Eighty-seven got a seat on "Gruesome Gertie" and were electrocuted.
Seven were put to sleep permanently by lethal injection.
In all, 94 people found guilty of capital crimes, such as first-degree murder or treason, have been executed in Louisiana since 1941. Eighty-two more, including two women, sit on death row today.
Their impending executions and those of others punished under Louisiana's death penalty have come under the scrutiny of media, victims, lawmakers, activists and the U.S. Supreme Court.
Some say the state's capital punishment law, like those of 34 other states, is bound in the biblical tradition that those who take a life may be killed. The death penalty brings justice to victims' families and deters would-be killers, proponents argue.
"Most people believe that some people ought to get the death penalty — there are some crimes that are so bad that the person who commits (them) ought to be given the death penalty, if convicted," said death penalty expert Burk Foster, a former University of Louisiana-Lafayette criminal justice associate professor now teaching in Michigan.
Others insist the law is distorted and ineffective. Eight Louisiana death row inmates have been exonerated of their alleged crimes. More sentences overturned in recent years paired with fewer executions have all but already abolished the state's death penalty, they say.
"It's not as easy to get a death penalty (verdict) and certainly not (easy to) get one at this point," said Sabine District Attorney Don Burkett, who helped put three men on death row while district attorney for DeSoto and Sabine parishes. "I don't know how effective the death penalty is because there are so few being carried out."
Dwindling executions
The last execution in Louisiana was in May 2002. Leslie Dale Martin was put to death by lethal injection for the 1991 rape and killing of a 19-year-old college student. No other execution is scheduled, said Pam Laborde, Louisiana Department of Corrections spokeswoman.
Of the 27 men put to death since Louisiana reinstated the death penalty in 1979, 18 were executed between 1983 and 1988. Seven more were put to death during the '90s and just two were executed since 2000.
That mirrors a national trend. There have been 1,171 executions nationwide since 1976. The annual number has steadily dropped from a peak of 98 in 1999 to 37 executions last year, the Death Penalty Information Center reports.
"Louisiana was one of the most active death penalty states in the first 10 years after the death penalty was reinstated," Foster said. "Then it began to slow down. When we switched from electrocution to lethal injection it slowed down even more."
The reasons for that trend are varied, but better, more qualified legal representation for death row defendants has contributed to a lull in executions and an increase in exonerations and sentences being reversed, Foster said.
Since 2007, 11 men, not including those exonerated, have been taken off death row for a variety of reasons, the DOC reports. Most have seen their death sentences reversed and were resentenced to life in prison.
At least two men recently taken off death row were put there by Caddo Parish juries. In one case, the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled prosecutors made a mistake and ordered a new trial. Robert Coleman, accused of the 2003 slaying of retired minister Julian Brandon during a Blanchard home invasion, is scheduled to again stand trial in April 2010. His girlfriend, Brandy Holmes, also earned a death sentence for her role in the crime.
In the other Caddo case, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a sentencing was unconstitutional. Richard L. Davis, who was found guilty and sentenced to death for the rape of a 5-year-old girl, was resentenced to life in prison.
Nationwide, 135 death row inmates have been exonerated, according to Death Penalty Information Center statistics.
Fewer prosecutions
As a result of those and other factors, prosecutors are seeking death sentences less frequently. Faced with higher costs, the need for a unanimous jury verdict and a lengthy, expensive appeals process, they instead are opting for life sentences with no parole. Today there are 4,280 life inmates in Louisiana's state prisons.
An estimated 111 death sentences were meted out in 2008 across the country — part of a continual decline since 1998. In Louisiana, nearly half of the inmates on death row were sent there by three parishes — East Baton Rouge, Caddo and Jefferson. Between 2000 and 2008, those same parishes also had the most death row commitments in the state. Orleans Parish, which has the highest per capita murder rate in the nation, had not sentenced anyone to death in at least 12 years until August.
"There are parts of Louisiana that are very pro-death, but more than half the parishes in this state have never returned a death penalty," said Richard Bourke, director of the Louisiana Capital Assistance Center in New Orleans. "The death penalty in this state is driven by a small number of individually, locally-elected officials."
A colorful history
Hanging was the means of execution in Louisiana until 1941. The last man legally hanged in Louisiana was William Landers, who was executed in 1941 — barely six months after he and three other escaped Arkansas convicts killed a posse man sent to capture them.
Jury selection for the quartet's trial was hampered due to public sentiment against giving the death penalty to all four men when it was likely only one, Frank Boyce, actually was responsible for the murder, according to a 2001 article written by Foster.
That's not the only time the state's death penalty has met societal pressure, according to LSU-Shreveport criminal justice professor Bernadette Palombo.
During the penalty trial of Timothy Taylor, who was found guilty of first-degree murder in the 1999 shooting death of a Shreveport car salesman, defense attorneys and his parents pleaded with jurors to spare his life, Palombo said.
A man whose daughter was one of the 168 victims of the Oklahoma City bombing carried out by Timothy McVeigh spoke on Taylor's behalf, asking the jury not to give the death penalty. The man, who spoke as a representative of Murder Victims' Families for Reconciliation, also was seeking to stop McVeigh's execution. Ultimately, Taylor was given life in prison. His co-defendant, Michael Taylor, no relation, received the death penalty a year earlier.
Others have expressed satisfaction in the state's death penalty. After the 2002 execution of Martin, the parents of his victim, Christina Burgin, said they were "ecstatic" over his death, news reports at the time stated.
Louisiana State Penitentiary Warden Burl Cain, who was at Martin's side when he died, said he feels compassion for the families of death row inmates but his thoughts focus on the victims and their families.
"I think about the victims," Cain said of what goes through his mind while sharing a last meal and standing by an inmate, sometimes holding his hand, as he is executed. "I wish I could have helped the victims. I wish I could have stopped (the victim's murder)."
After the state's last hanging, Louisiana switched to the electric chair. The oak chair, which was transported to the parish where the execution was to take place for nearly 16 years, was the method of choice from 1941 to 1991. The electric chair found a permanent home at Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola in 1957.
In that chair is where the only woman to be executed in Louisiana met her end. Toni Jo Henry, a Shreveporter, was convicted and sentenced to die for the 1940 killing of a 41-year-old tire salesman from Houston. She was executed on Nov. 28, 1942, in Lake Charles.
Two women, including Brandy Holmes, of Shreveport, sit on death row today. Both are housed at the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women in St. Gabriel. Holmes' latest appeal is before the U.S. Supreme Court.
The other woman, former New Orleans police officer Antoinette Frank, saw her pending December 2008 execution for a 1995 triple homicide canceled by the Louisiana Supreme Court just weeks before she would have received a lethal injection.
In 1967, all executions nationwide were suspended pending a final decision by the U.S. Supreme Court, which ultimately struck down the death penalty. All death row inmates at that time were resentenced to life imprisonment, according to DOC records.
The state resumed executions in 1983 and switched to lethal injections in 1991.
Cain, who has led six of the seven men executed by lethal injection to their deaths, said the prison's method of execution, which offers the condemned a last meal of choice and time with families, offers dignity. He wishes more could be done for the victims and their families.
"You do what you can where you are," Cain said.
By Alison Bath
alisonbath1@gannett.com
Shreveport Times
Sunday, September 06, 2009
Monday, August 31, 2009
Senator Jim Webb on criminal justice reform:
The National Criminal Justice Commission Act of 2009 that I introduced in the Senate on March 26, 2009 will create a blue-ribbon commission to look at every aspect of our criminal justice system with an eye toward reshaping the process from top to bottom. I believe that it is time to bring together the best minds in America to confer, report, and make concrete recommendations about how we can reform the process.
Why We Urgently Need this Legislation:
With 5% of the world's population, our country now houses 25% of the world's reported prisoners.
Incarcerated drug offenders have soared 1200% since 1980.
Four times as many mentally ill people are in prisons than in mental health hospitals.
Approximately 1 million gang members reside in the U.S., many of them foreign-based; and Mexican cartels operate in 230+ communities across the country.
Post-incarceration re-entry programs are haphazard and often nonexistent, undermining public safety and making it extremely difficult for ex-offenders to become full, contributing members of society.
America's criminal justice system has deteriorated to the point that it is a national disgrace. Its irregularities and inequities cut against the notion that we are a society founded on fundamental fairness. Our failure to address this problem has caused the nation's prisons to burst their seams with massive overcrowding, even as our neighborhoods have become more dangerous. We are wasting billions of dollars and diminishing millions of lives.
We need to fix the system. Doing so will require a major nationwide recalculation of who goes to prison and for how long and of how we address the long-term consequences of incarceration.
Why We Urgently Need this Legislation:
With 5% of the world's population, our country now houses 25% of the world's reported prisoners.
Incarcerated drug offenders have soared 1200% since 1980.
Four times as many mentally ill people are in prisons than in mental health hospitals.
Approximately 1 million gang members reside in the U.S., many of them foreign-based; and Mexican cartels operate in 230+ communities across the country.
Post-incarceration re-entry programs are haphazard and often nonexistent, undermining public safety and making it extremely difficult for ex-offenders to become full, contributing members of society.
America's criminal justice system has deteriorated to the point that it is a national disgrace. Its irregularities and inequities cut against the notion that we are a society founded on fundamental fairness. Our failure to address this problem has caused the nation's prisons to burst their seams with massive overcrowding, even as our neighborhoods have become more dangerous. We are wasting billions of dollars and diminishing millions of lives.
