no additional resources in order to safely manage the population surge. I simply cannot see how that is true.

These conditions cannot be ignored. For the protection of the public and corrections staff, you must allow the front-line professionals in corrections and parole to tell state officials what they need to safely manage the inmate population and the offenders who are or who will be released into the community in the near and long term. We, in turn, must provide them with those resources.

Meanwhile (and there’s no link to this - surprise, surprise!), there are reports that there was a violent fight at Brooklyn Correctional last night that resulted in an inmate’s head being busted open. Inmates and COs have been warning that this overcrowding is creating a very volatile situation. Let’s hope someone takes heed before it turns ugly.

Or perhaps they should just look to this 2000 report prepared by our very own Legislative Program Review and Investigations Committee, which concludes:

Prison overcrowding has a cyclical pattern in Connecticut — reaching a crisis point about every 10 years. The committee report showed most of the causes of prison overcrowding occurred outside the administration and jurisdiction of the Department of Correction and these complex issues and problems cannot be addressed by a single state agency. Specifically, the program review committee identified five main causes of prison overcrowding. They are:

• Despite the decrease in arrest and crime rates, the number of offenders in prison or jail continued to increase due to the “war on drugs”, increased funding for police, increased role of victims and victim advocacy groups in the court process, added bed capacity in the correctional system, recidivism and technical violations of probation and parole, harsher penalties for certain types of crimes, and narrowed eligibility for community release and alternative sanction options.
• Convicted inmates were remaining incarcerated for a greater portion of their court-imposed prison sentences as a result of the shift from an indeterminate to a determinate sentencing structure, elimination of “good time”, creation of time-served standards for parole eligibility, and the enactment of several “truth in sentencing” initiatives.
• The aggressive “tough on crime” approach supported by the legislature and adopted by the executive and judicial branches allows the criminal justice system to narrow its use of discretion and take a more conservative and less controversial approach to punishment.
• A lack of prison beds, especially high security and pre-trial beds, forced DOC to operate at capacity.
• Poor planning and a lack of an accurate population projection and offender needs analysis contributed to the cycle of overcrowding and hampered DOC’s efforts to adequately plan for new or expanded facilities.

In reviewing options available to manage and control growth of the inmate population, the committee found Connecticut cannot build its way out of a prison overcrowding crisis. However, prison expansion is one model to address prison overcrowding. This strategy has been Connecticut’s primary response to prison overcrowding over the past 20 years. It is the simplest but least effective and most expensive approach. Services in this model are concentrated primarily on the small percent (25 percent) of the offender population in prison.

If legislators are truly interested in the “best solution”, then they should perhaps look to the current overcrowding problems in Texas, wonderfully covered by Grits for Breakfast [latest post here].

The full press release is after the jump, if you’re interested.

At the behest of a disgruntled correctional officer’s union, lawmakers today toured Willard-Cybulski Correctional Institution, getting a first hand look at the overcrowding.

Correction officers and inmates complained about overcrowding. Officers cited the governor’s changes to the prison system after a number of violent incidents involving parolees this summer[.]

Correction Officer Vinal Arthurs said it’s getting tough to manage the 118 inmates. “They’re bumping into each other. There’s no room,” Arthurs said. “We can’t handle it. The commissioner said we could handle it, we can’t handle it.”

Inmates gave a glimpse of what life has become:

Inmates at the facility said there are fights and arguments because too many inmates are crowded into small spaces.

Correction officers showed Eyewitness News three recreation areas inside each dorm, where inmates watch TV. Two areas, however, have been converted into living quarters.

Inmate Alfred Hebert, 26, of Plainfield, spends most of his days with seven other men in one of the units at Cybulski designed to hold four prisoners.

“I’ve seen people aggravated with each other,” he said. “They’re too crowded. There’s too many people.”

Yet, the Governor denies this is overcrowding.

“We continue to believe that we will be able to manage the population as it stands now, if that has changed dramatically, I have not heard so.”

Well, let me tell you. It’s overcrowded. 800 more inmates since your “ban”, Guv. Oh, my word isn’t good enough? How about this:

Since the temporary ban took effect, the state’s prison population has grown from 18,864 to 19,655, according to Department of Correction statistics.

Correction officers said one officer supervises 118 inmates in one particular dorm — a headcount that has increased from a few weeks ago.

Members of the unions that represent corrections officers said more than half of the state’s 18 prisons are overcrowded.

“What we do not understand is the commissioner’s reluctance to acknowledge that there are limitations to her resources and to the number of inmates the system can hold,” said Jon Pepe, a 17-year correction officer at Northern Correctional Institution and president of Local 391 of Council 4.

Now do you - no? What if some legislators told you:

“I think what we saw today really confirms our worst suspicions,” said [Rep. Mike] Lawlor. “You have to either have more prison capacity, or more nonviolent offenders out in halfway houses, or a combination of the two, but we have to do something.”

“This facility in particular is definitely pushing at the seams and I have great concern that it is adequately staffed with the proper number of correction officers,” said Judiciary Committee member Sen. John Kissel.

There’s a raw feed at this link, as well as pictures from the facilities and some other goodies.

Image license info here.