We need to fix the system. Doing so will require a major nationwide recalculation of who goes to prison and for how long and of how we address the long-term consequences of incarceration.
Saturday, August 22, 2009
A letter to Senator Nancy Detert
This past week I heard Senator Nancy Detert speak at SarasotA Tiger Bay. Following the discussion, members of Senator Detert's staff passed out a newsletter and survery to return to her. Rather than complete the survey I decided to write the Senator abour criminal justice. Here is an except from my letter.
" I thought I would write you a letter about my primary concern, which is criminal justice. I am of the opinion that our criminal justice system in Florida is in need of a complete overhaul. We need to make better decisions about imprisonment, alternative sentences, resources and procedures.
You may be aware that Senator Jim Webb has proposed formation of a national commission on criminal justice to study the federal system. This commission would include members from law enforcement, the judiciary, treatment professionals, prosecutors and defense attorneys. There will be no “scared cows” and everything would be on the table for discussion.
I would encourage you to discuss criminal justice issues with other members of the Florida Senate and see if there would be any support for a similar commission in our state. The commission would be charged with determining the goals for Florida’s criminal justice system, how to best use resources, how to compensate victims and how to rehabilitate offenders. Everything should be under consideration including capital punishment, minimum mandatory sentences, drug offender sanctions and independent forensic laboratories."
" I thought I would write you a letter about my primary concern, which is criminal justice. I am of the opinion that our criminal justice system in Florida is in need of a complete overhaul. We need to make better decisions about imprisonment, alternative sentences, resources and procedures.
You may be aware that Senator Jim Webb has proposed formation of a national commission on criminal justice to study the federal system. This commission would include members from law enforcement, the judiciary, treatment professionals, prosecutors and defense attorneys. There will be no “scared cows” and everything would be on the table for discussion.
I would encourage you to discuss criminal justice issues with other members of the Florida Senate and see if there would be any support for a similar commission in our state. The commission would be charged with determining the goals for Florida’s criminal justice system, how to best use resources, how to compensate victims and how to rehabilitate offenders. Everything should be under consideration including capital punishment, minimum mandatory sentences, drug offender sanctions and independent forensic laboratories."
Monday, August 17, 2009
Getting Smart on Crime:
After decades of supercharged incarceration rates, our bloated prison system is straining under its own weight, and policy makers are finally being forced to deal with the need to shrink it.
According to a study last year by The Pew Center on the States entitled “One in 100: Behind bars in America 2008,” the prison population of the United States has nearly quadrupled over the last 25 years while the nation’s population has grown by less than a third.
We now have more inmates per capita than any of the 36 European countries with the largest inmate populations, and our total number of inmates is more than all the inmates in those countries combined.
This comes at a cost. According to a report published last month by the Vera Institute of Justice, an independent, nonprofit research group, $1 in every $15 from states’ general funds is now spent on corrections. That doesn’t work in a recession.
Much of the rise in the prison population was because of draconian mandatory sentencing laws that are illogical — sociologically and economically.
On the sociological side, as the criminal justice expert Joel Dvoskin of the University of Arizona explained to me, data overwhelmingly support the idea that locking up low-risk, nonviolent offenders makes them worse, not better.
A study from a decade ago that was published in the journal American Psychologist put it this way: “Department of corrections data show that about a fourth of those initially imprisoned for nonviolent crimes are sentenced a second time for committing a violent offense. Whatever else it reflects, this pattern highlights the possibility that prison serves to transmit violent habits and values rather than to reduce them.”
On the economic side, putting nonviolent drug offenders in rehab is cheaper than putting them in prison. A 2006 U.C.L.A. study found that California’s Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act of 2000, which allowed nonviolent drug possession offenders to go to rehab instead of prison, saved taxpayers nearly $2.50 for every $1 invested in the program. (Unfortunately, funding for the program has been gutted.)
Put them in prison and make them worse criminals, or put them in rehab, possibly make them better, and save some money. Sounds like a no-brainer.
There are encouraging signs that policy makers are moving in the right direction. Many states have moved to repeal mandatory minimums, and there is a bill in Congress to repeal federal mandatory sentencing. Furthermore, Attorney General Eric Holder seems to be thinking about this issue the right way. Speaking to the American Bar Association last week, he said, “There is no doubt that we must be tough on crime. But we must also commit ourselves to being smart on crime. ... We need to adopt what works.”
By CHARLES M. BLOW and published in the New York Times on Saturday, August 8 2009
According to a study last year by The Pew Center on the States entitled “One in 100: Behind bars in America 2008,” the prison population of the United States has nearly quadrupled over the last 25 years while the nation’s population has grown by less than a third.
We now have more inmates per capita than any of the 36 European countries with the largest inmate populations, and our total number of inmates is more than all the inmates in those countries combined.
This comes at a cost. According to a report published last month by the Vera Institute of Justice, an independent, nonprofit research group, $1 in every $15 from states’ general funds is now spent on corrections. That doesn’t work in a recession.
Much of the rise in the prison population was because of draconian mandatory sentencing laws that are illogical — sociologically and economically.
On the sociological side, as the criminal justice expert Joel Dvoskin of the University of Arizona explained to me, data overwhelmingly support the idea that locking up low-risk, nonviolent offenders makes them worse, not better.
A study from a decade ago that was published in the journal American Psychologist put it this way: “Department of corrections data show that about a fourth of those initially imprisoned for nonviolent crimes are sentenced a second time for committing a violent offense. Whatever else it reflects, this pattern highlights the possibility that prison serves to transmit violent habits and values rather than to reduce them.”
On the economic side, putting nonviolent drug offenders in rehab is cheaper than putting them in prison. A 2006 U.C.L.A. study found that California’s Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act of 2000, which allowed nonviolent drug possession offenders to go to rehab instead of prison, saved taxpayers nearly $2.50 for every $1 invested in the program. (Unfortunately, funding for the program has been gutted.)
Put them in prison and make them worse criminals, or put them in rehab, possibly make them better, and save some money. Sounds like a no-brainer.
There are encouraging signs that policy makers are moving in the right direction. Many states have moved to repeal mandatory minimums, and there is a bill in Congress to repeal federal mandatory sentencing. Furthermore, Attorney General Eric Holder seems to be thinking about this issue the right way. Speaking to the American Bar Association last week, he said, “There is no doubt that we must be tough on crime. But we must also commit ourselves to being smart on crime. ... We need to adopt what works.”
By CHARLES M. BLOW and published in the New York Times on Saturday, August 8 2009
Sunday, August 02, 2009
Breaking Our Addiction to Prison: by General Barry McCaffrey
Our traditional justice system has been inadequate to the task of breaking the cycle of substance abuse and crime. Four out of every five offenses are committed by someone with a drug or alcohol problem; and we just keep locking them up!
In just the past 20 years alone, state prison systems have added 1 million new cells to incarcerate the 2.3 million adults now behind bars in the U.S. That's far more than any other country on the globe with 1 out of every 100 adult Americans currently serving time.1 Approximately one-half of these individuals are addicted to drugs or alcohol2 and most do not pose a serious threat to public safety.
Prison for these individuals has accomplished little to stem the tide of crime or substance abuse. Upon their release from prison, two thirds of drug abusers commit a new crime3 and virtually all relapse quickly to drug abuse.4 And yet, despite these disappointing figures national expenditures on corrections well exceed $60 billion annually.5 On average, states spend $65,000 per bed, per year to build new prisons and $23,876 per bed, per year to operate them. Despite the staggering cost to incarcerate these individuals, most return to their communities without treatment, without jobs and without hope.
Given the abysmal outcomes of incarceration on addictive behavior, there's absolutely no justification for state governments to continue to waste tax dollars feeding a situation where generational recidivism is becoming the norm and parents, children and grandparents may find themselves locked up together.
Author Judge Dennis Challeen (ret.) said it best about sending the addicted to prison:
We want them to have self-worth
So we destroy their self-worth
We want them to be responsible
So we take away all responsibility
We want them to be positive and constructive
So we degrade them and make them useless
We want them to be trustworthy
So we put them where there is no trust
We want them to be non-violent
So we put them where violence is all around them
We want them to be kind and loving people
So we subject them to hatred and cruelty
We want them to quit being the tough guy
So we put them where the tough guy is respected
We want them quit hanging around losers
So we put all the losers in the state under one roof
We want them to quit exploiting us
So we put them where they exploit each other
We want them to take control of their lives, own problems and quit being a parasite on society
So we make them totally dependent on us
An Investment Beginning to be Realized
The verdict is in on Drug Courts. It has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Drug Courts work. Drug Courts significantly reduce drug abuse and crime and do so at less expense than any other justice strategy.
That is why the historic 1994 Biden Crime Bill authorized $1 billion for the Drug Court Discretionary Grant Program, administered by the Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs. The intent of the Biden Crime Bill at the time was to expand Drug Court funding to $200 million annually by the year 2000. Unfortunately the DOJ federal appropriation has averaged only $40 million and saw its lowest level in 2006 at a mere $10 million.
The Center for Substance Abuse Treatment within the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) has also supported Drug Courts through its discretionary funding. But it, too, is drastically under-funded with a meager $10 million a year available to enhance treatment services within Drug Court programs.
That is all changing. Earlier this year, Congress approved $64 million for Drug Courts; the highest federal appropriation for the program in its 20 year history. And President Obama has plans to take the ball further up field. In the Administration's budget for 2010, there is potentially $118 million for Drug Courts.
How Much Money Is Needed?
Drug Courts need $250 million per year for the next six years--essentially as was originally envisioned in the Crime Bill -- in order to put a Drug Court within reach of the 1.2 million adult offenders who need it and to truly begin to heal America's number one social problem...addiction.
What Will be the Return on the Investment?
A $250 million annual Federal investment would reap staggering savings, with an estimated annual return of as much as $840 million in net benefits from avoided criminal justice costs alone and another 2.2 billion in savings to our communities. A $250 million annual Federal investment would also substantially reduce the demand for illicit drugs and enable state and local governments to cease over-relying on expensive and ineffective prison sentences for nonviolent, addicted offenders.
If the past is any indication of the future, state and local governments can be expected to follow suit and leverage the Federal investment several-fold. In these down-turn economic times, there is no way to be certain whether the states will be able to continue to leverage Federal dollars at a 9:1 ratio as they have done in the past. But once states began to realize cost-offsets from criminal justice and prison expenditures, state funding can be reapportioned to expand and sustain Drug Courts. Assuming even a modest 5:1 state investment, a $250 million annual Federal investment could leverage as much as $1.25 billion in state funding.
Drug Courts are just good common CENTS! For more information about Drug Courts, go to www.allrise.org.
In just the past 20 years alone, state prison systems have added 1 million new cells to incarcerate the 2.3 million adults now behind bars in the U.S. That's far more than any other country on the globe with 1 out of every 100 adult Americans currently serving time.1 Approximately one-half of these individuals are addicted to drugs or alcohol2 and most do not pose a serious threat to public safety.
Prison for these individuals has accomplished little to stem the tide of crime or substance abuse. Upon their release from prison, two thirds of drug abusers commit a new crime3 and virtually all relapse quickly to drug abuse.4 And yet, despite these disappointing figures national expenditures on corrections well exceed $60 billion annually.5 On average, states spend $65,000 per bed, per year to build new prisons and $23,876 per bed, per year to operate them. Despite the staggering cost to incarcerate these individuals, most return to their communities without treatment, without jobs and without hope.
Given the abysmal outcomes of incarceration on addictive behavior, there's absolutely no justification for state governments to continue to waste tax dollars feeding a situation where generational recidivism is becoming the norm and parents, children and grandparents may find themselves locked up together.
Author Judge Dennis Challeen (ret.) said it best about sending the addicted to prison:
We want them to have self-worth
So we destroy their self-worth
We want them to be responsible
So we take away all responsibility
We want them to be positive and constructive
So we degrade them and make them useless
We want them to be trustworthy
So we put them where there is no trust
We want them to be non-violent
So we put them where violence is all around them
We want them to be kind and loving people
So we subject them to hatred and cruelty
We want them to quit being the tough guy
So we put them where the tough guy is respected
We want them quit hanging around losers
So we put all the losers in the state under one roof
We want them to quit exploiting us
So we put them where they exploit each other
We want them to take control of their lives, own problems and quit being a parasite on society
So we make them totally dependent on us
An Investment Beginning to be Realized
The verdict is in on Drug Courts. It has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Drug Courts work. Drug Courts significantly reduce drug abuse and crime and do so at less expense than any other justice strategy.
That is why the historic 1994 Biden Crime Bill authorized $1 billion for the Drug Court Discretionary Grant Program, administered by the Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs. The intent of the Biden Crime Bill at the time was to expand Drug Court funding to $200 million annually by the year 2000. Unfortunately the DOJ federal appropriation has averaged only $40 million and saw its lowest level in 2006 at a mere $10 million.
The Center for Substance Abuse Treatment within the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) has also supported Drug Courts through its discretionary funding. But it, too, is drastically under-funded with a meager $10 million a year available to enhance treatment services within Drug Court programs.
That is all changing. Earlier this year, Congress approved $64 million for Drug Courts; the highest federal appropriation for the program in its 20 year history. And President Obama has plans to take the ball further up field. In the Administration's budget for 2010, there is potentially $118 million for Drug Courts.
How Much Money Is Needed?
Drug Courts need $250 million per year for the next six years--essentially as was originally envisioned in the Crime Bill -- in order to put a Drug Court within reach of the 1.2 million adult offenders who need it and to truly begin to heal America's number one social problem...addiction.
What Will be the Return on the Investment?
A $250 million annual Federal investment would reap staggering savings, with an estimated annual return of as much as $840 million in net benefits from avoided criminal justice costs alone and another 2.2 billion in savings to our communities. A $250 million annual Federal investment would also substantially reduce the demand for illicit drugs and enable state and local governments to cease over-relying on expensive and ineffective prison sentences for nonviolent, addicted offenders.
If the past is any indication of the future, state and local governments can be expected to follow suit and leverage the Federal investment several-fold. In these down-turn economic times, there is no way to be certain whether the states will be able to continue to leverage Federal dollars at a 9:1 ratio as they have done in the past. But once states began to realize cost-offsets from criminal justice and prison expenditures, state funding can be reapportioned to expand and sustain Drug Courts. Assuming even a modest 5:1 state investment, a $250 million annual Federal investment could leverage as much as $1.25 billion in state funding.
Drug Courts are just good common CENTS! For more information about Drug Courts, go to www.allrise.org.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
New Jails for Sarasota County? latest links
People protest possible jail locations:
http://www.sunnewspapers.net/articles/llnews.aspx?articleID=13805&bnpg=0
Community corrections center comes up empty on site selections:
http://www.pelicanpress.org/content/1233_1.php
(cut and paste links into your browser.
http://www.sunnewspapers.net/articles/llnews.aspx?articleID=13805&bnpg=0
Community corrections center comes up empty on site selections:
http://www.pelicanpress.org/content/1233_1.php
(cut and paste links into your browser.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Less crime is better than more prisons:
Something important is afoot on the topic of Florida's prisons.
A growing group of prominent Floridians is questioning whether we can just keep building more of them.
Is this group, the Coalition for Smart Justice, made up of whiny, hand-wringing, soft-on-crime liberals? No.
Here's some who have endorsed the effort:
The president of the business lobby Associated Industries of Florida; the president of Florida TaxWatch; the executive vice president of the Florida Chamber Foundation; at least one former state corrections secretary; three former Florida attorneys general; the executive director of the Florida Police Benevolent Association; the executive director of the Florida Catholic Conference.
They are among the signers of a document titled, "An Open Letter to the Governor, Legislature and People of Florida," urging the state to do more than just build. The group continues to gather more signers.
"Too many ex-offenders (are) going back to prison," the letter says, "because, while behind bars, they received little or no job training, mental health and substance abuse treatment, and the necessary life-skills tools to legitimately re-enter civil society."
About 33 percent of inmates released in Florida are back behind bars within three years. This is costing us a fortune and will cost more.
We have just over 100,000 people in prison. The budget of the Department of Corrections this year is $2.4 billion.
And if we keep zipping along, we'll need 15 or more additional prisons over the next five years (on top of the 60 we have), costing a couple of billion more in construction, not including the money to run them.
Just to be clear here:
Nobody is talking about being "soft on crime" or coddling criminals.
What they're talking about is how to make inmates less likely to commit new crimes once they get out.
Here's an example: Remember that 33 percent of released inmates go back to prison within three years. But for inmates who go through substance-abuse treatment, that figure is 6.7 percent.
The Department of Corrections also is placing a new emphasis on the concept of "re-entry," taking extra steps to prepare inmates for their return to society.
Seven Florida prisons have some sort of "faith and character-based" programs staffed by volunteer citizens, and are reporting recidivism rates below 10 percent.
"A belief in something outside themselves," is how Allison DeFoor, a former sheriff and judge turned Episcopal priest, describes the goal in a recent article in the Journal of the James Madison Institute.
"I suggest God, but it could be Allah. It could be the arts, or secular humanism, or the labor movement."
(Let's skip, for today, the question of how much business a state prison has getting involved with "faith." The point is the recidivism rate.)
The Legislature needs to consider alternatives to building prison after prison. It might save money. It might save some of us from being future victims of crime. It might even salvage some lives.
To learn more about the Coalition for Smart Justice, visit the Web site of the Collins Center for Public Policy at www.collinscenter.org.
For more on faith and character-based education in Florida's prisons: http://www.dc.state.fl.us/oth/faith/
By Howard Troxler, St. Pete Times Columnist
Published Wednesday, July 15, 2009
A growing group of prominent Floridians is questioning whether we can just keep building more of them.
Is this group, the Coalition for Smart Justice, made up of whiny, hand-wringing, soft-on-crime liberals? No.
Here's some who have endorsed the effort:
The president of the business lobby Associated Industries of Florida; the president of Florida TaxWatch; the executive vice president of the Florida Chamber Foundation; at least one former state corrections secretary; three former Florida attorneys general; the executive director of the Florida Police Benevolent Association; the executive director of the Florida Catholic Conference.
They are among the signers of a document titled, "An Open Letter to the Governor, Legislature and People of Florida," urging the state to do more than just build. The group continues to gather more signers.
"Too many ex-offenders (are) going back to prison," the letter says, "because, while behind bars, they received little or no job training, mental health and substance abuse treatment, and the necessary life-skills tools to legitimately re-enter civil society."
About 33 percent of inmates released in Florida are back behind bars within three years. This is costing us a fortune and will cost more.
We have just over 100,000 people in prison. The budget of the Department of Corrections this year is $2.4 billion.