Not too much else is happening and I’m still hung up on solving the revolving door of parole, so here’s a poll. What is the solution to this problem and as part of the solution, what do you believe should be the extent of the state’s involvement?

Should the state’s role be limited to incarceration and minimal effort at rehabilitation? Should the state be required to provide enough spots in programs for all inmates? Should the State have to go a step further and ensure that released inmates do not re-offend by providing them employment for a limited period, till they get back on their feet?

Clearly, some people can make it on their own on the outside. Maybe they have been convicted of minor offenses, maybe they have strong family support and jobs waiting for them. A greater number of inmates, however, don’t have a hope. No job, no employable skills, no family and no money. Who, then, should shoulder the responsibility of ensuring that they do not re-offend? It would be in everyone’s interests that they stay on the right side of the law (well, except maybe corrections).

Make your choice (and explain in the comments if you feel like it).

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Image license info here.

Watching Koppel’s “Breaking Point” last night [previous coverage here], one of the issues that stood out to me was the recidivism in California and the number of parole violators that were back in prison. Someone, maybe it was Koppel, maybe a counselor or even an inmate perhaps, described it as a “revolving door”.Lawmakers look at this revolving door - high recidivism rates - and point to a need for stricter laws. Parts of the public also subscribe to this view. “Look at these criminals! We let them and what do they do? Go right back in! Harsher penalties! Three strikes and you’re out! Life, life, life, death”.

This is a misguided view. The real problem is that nothing happens to these inmates in overcrowded jails. What I mean by that is when they leave they’re essentially the same person that walked in the door. All that has happened is the passage of time, knowledge of how to commit more crimes and perhaps a sexually transmitted disease or two.

Consider this (and I’m writing from memory): There are 500 spots in all types of “rehabilitation” programs at CSP - Solano and over 10,000 inmates. These spots include GED classes, drug rehab classes and vocational programs.

As those on the outside will acknowledge, GED and vocational classes aren’t worth much, but they’re better than nothing. Yet, over 90% of inmates don’t even have access to any such program. They sit around the yard (calling themselves “yard dogs”), working out and the only way they can make any money is the drug trade. Overcrowding has placed such a severe burden on resources that frequently inmates will be paroled without ever taking a single rehabilitation class in prison.

Take the case of Travis Tippets [first in the slideshow] (whom the show followed after his release on parole). He had to be paroled to his last residence: his father’s house. He doesn’t have a license (two prior DUI convictions) and has felony convictions. He also had a drug habit but received no counseling or rehab. He also was unable to get into any vocational class (except one three years prior to his release in welding or some such thing). He lives in an economically repressed area, where there isn’t much industry and what little there is conducts background checks.

He either has to walk to work or take a bus. Either option will not get him anywhere for the normal start time of 9am. Is it any surprise that he will violate his parole?

So, what then, are they we to do? If we cannot increase prison program capacity and availability, then we are setting these inmates up to fail. We cannot, then, point the finger back at them and say “you’re no good, go back to jail”. That’s a dishonest position.

I suggest the following (or a variation thereof): The State employs paroled inmates for a period of two years following their release. Pick an industry, set up offices throughout the state and hire parolees. The State has control over them (call it a modified form of probation), pays them slightly above minimum wage and puts them to work. Give them access to rehabilitation programs on the outside and make them productive citizens. The State’s responsibility to keep the streets safe can work in several ways. It we want to ensure that criminals are not on the streets engaging in criminal conduct, then we need to ensure that they have no incentive to do so and have the necessary tools to cope with the stresses of life.

It’s entirely possible. If the State has the resources to spend $43,000 a year on Travis Tippets in jail, then it can certainly spend that money on paying Tippets to work on the outside and lead a responsible life. He learns a trade and after two years is employable. He also doesn’t feel discarded, forgotten and reviled.

Thoughts?

More on yesterday’s report. Judiciary co-chair Mike Lawlor weighs in:

That shows the disparities may be more between the rich and the poor, said state Rep. Mike Lawlor, D-East Haven, co-chairman of the legislature’s Judiciary Committee.

Connecticut’s white population is unusually rich, meaning more white offenders can afford the best attorneys and avoid prison than minority defendants, Lawlor said.

Uh, what? Rep. Lawlor, in case you didn’t know, your state (my state, our state) has one of the best public defender systems in the country. I would rather be represented by a public defender in this state. Please, do not disparage the brilliant attorneys working for our division so. Them’s fightin’ words - and a little heartbreaking

You want to know another reason why the racial disparity is such? Because we classify non-violent drug offenders are violent based on their past history and keep them in jail longer.

That’s not to say CT hasn’t taken steps:

The legislature in 2005 increased the amount of crack cocaine a person must carry to be charged with planning to sell drugs. A commission of legislators, officials and policy experts is studying sentencing reform, including possibly changing the state’s mandatory minimum drug laws.

Nearly two-thirds of defendants charged with mandatory minimum drug crimes are black or Hispanic, state statistics show.

“The overrepresentation of people of color in our correctional institutions has long been of great concern to me,” Correction Commissioner Theresa Lantz said. “While I can’t control who is placed in my custody, I strive to address literacy, employment skills, sobriety and housing during incarceration, so that these individuals are prepared for a productive re-entry to their communities.”

Sentencing disparities anyone?