And if we keep zipping along, we'll need 15 or more additional prisons over the next five years (on top of the 60 we have), costing a couple of billion more in construction, not including the money to run them.
Just to be clear here:
Nobody is talking about being "soft on crime" or coddling criminals.
What they're talking about is how to make inmates less likely to commit new crimes once they get out.
Here's an example: Remember that 33 percent of released inmates go back to prison within three years. But for inmates who go through substance-abuse treatment, that figure is 6.7 percent.
The Department of Corrections also is placing a new emphasis on the concept of "re-entry," taking extra steps to prepare inmates for their return to society.
Seven Florida prisons have some sort of "faith and character-based" programs staffed by volunteer citizens, and are reporting recidivism rates below 10 percent.
"A belief in something outside themselves," is how Allison DeFoor, a former sheriff and judge turned Episcopal priest, describes the goal in a recent article in the Journal of the James Madison Institute.
"I suggest God, but it could be Allah. It could be the arts, or secular humanism, or the labor movement."
(Let's skip, for today, the question of how much business a state prison has getting involved with "faith." The point is the recidivism rate.)
The Legislature needs to consider alternatives to building prison after prison. It might save money. It might save some of us from being future victims of crime. It might even salvage some lives.
To learn more about the Coalition for Smart Justice, visit the Web site of the Collins Center for Public Policy at www.collinscenter.org.
For more on faith and character-based education in Florida's prisons: http://www.dc.state.fl.us/oth/faith/
By Howard Troxler, St. Pete Times Columnist
Published Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Florida can challenge the injustice of mass incarceration
Last year Florida hit a disturbing milestone: For the first time, the state's daily prison population topped 100,000, a figure that didn't include people locked up in county jails (about 60,000) or serving probation (nearly 160,000). Florida spends more than 10 percent of its general fund on corrections, and the prison system -- which saw a building boom in the late 1990s -- is again near capacity.
Nobody suggests turning dangerous offenders loose. But a growing number of Florida leaders -- across the political spectrum -- say the state has gone too far in locking up non-violent offenders and probation violators. Gov. Crist and the Legislature should heed the message.
Last week, Crist received an open letter from key opinion makers, including three former attorneys general, the former head of Florida's prison system, the Florida Association of Counties and the Florida Catholic Conference. "A bold and serious conversation about justice reform must begin today," the letter says, pointing out that prison costs have already begun to "crowd out" other priorities such as education, economic development and human service needs.
The letter follows a missive from Associated Industries of Florida, the Florida Chamber Foundation and Florida TaxWatch -- the most powerful business lobbying groups in the state -- which said essentially the same thing: Florida can't afford to keep building prisons and filling them indiscriminately.
Collectively, these groups have formed a "Coalition for Smart Justice" recommending immediate reforms that include the creation of an advisory council (mandated by the Legislature in 2008, but never established) that would review Florida's corrections system thoroughly. The legislation -- which passed unanimously in both chambers -- demanded an investigation of mental-health and substance-abuse treatment, diversion for low-level offenders and the impacts of repeated incarceration.
The council could start by looking at effective strategies in other states. Texas made a dramatic change in its corrections policies that focused on alternatives to prison -- including electronic monitoring of probationers and the addition of 6,000 treatment beds both inside prisons and in diversion centers. As a result, that state's prison system -- which was over capacity in 2006 -- should see a slight population decline next year, authorities say. Arizona, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are among other states tackling comprehensive corrections reform, with impressive results.
But Crist and lawmakers shouldn't wait on the council, especially when meeting a pressing need: Better mental-health and substance-abuse policies. More than half of all Florida prisoners struggle with addiction or mental illness. Providing treatment alternatives to incarceration could reduce the number of people who cycle through prisons and jails on minor offenses.
Florida also needs better rehabilitation programs for offenders before they leave prison, and support afterwards. Too many inmates are discharged abruptly, lacking the education and life skills to lead successful, crime-free lives.
The state's criminal-justice policy has become too costly, in ruined lives and strained budgets alike. Reform should focus attention on incarcerating truly dangerous criminals, providing meaningful rehabilitation for the 90 percent of inmates who will eventually be released and diverting people who don't belong in prison.
An editorial published June 28, 2009 in the Daytona News Journal
Nobody suggests turning dangerous offenders loose. But a growing number of Florida leaders -- across the political spectrum -- say the state has gone too far in locking up non-violent offenders and probation violators. Gov. Crist and the Legislature should heed the message.
Last week, Crist received an open letter from key opinion makers, including three former attorneys general, the former head of Florida's prison system, the Florida Association of Counties and the Florida Catholic Conference. "A bold and serious conversation about justice reform must begin today," the letter says, pointing out that prison costs have already begun to "crowd out" other priorities such as education, economic development and human service needs.
The letter follows a missive from Associated Industries of Florida, the Florida Chamber Foundation and Florida TaxWatch -- the most powerful business lobbying groups in the state -- which said essentially the same thing: Florida can't afford to keep building prisons and filling them indiscriminately.
Collectively, these groups have formed a "Coalition for Smart Justice" recommending immediate reforms that include the creation of an advisory council (mandated by the Legislature in 2008, but never established) that would review Florida's corrections system thoroughly. The legislation -- which passed unanimously in both chambers -- demanded an investigation of mental-health and substance-abuse treatment, diversion for low-level offenders and the impacts of repeated incarceration.
The council could start by looking at effective strategies in other states. Texas made a dramatic change in its corrections policies that focused on alternatives to prison -- including electronic monitoring of probationers and the addition of 6,000 treatment beds both inside prisons and in diversion centers. As a result, that state's prison system -- which was over capacity in 2006 -- should see a slight population decline next year, authorities say. Arizona, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are among other states tackling comprehensive corrections reform, with impressive results.
But Crist and lawmakers shouldn't wait on the council, especially when meeting a pressing need: Better mental-health and substance-abuse policies. More than half of all Florida prisoners struggle with addiction or mental illness. Providing treatment alternatives to incarceration could reduce the number of people who cycle through prisons and jails on minor offenses.
Florida also needs better rehabilitation programs for offenders before they leave prison, and support afterwards. Too many inmates are discharged abruptly, lacking the education and life skills to lead successful, crime-free lives.
The state's criminal-justice policy has become too costly, in ruined lives and strained budgets alike. Reform should focus attention on incarcerating truly dangerous criminals, providing meaningful rehabilitation for the 90 percent of inmates who will eventually be released and diverting people who don't belong in prison.
An editorial published June 28, 2009 in the Daytona News Journal
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Coalition pushes for alternatives to more prisons:
A call by Florida’s most powerful business lobby to halt prison construction and reform the criminal justice system is gaining surprising traction among policy makers in the wake of a deepening budget crisis and growing evidence that building new prison beds will not reduce crime.
Four months after the head of Associated Industries of Florida stunned lawmakers with his plea to slow prison growth, a who’s-who of business, religious and political leaders are asking Gov. Charlie Crist to consider alternatives to incarceration for non-violent offenders, particularly drug addicts.
Crist and state lawmakers this week received an “open letter’’ from opinion-makers calling for a “bold and serious conversation about justice reform.”
The statement was signed by three former state attorneys general — Jim Smith, Bob Butterworth and Richard Doran — along with retired Department of Corrections secretary James McDonough and the heads of the Florida Association of Counties and the Florida Catholic Conference.
“At a time when Florida is in serious recession and facing a deep state budget crisis, the $2 billion-plus budget of the Florida Department of Corrections has grown larger; and without reform, that budget will continue to grow at a pace that crowds out other mission-critical state services such as education, human service needs, and environmental protection,” the group wrote.
Calling itself the Coalition for Smart Justice, the group is asking state leaders to bolster education, drug and alcohol treatment and faith-based and character-building programs both within the state prison system and in community settings as an alternative to prison.
Coalition members also want Crist to “immediately implement’’ a bill passed by the Legislature in 2008 that created “the much needed’’ Correctional Policy Advisory Council to offer new directions for criminal justice administration.
Staying the course, coalition members wrote, will lead to “too many non-violent individuals being incarcerated, too many prisons needing to be built at astounding public cost (and) too many young people moving from the juvenile justice system into the adult justice system.”
At the root of the state’s failures, the coalition says, is the unwillingness of lawmakers to invest in programs — such as job training, education and substance-abuse treatment — that can break the cycle of crime and reduce recidivism.
McDonough, the state’s former drug czar and prisons chief, said Florida can avoid the need to build a new $100 million prison each year by spending one-fifth that amount on drug treatment. “The math is irrefutable,” McDonough said. “That’s $100 million right there that you don’t have to spend immediately.”
That’s an assertion former Manatee sheriff Charlie Wells scoffs at, as a veteran of the debate over the effectiveness of prisons in reducing and deterring crime. Wells said he is concerned the movement to turn the state away from building new prisons will lead to the repealing of legislation he pioneered in the 1990s that mandates inmates serve at least 85 percent of their prison terms.
“I think it is a bad mistake to be flirting with the idea of cutting back building prisons under the guise of looking for ways to cut costs,” said Wells. “If we stop building prisons, overcrowding will force legislators to repeal that law, which would be a serious mistake.”
Wells said advocates of diversion programs for non-violent offenders in lieu of prison time often do not tell the whole story about offenders sentenced to prison.
“That argument has been there since I started fighting this battle. But what always gets lost in translation is the length of someone’s record who is finally is sent to prison. Someone who is going to prison for a so-called ‘minor offense’ has most likely been arrested a significant number of times,” said Wells. “So I think it is absurd to start chipping away at the most significant aspect of crime prevention, which is sentencing and punishment.”
Gretl Plessinger, DOC’s spokeswoman, said the equation is far more complicated in response to the coalition’s claims. Since the prison system runs on a five-year cycle based on “strategic projections,” the corrections agency cannot simply “stop construction on a dime.”
By CAROL MARBIN MILLER
Miami Herald
Four months after the head of Associated Industries of Florida stunned lawmakers with his plea to slow prison growth, a who’s-who of business, religious and political leaders are asking Gov. Charlie Crist to consider alternatives to incarceration for non-violent offenders, particularly drug addicts.
Crist and state lawmakers this week received an “open letter’’ from opinion-makers calling for a “bold and serious conversation about justice reform.”
The statement was signed by three former state attorneys general — Jim Smith, Bob Butterworth and Richard Doran — along with retired Department of Corrections secretary James McDonough and the heads of the Florida Association of Counties and the Florida Catholic Conference.
“At a time when Florida is in serious recession and facing a deep state budget crisis, the $2 billion-plus budget of the Florida Department of Corrections has grown larger; and without reform, that budget will continue to grow at a pace that crowds out other mission-critical state services such as education, human service needs, and environmental protection,” the group wrote.
Calling itself the Coalition for Smart Justice, the group is asking state leaders to bolster education, drug and alcohol treatment and faith-based and character-building programs both within the state prison system and in community settings as an alternative to prison.
Coalition members also want Crist to “immediately implement’’ a bill passed by the Legislature in 2008 that created “the much needed’’ Correctional Policy Advisory Council to offer new directions for criminal justice administration.
Staying the course, coalition members wrote, will lead to “too many non-violent individuals being incarcerated, too many prisons needing to be built at astounding public cost (and) too many young people moving from the juvenile justice system into the adult justice system.”
At the root of the state’s failures, the coalition says, is the unwillingness of lawmakers to invest in programs — such as job training, education and substance-abuse treatment — that can break the cycle of crime and reduce recidivism.
McDonough, the state’s former drug czar and prisons chief, said Florida can avoid the need to build a new $100 million prison each year by spending one-fifth that amount on drug treatment. “The math is irrefutable,” McDonough said. “That’s $100 million right there that you don’t have to spend immediately.”
That’s an assertion former Manatee sheriff Charlie Wells scoffs at, as a veteran of the debate over the effectiveness of prisons in reducing and deterring crime. Wells said he is concerned the movement to turn the state away from building new prisons will lead to the repealing of legislation he pioneered in the 1990s that mandates inmates serve at least 85 percent of their prison terms.
“I think it is a bad mistake to be flirting with the idea of cutting back building prisons under the guise of looking for ways to cut costs,” said Wells. “If we stop building prisons, overcrowding will force legislators to repeal that law, which would be a serious mistake.”
Wells said advocates of diversion programs for non-violent offenders in lieu of prison time often do not tell the whole story about offenders sentenced to prison.
“That argument has been there since I started fighting this battle. But what always gets lost in translation is the length of someone’s record who is finally is sent to prison. Someone who is going to prison for a so-called ‘minor offense’ has most likely been arrested a significant number of times,” said Wells. “So I think it is absurd to start chipping away at the most significant aspect of crime prevention, which is sentencing and punishment.”
Gretl Plessinger, DOC’s spokeswoman, said the equation is far more complicated in response to the coalition’s claims. Since the prison system runs on a five-year cycle based on “strategic projections,” the corrections agency cannot simply “stop construction on a dime.”
By CAROL MARBIN MILLER
Miami Herald
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Tackle prison overcrowding from the other end
The Florida Legislature passed a ''just in case'' bill that its author, Sen. Victor Crist, R-Tampa, calls a ''passive safety net,'' not a mandate. But the philosophy behind SB 1722, which becomes law July 1, is based on regressive thinking.
It would allow the corrections department to ship inmates to other states in case prison overcrowding forces early releases here.
Fund programs
This is a patchwork solution that misses the point. Florida should be fighting crime at the front end -- not shipping prisoners to be warehoused out of state.
To reduce prison beds the state has to adequately fund programs to reduce school drop-out rates and increase job-training and life-skills classes. It means counseling and access to needed services for troubled families with teens who have strayed but not fallen off the deep end yet.
It also means drug rehabilitation programs, well-resourced drug courts and mental-health counseling for teenagers. In the long run these preventive measures would save the state millions of dollars it now spends housing prisoners who could be contributing members of society.
The irony is that, until budget deficits hit this year, Florida's been on a prison-building spree even as it has cut back on programs to reduce recidivism. The 2010 state budget is the first in a long while with no money set aside for new prison construction.
Enter the private-prison lobbyists who have long urged lawmakers to imitate the 15 states that export prisoners to public and private lockups. Even though Florida's Corrections Secretary Walt McNeil isn't a proponent of sending prisoners out of state, the private-prison lobbyists prevailed in the Legislature.
Besides its regressive thinking, this bill is an example of bad public policy. As Mr. McNeil points out, one method of reducing recidivism is encouraging inmates to build ties to the community they will return to once they're released. It's detrimental to inmates' morale -- and no incentive to go straight -- to be incarcerated hundreds of miles from their families, making visitations rare.
Cutting corners
There are other concerns. The quality in private prisons is uneven, to say the least. Some private operators have been exposed for cutting corners by understaffing and chintzing on inmates' medical care. It would be impossible for Florida to monitor treatment of its inmates in a prison in, say, Tennessee.
Currently, Florida's prison population is stable at 101,000 and even a little below previous projections. The state's total bed capacity is around 106,000, so Florida probably won't be exporting prisoners any time soon. That gives state leaders time to craft a smarter, more cost-effective strategy to prevent prison overcrowding.
It's called crime prevention.
An editorial from the Miami Herald published June 13, 2009
It would allow the corrections department to ship inmates to other states in case prison overcrowding forces early releases here.
Fund programs
This is a patchwork solution that misses the point. Florida should be fighting crime at the front end -- not shipping prisoners to be warehoused out of state.
To reduce prison beds the state has to adequately fund programs to reduce school drop-out rates and increase job-training and life-skills classes. It means counseling and access to needed services for troubled families with teens who have strayed but not fallen off the deep end yet.
It also means drug rehabilitation programs, well-resourced drug courts and mental-health counseling for teenagers. In the long run these preventive measures would save the state millions of dollars it now spends housing prisoners who could be contributing members of society.
The irony is that, until budget deficits hit this year, Florida's been on a prison-building spree even as it has cut back on programs to reduce recidivism. The 2010 state budget is the first in a long while with no money set aside for new prison construction.
Enter the private-prison lobbyists who have long urged lawmakers to imitate the 15 states that export prisoners to public and private lockups. Even though Florida's Corrections Secretary Walt McNeil isn't a proponent of sending prisoners out of state, the private-prison lobbyists prevailed in the Legislature.
Besides its regressive thinking, this bill is an example of bad public policy. As Mr. McNeil points out, one method of reducing recidivism is encouraging inmates to build ties to the community they will return to once they're released. It's detrimental to inmates' morale -- and no incentive to go straight -- to be incarcerated hundreds of miles from their families, making visitations rare.
Cutting corners
There are other concerns. The quality in private prisons is uneven, to say the least. Some private operators have been exposed for cutting corners by understaffing and chintzing on inmates' medical care. It would be impossible for Florida to monitor treatment of its inmates in a prison in, say, Tennessee.
Currently, Florida's prison population is stable at 101,000 and even a little below previous projections. The state's total bed capacity is around 106,000, so Florida probably won't be exporting prisoners any time soon. That gives state leaders time to craft a smarter, more cost-effective strategy to prevent prison overcrowding.
It's called crime prevention.
An editorial from the Miami Herald published June 13, 2009
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Restoration of Rights workshop--THIS WEEKEND
Do you know someone who has lost their civil rights, including their right to vote, due to a conviction for a felony? The Sarasota branches of the NAACP and ACLU are sponsoring a restoration of rights workshop at the Selby Goodwill at 1732 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, Way, from 10 a.m -3:00 p.m. on Saturday June 13. Please help me get the word out.
OFFERING:
√ Assistance in preparing documents for re‐enfranchisement (your right to vote).
√ A road map for restoring and protecting your civil rights.
√ Direction to employment and training resources in your community.
OFFERING:
√ Assistance in preparing documents for re‐enfranchisement (your right to vote).
√ A road map for restoring and protecting your civil rights.
√ Direction to employment and training resources in your community.
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Jailing the mentally ill strains justice:
Every jailer in Florida knows the face of mental illness.
County jails throughout the state house thousands of people with serious mental conditions. Some of them can't maintain a life on the outside -- as soon as they are released, they commit a new, usually petty crime and end up back in jail. Counties pay staggering bills for psychiatric medications and treatment. They struggle to house inmates whose illnesses make them vulnerable (or in isolated cases, dangerous) in the jail's general population. And as community treatment centers close, the number of mentally ill people in prisons and jails increases, along with the burden on their families and the taxpayers who pay for fruitless rounds of arrest and incarceration.
Florida lawmakers had the opportunity this year to make a fundamental change in the way local jails and state prisons deal with people who have severe mental illness. But they fumbled, delaying action on a bill that would have created a new system for mentally ill offenders.
A study conducted by the Council of State Governments and published Monday in the journal Psychiatric Services illustrates how badly Florida leaders dropped the ball. Researchers administered psychiatric screenings to more than 20,000 inmates in five jails in Maryland and New York, concluding that 14.5 percent of men and 31 percent of women booked into county jails had at least one serious mental illness. The number includes only people with very serious afflictions such as bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and major depression -- excluding those with lesser (but often debilitating) diagnoses of anxiety disorders or other mental conditions.
The study didn't cover Florida, but the state's own numbers suggest similar concerns. According to a 2007 study, an estimated 15,000 inmates in Florida's jails on any given day have serious mental illnesses -- roughly one in four. And like the national study, the percentage of inmates with mental illness has climbed steadily in Florida.
The national study suggests several factors behind this increase. People with mental illness are more likely to be visible to police because they are less capable of controlling their behavior. They're also more likely to use illegal drugs, especially if they don't have access to treatment and psychiatric medication. The correlation between mental illness and homelessness is significant, and homeless people are far more likely to be arrested. Finally -- and this thread runs through the entire discussion -- the nation's mental-health treatment system is badly overburdened.
Many people believe the public is safer if people with mental illness are confined, even if that means imprisonment in an inappropriate setting like jail. The new study disputes that impression as well, pointing out the "weak correlation" between mental illness and violent behavior. In fact, many behavioral-health specialists believe that imprisonment increases the likelihood of violent crime, by further destabilizing people with certain mental disorders, and making them more likely perpetrators or victims of crime.
Counties are trying individually to confront the problems of mental illness in their jails. Volusia County, for example, recently hired Stewart-Marchman-Act Corp. to oversee treatment in its correctional facilities.
Still, it's not enough. The bill that failed to pass the Legislature this year would have sparked a comprehensive overhaul of Florida's criminal-justice system, setting up better community-diversion programs to keep people out of jail and creating transitions for people with mental illness who are about to be released from prison. But Gov. Charlie Crist shouldn't wait for the next legislative session -- many of the reforms the bill called for can be instituted by executive order instead, and the state Department of Children & Families can start planning others.
DCF Secretary George Sheldon says that the hundreds of millions of dollars Florida spends incarcerating people with mental illness is the "worst money we spend." It's time for a change, and Crist can help to bring it about.
Published in the Daytona News-Journal on June 7, 2009
County jails throughout the state house thousands of people with serious mental conditions. Some of them can't maintain a life on the outside -- as soon as they are released, they commit a new, usually petty crime and end up back in jail. Counties pay staggering bills for psychiatric medications and treatment. They struggle to house inmates whose illnesses make them vulnerable (or in isolated cases, dangerous) in the jail's general population. And as community treatment centers close, the number of mentally ill people in prisons and jails increases, along with the burden on their families and the taxpayers who pay for fruitless rounds of arrest and incarceration.
Florida lawmakers had the opportunity this year to make a fundamental change in the way local jails and state prisons deal with people who have severe mental illness. But they fumbled, delaying action on a bill that would have created a new system for mentally ill offenders.
A study conducted by the Council of State Governments and published Monday in the journal Psychiatric Services illustrates how badly Florida leaders dropped the ball. Researchers administered psychiatric screenings to more than 20,000 inmates in five jails in Maryland and New York, concluding that 14.5 percent of men and 31 percent of women booked into county jails had at least one serious mental illness. The number includes only people with very serious afflictions such as bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and major depression -- excluding those with lesser (but often debilitating) diagnoses of anxiety disorders or other mental conditions.
The study didn't cover Florida, but the state's own numbers suggest similar concerns. According to a 2007 study, an estimated 15,000 inmates in Florida's jails on any given day have serious mental illnesses -- roughly one in four. And like the national study, the percentage of inmates with mental illness has climbed steadily in Florida.
The national study suggests several factors behind this increase. People with mental illness are more likely to be visible to police because they are less capable of controlling their behavior. They're also more likely to use illegal drugs, especially if they don't have access to treatment and psychiatric medication. The correlation between mental illness and homelessness is significant, and homeless people are far more likely to be arrested. Finally -- and this thread runs through the entire discussion -- the nation's mental-health treatment system is badly overburdened.
Many people believe the public is safer if people with mental illness are confined, even if that means imprisonment in an inappropriate setting like jail. The new study disputes that impression as well, pointing out the "weak correlation" between mental illness and violent behavior. In fact, many behavioral-health specialists believe that imprisonment increases the likelihood of violent crime, by further destabilizing people with certain mental disorders, and making them more likely perpetrators or victims of crime.
Counties are trying individually to confront the problems of mental illness in their jails. Volusia County, for example, recently hired Stewart-Marchman-Act Corp. to oversee treatment in its correctional facilities.
Still, it's not enough. The bill that failed to pass the Legislature this year would have sparked a comprehensive overhaul of Florida's criminal-justice system, setting up better community-diversion programs to keep people out of jail and creating transitions for people with mental illness who are about to be released from prison. But Gov. Charlie Crist shouldn't wait for the next legislative session -- many of the reforms the bill called for can be instituted by executive order instead, and the state Department of Children & Families can start planning others.
DCF Secretary George Sheldon says that the hundreds of millions of dollars Florida spends incarcerating people with mental illness is the "worst money we spend." It's time for a change, and Crist can help to bring it about.
Published in the Daytona News-Journal on June 7, 2009
Thursday, June 04, 2009
A New Jail for Sarasota County?
There's been lots of jail talk these days in Sarasota County; The current jail is over capacity. Now some local leaders are trying to find the money and a place for a new one. But not everyone is on board.
From Fruitville Road to Sumter Boulevard...even Buchan Airport in Englewood. Those are just a few of the 15 or so sites submitted and being discussed by a local committee, rating possible new jail sites. "We are moving geographically around the county," says Criminal Justice Policy Holder for the county Wayne Applebee.
The group meets every other week. First criteria is government-owned land or land submitted by property owners. 30 acres are wanted. Then there is the whole location thing. "The access, the ownership, development and construction costs, environmental impacts, costs going into the future by where its location is."
Thursday, Sarasota County and city commissioners were briefed on the latest. While the whole county is being explored, it seems north county might not be the best option. "We are probably looking mid-county or south county...the North Port area," says Sarasota County Commissioner Joe Barbetta. Some North Port commissioners have said they're not opposed to the jail there.
One location many have suggested is in mid-county, off Knight's Trail, right next to the dump. It's centrally located with plenty of land. However, there was already an attempt to put a jail near there in the past, says Barbetta. "It was probably the largest planning commission ever. Over 600 people showed up when the jail was proposed. It was at least nine or ten years ago...vehement opposition."
But also Barbetta says he's not sure he wants to spend the estimated $60 million to dump inmates anywhere. "Is something wrong with our system that we keep building these monstrosity-sized jails? Is the problem deeper and is it more social service related?"
The county is also looking for land for a community corrections center. That's different than the jail. "We are in need of a smaller community corrections facility for light to medium security; Somewhere in the county, but we don't want to impact the neighborhoods."
Future site selections that might not be popular when it turns out to be in your back yard. "It's a tough problem for all communities. I just think if we put money in bricks and mortar it's not really the solution."
The current plan calls for enough room to house nearly 1,000 more inmates by the year 2035 in Sarasota County. The group searching for sites says they would like to have their top picks by the fall.
You can go to the site rating meeting for yourself. They are every other Wednesday at the Sandra Sims Terry Community Center in Laurel. The next meeting is June 17th.
As Reported by ABC Channel 7
From Fruitville Road to Sumter Boulevard...even Buchan Airport in Englewood. Those are just a few of the 15 or so sites submitted and being discussed by a local committee, rating possible new jail sites. "We are moving geographically around the county," says Criminal Justice Policy Holder for the county Wayne Applebee.
The group meets every other week. First criteria is government-owned land or land submitted by property owners. 30 acres are wanted. Then there is the whole location thing. "The access, the ownership, development and construction costs, environmental impacts, costs going into the future by where its location is."
Thursday, Sarasota County and city commissioners were briefed on the latest. While the whole county is being explored, it seems north county might not be the best option. "We are probably looking mid-county or south county...the North Port area," says Sarasota County Commissioner Joe Barbetta. Some North Port commissioners have said they're not opposed to the jail there.
One location many have suggested is in mid-county, off Knight's Trail, right next to the dump. It's centrally located with plenty of land. However, there was already an attempt to put a jail near there in the past, says Barbetta. "It was probably the largest planning commission ever. Over 600 people showed up when the jail was proposed. It was at least nine or ten years ago...vehement opposition."
But also Barbetta says he's not sure he wants to spend the estimated $60 million to dump inmates anywhere. "Is something wrong with our system that we keep building these monstrosity-sized jails? Is the problem deeper and is it more social service related?"
The county is also looking for land for a community corrections center. That's different than the jail. "We are in need of a smaller community corrections facility for light to medium security; Somewhere in the county, but we don't want to impact the neighborhoods."
Future site selections that might not be popular when it turns out to be in your back yard. "It's a tough problem for all communities. I just think if we put money in bricks and mortar it's not really the solution."
The current plan calls for enough room to house nearly 1,000 more inmates by the year 2035 in Sarasota County. The group searching for sites says they would like to have their top picks by the fall.
You can go to the site rating meeting for yourself. They are every other Wednesday at the Sandra Sims Terry Community Center in Laurel. The next meeting is June 17th.
As Reported by ABC Channel 7
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Restore Your Civil Rights
Do you know someone who has lost their civil rights, including their right to vote, due to a conviction for a felony? The Sarasota branches of the NAACP and ACLU are sponsoring a restoration of rights workshop at the Selby Goodwill at 1732 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, Way, from 10 a.m -3:00 p.m. on Saturday June 13. Please help me get the word out.
OFFERING:
√ Assistance in preparing documents for re‐enfranchisement (your right to vote).
√ A road map for restoring and protecting your civil rights.
√ Direction to employment and training resources in your community.
OFFERING:
√ Assistance in preparing documents for re‐enfranchisement (your right to vote).
√ A road map for restoring and protecting your civil rights.
√ Direction to employment and training resources in your community.
Death Penalty Consequences:
There are many ways to make the case for abolishing the death penalty in Florida.
First, consider the extra $50 million that the state spends each year on death-penalty prosecutions and appeals.
Then look at the deep flaws that the American Bar Association found with Florida's system of capital punishment -- and recognize that those legal inequities haven't been addressed in the three years since the Bar released its review.
Finally, consider the haunting probability that the state has executed innocent people -- mistakes it can never correct.
The last argument is the one that torments former Florida State Penitentiary warden Ron McAndrew, whose duties included participating in the executions (by electrocution) of three men during his tenure at the prison. In an opinion piece written for the Orlando Sentinel's online edition, McAndrew describes a gradual change of heart that culminated in a face-to-face meeting with Juan Melendez, a man who spent more than 17 years on Florida's death row before being proved innocent of a 1983 murder.
McAndrew isn't the only one to express doubts. And Melendez is not the only man to walk free: Florida leads the nation in death-row exonerations. Since 1973, 22 death-row inmates have had their convictions definitively overturned. Two other cases bring Florida's "official" roster of wrongful death sentences to 24: Frank Lee Smith was proven innocent by DNA but died in prison before his conviction could be overturned, and Sonia Jacobs walked free from death row after the case against her fell apart -- though she accepted a plea bargain, her murder conviction was dismissed.
Death-penalty proponents claim the exonerations as proof that "the system works." In actuality, they prove the opposite. Many of Florida's exonerations were only obtained after lengthy defense fights to obtain and test DNA evidence that proved someone else was guilty of a particular crime. But the first DNA exoneration didn't happen until 1993 -- and even after the technology became widely accepted, prosecutors fought hard (and often successfully) to keep DNA evidence from being tested in a contested conviction. In many cases of disputed convictions, DNA evidence either didn't exist, or has disappeared or degraded. And the system is currently set up to protect convictions, requiring extraordinary proof to even request DNA tests. It's likely that Florida has executed several innocent people, including Jesse Tafero, Jacobs' co-defendant, who was convicted on the same unreliable evidence used in her initial conviction.
The American Bar Association called for the state to create a commission to investigate potential wrongful convictions, and a separate commission that would study how Florida came to lead the nation in death-row mistakes. Thus far, lawmakers and Gov. Charlie Crist have ignored both recommendations, along with other common-sense suggestions that would force more justice on the state's death-penalty machine.
But there's one argument they might not be able to shove aside so easily. The state could save a considerable sum -- a reliable estimate suggests it's more than $50 million a year -- by converting every sentence on death row to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
That financial argument is swaying states away from capital punishment in a way that the possibility of miscarried justice never did. New York, New Mexico and New Jersey have rejected the death penalty in the last two years, citing costs. Last week, the Connecticut legislature did the same, though that bill faces a threatened veto. Maryland, Illinois and Kansas have all considered legislation that would eliminate or greatly reduce death-penalty prosecutions.
If Florida leaders won't kill the death penalty because it is wrong, they should accept that it costs too much. If they weigh that cost with a dollar sign -- rather than the moral burden of taking lives through a flawed, unjust and fallible system -- it should still tip the balance in favor of death-penalty abolition.
An editorial published by the Daytona Beach News Journal on May 28, 2009
First, consider the extra $50 million that the state spends each year on death-penalty prosecutions and appeals.
Then look at the deep flaws that the American Bar Association found with Florida's system of capital punishment -- and recognize that those legal inequities haven't been addressed in the three years since the Bar released its review.
Finally, consider the haunting probability that the state has executed innocent people -- mistakes it can never correct.
The last argument is the one that torments former Florida State Penitentiary warden Ron McAndrew, whose duties included participating in the executions (by electrocution) of three men during his tenure at the prison. In an opinion piece written for the Orlando Sentinel's online edition, McAndrew describes a gradual change of heart that culminated in a face-to-face meeting with Juan Melendez, a man who spent more than 17 years on Florida's death row before being proved innocent of a 1983 murder.
McAndrew isn't the only one to express doubts. And Melendez is not the only man to walk free: Florida leads the nation in death-row exonerations. Since 1973, 22 death-row inmates have had their convictions definitively overturned. Two other cases bring Florida's "official" roster of wrongful death sentences to 24: Frank Lee Smith was proven innocent by DNA but died in prison before his conviction could be overturned, and Sonia Jacobs walked free from death row after the case against her fell apart -- though she accepted a plea bargain, her murder conviction was dismissed.
Death-penalty proponents claim the exonerations as proof that "the system works." In actuality, they prove the opposite. Many of Florida's exonerations were only obtained after lengthy defense fights to obtain and test DNA evidence that proved someone else was guilty of a particular crime. But the first DNA exoneration didn't happen until 1993 -- and even after the technology became widely accepted, prosecutors fought hard (and often successfully) to keep DNA evidence from being tested in a contested conviction. In many cases of disputed convictions, DNA evidence either didn't exist, or has disappeared or degraded. And the system is currently set up to protect convictions, requiring extraordinary proof to even request DNA tests. It's likely that Florida has executed several innocent people, including Jesse Tafero, Jacobs' co-defendant, who was convicted on the same unreliable evidence used in her initial conviction.
The American Bar Association called for the state to create a commission to investigate potential wrongful convictions, and a separate commission that would study how Florida came to lead the nation in death-row mistakes. Thus far, lawmakers and Gov. Charlie Crist have ignored both recommendations, along with other common-sense suggestions that would force more justice on the state's death-penalty machine.
But there's one argument they might not be able to shove aside so easily. The state could save a considerable sum -- a reliable estimate suggests it's more than $50 million a year -- by converting every sentence on death row to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
That financial argument is swaying states away from capital punishment in a way that the possibility of miscarried justice never did. New York, New Mexico and New Jersey have rejected the death penalty in the last two years, citing costs. Last week, the Connecticut legislature did the same, though that bill faces a threatened veto. Maryland, Illinois and Kansas have all considered legislation that would eliminate or greatly reduce death-penalty prosecutions.
If Florida leaders won't kill the death penalty because it is wrong, they should accept that it costs too much. If they weigh that cost with a dollar sign -- rather than the moral burden of taking lives through a flawed, unjust and fallible system -- it should still tip the balance in favor of death-penalty abolition.
An editorial published by the Daytona Beach News Journal on May 28, 2009
Monday, May 25, 2009
Florida must abolish flawed death penalty:
"Capital punishment: them without the capital get the punishment." Those were the last words of John Spenkelink, executed 30 years ago today in Starke for murdering traveling companion Joseph Szymankiewicz. Spenkelink was the first person executed in the state, the second nationwide after a 1976 U.S. Supreme Court ruling reinstated capital punishment.
As a former Florida prison warden who carried out three electric-chair executions and shadowed five lethal-injection executions in Texas, I know that Spenkelink was correct: Most death-row inmates cannot afford experienced attorneys.
Once, I firmly supported capital punishment. Part of my job was to help strap prisoners into the electric chair, and signal the hooded executioner to administer the current. But each execution lessened my support. In Texas, I thought the more "civilized" executions by lethal injection would remove my repugnance. They didn't.
My change of heart was gradual and painful. At night I would awaken to visions of executed inmates sitting on the edge of my bed.
I began studying the reasons behind executions over the centuries. I was appalled to think I had been part of this ceremonial barbaric act committed to appease chest-pounding politicians attempting to appear "tough on crime."
An experience I had this January underscored my transformation. I was a speaker at the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty's conference in Pennsylvania. In the conference venue one day, a man turned to me as I approached. Shockingly, the last time I saw this gentle soul was inside a Florida death-row prison cell; I was his warden.
We embraced. It was Juan Melendez, an exoneree who had spent 17 years, eight months and one day on death row for a crime he didn't commit. As his warden, I could have taken this innocent man from his cell into the death chamber.
Melendez's case is typical for many on death row. Substandard representation and prosecutorial misconduct are among the reasons for exonerations over the years — 133 men and women since 1973. Three men were exonerated this year. Florida leads the nation in exonerations since 1973 with 22.
Race is a factor in death sentences. According to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund report "Death Row U.S.A. Winter 2009," 41.58 percent of death-row inmates nationally are African-American, although they comprise 13.5 percent of the U.S. The percentage is similar in Florida.
Since the Spenkelink execution, research revealed how capital punishment drains states' financial resources that could otherwise fund better law enforcement, crime-prevention programs, counseling and other support for murder victims' families, and reinvestigations of unsolved homicides. The cost issue figured prominently in several states' repeal bills this year, including New Mexico's, which abolished capital punishment in March. Florida executed 67 death-row inmates between 1976 and 2008 at approximately $24 million per execution.
In 30 years, Americans began realizing that capital punishment doesn't deter homicides. Florida, with 402 death-row inmates — the second-largest death-row-inmate population nationally after California's — has one of the highest murder rates nationally. The rate is 6.6 per 100,000 people, more than the average national murder rate of 5.5 people per capita and higher than the murder rate in states without the death penalty, 3.1 people per capita.
The lesson that I, and all of us, should learn post-Spenkelink is that capital punishment does not ensure public safety, and has no safeguards against wrongful executions. The 35 death-penalty states, Florida included, should abolish it, replace it with life without parole, and apply the savings where they would do the most good — helping homicide victims' survivors and funding effective law enforcement that protects our communities.
By Ron McAndrew, who spent 25 years in Florida corrections before retiring, working his way up from an entry-level corrections officer to a warden in the Florida State Penitentiary. He also served as the interim director of the Orange County jail in Orlando.
Published in the Orlando Sentinel on May 24, 2009
As a former Florida prison warden who carried out three electric-chair executions and shadowed five lethal-injection executions in Texas, I know that Spenkelink was correct: Most death-row inmates cannot afford experienced attorneys.
Once, I firmly supported capital punishment. Part of my job was to help strap prisoners into the electric chair, and signal the hooded executioner to administer the current. But each execution lessened my support. In Texas, I thought the more "civilized" executions by lethal injection would remove my repugnance. They didn't.
My change of heart was gradual and painful. At night I would awaken to visions of executed inmates sitting on the edge of my bed.
I began studying the reasons behind executions over the centuries. I was appalled to think I had been part of this ceremonial barbaric act committed to appease chest-pounding politicians attempting to appear "tough on crime."
An experience I had this January underscored my transformation. I was a speaker at the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty's conference in Pennsylvania. In the conference venue one day, a man turned to me as I approached. Shockingly, the last time I saw this gentle soul was inside a Florida death-row prison cell; I was his warden.
We embraced. It was Juan Melendez, an exoneree who had spent 17 years, eight months and one day on death row for a crime he didn't commit. As his warden, I could have taken this innocent man from his cell into the death chamber.
Melendez's case is typical for many on death row. Substandard representation and prosecutorial misconduct are among the reasons for exonerations over the years — 133 men and women since 1973. Three men were exonerated this year. Florida leads the nation in exonerations since 1973 with 22.
Race is a factor in death sentences. According to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund report "Death Row U.S.A. Winter 2009," 41.58 percent of death-row inmates nationally are African-American, although they comprise 13.5 percent of the U.S. The percentage is similar in Florida.
Since the Spenkelink execution, research revealed how capital punishment drains states' financial resources that could otherwise fund better law enforcement, crime-prevention programs, counseling and other support for murder victims' families, and reinvestigations of unsolved homicides. The cost issue figured prominently in several states' repeal bills this year, including New Mexico's, which abolished capital punishment in March. Florida executed 67 death-row inmates between 1976 and 2008 at approximately $24 million per execution.
In 30 years, Americans began realizing that capital punishment doesn't deter homicides. Florida, with 402 death-row inmates — the second-largest death-row-inmate population nationally after California's — has one of the highest murder rates nationally. The rate is 6.6 per 100,000 people, more than the average national murder rate of 5.5 people per capita and higher than the murder rate in states without the death penalty, 3.1 people per capita.
The lesson that I, and all of us, should learn post-Spenkelink is that capital punishment does not ensure public safety, and has no safeguards against wrongful executions. The 35 death-penalty states, Florida included, should abolish it, replace it with life without parole, and apply the savings where they would do the most good — helping homicide victims' survivors and funding effective law enforcement that protects our communities.
By Ron McAndrew, who spent 25 years in Florida corrections before retiring, working his way up from an entry-level corrections officer to a warden in the Florida State Penitentiary. He also served as the interim director of the Orange County jail in Orlando.
Published in the Orlando Sentinel on May 24, 2009
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
Restore Your Civil Rights
Do you know someone who has lost their civil rights, including their right to vote, due to a conviction for a felony? The Sarasota branches of the NAACP and ACLU are sponsoring a restoration of rights workshop at the Selby Goodwill at 1732 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, Way, from 10 a.m -3:00 p.m. on Saturday June 13. Please help me get the word out.
OFFERING:
√ Assistance in preparing documents for re‐enfranchisement (your right to vote).
√ A road map for restoring and protecting your civil rights.
√ Direction to employment and training resources in your community.
OFFERING:
√ Assistance in preparing documents for re‐enfranchisement (your right to vote).
√ A road map for restoring and protecting your civil rights.
√ Direction to employment and training resources in your community.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Reforms coming in Federal Sentencing?
Judge William Sessions, who was nominated Monday to be chairman of the U.S. Sentencing Commission, hopes to continue reforming federal sentencing guidelines to address prison overcrowding. "We're at a particular point in history where prisons are incredibly overcrowded," Sessions said. "We're also at a particular point in time in which there's a potential for real change."...
Options other than standard incarceration should be used more to address prison overcrowding, Sessions said. That includes drug treatment courts, placement in home confinement or community confinement, and split sentences in which part of a sentence is served in prison and part is served in the community.
Sessions also hopes to make rehabilitation a higher priority in federal sentences. "For the last 15 years there's been little interest in rehabilitation," Sessions said. Instead, punishment has been the priority. "A person commits a crime, and they get X," he said. "We're going back to, 'How do we get these people rehabilitated so when they get out of prison, they're not a danger?'"
Options other than standard incarceration should be used more to address prison overcrowding, Sessions said. That includes drug treatment courts, placement in home confinement or community confinement, and split sentences in which part of a sentence is served in prison and part is served in the community.
Sessions also hopes to make rehabilitation a higher priority in federal sentences. "For the last 15 years there's been little interest in rehabilitation," Sessions said. Instead, punishment has been the priority. "A person commits a crime, and they get X," he said. "We're going back to, 'How do we get these people rehabilitated so when they get out of prison, they're not a danger?'"
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Treat the Mentally Ill--Don't Incarcerate Them
The current system for dealing with mentally ill people who commit crimes is, by all accounts, broken. And expensive: It costs Florida taxpayers tens of millions of dollars every year.
People with schizophrenia or other mental illnesses who get arrested are sent to expensive mental health facilities, where they're stabilized for the sole purpose of appearing in court. Most get released on time served, only to get sick again for lack of medication and treatment. They commit more crimes, and the process starts all over.
Florida spends $140,000 for each of 1,700 of these mental health beds, for a total of $250 million every year. That represents a third of all mental health funding in Florida.
"It's the worst money we spend," said Department of Children and Families Secretary George Sheldon.
Miami-Dade Judge Steven Leifman, tapped by the Florida Supreme Court to help reduce the number of mentally ill in Florida's corrections system, calls it "the insanity of all insanities."
Now, nearly three years after Pinellas-Pasco Public Defender Bob Dillinger sued the DCF over its lack of mental health beds for criminals, the Legislature is close to overhauling Florida's treatment of the mentally ill. If the proposed legislation becomes law, Florida would become the first state to take such an innovative approach, Leifman said.
And in a recession year when saving money is at the top of lawmakers' priority list, the changes could save the state tens of millions in taxpayer dollars.
"This will save us money, and it will help these people," said the bill's sponsor, Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey. "Because they're not going to get the services they need sitting in the county jail."
The Department of Corrections, the DCF and the Agency for Heath Care Administration all support the proposal (HB7103, SB2018), which would treat and rehabilitate some of Florida's mentally ill in more comprehensive but affordable community facilities.
The latter two agencies would develop a plan for long-term services for the mentally ill who are at risk of ending up in the corrections system. A mentally ill inmate would first go to a locked facility for stabilization, then to a step-down facility that provides job skill training, drug and psychological treatment, and a case manager.
Leifman said the treatment would cost $25,000 per patient. But it would cost Florida less than that because the bill allows the state to apply for Medicaid money to pay for about two-thirds of the costs, which now have to be covered by general revenue.
The changes also would help some of the 4,000 or so people with serious mental illness who are sentenced to Florida's prisons each year. About half of those prisoners reoffend after they're released, so the new system would provide them the treatment they need to be healthy, functioning citizens.
The Pinellas-Pasco Circuit has already changed the way it deals with the mentally ill, and Sheldon considers its success a model for what the proposed statewide overhaul can achieve.
Dillinger a couple of years ago used $80,000 from the DCF to expand its jail diversion program for the mentally ill. Now in its fifth year, the program has diverted over 2,000 people from county jails into community facilities that provide housing, transportation, job transportation and therapy. The sites cost $800 a month per person, compared to $3,000 a month to house them in jail, Dillinger said.
The proposed legislation would create three pilot sites, including one in South Florida and one in Central Florida, to serve up to 1,000 people in ways similar to what Dillinger's program does.
"If you divert 1,000 people this year, you're talking about saving tens of millions of dollars," Leifman said. "This is serious bucks. And you're going to improve public safety because these people are much less likely to reoffend."
The legislation, sponsored by Fasano and Rep. William Snyder, R-Stuart, is based on recommendations issued by the Florida Supreme Court in a 2007 report that was commissioned after Dillinger sued then-DCF Secretary Lucy Hadi for not moving mentally ill jail inmates to hospitals.
"This is the most important mental health bill since the Baker Act in the 1970s," said assistant DCF Secretary Bill James. "We are talking about changing the system."
The proposal is making its way through the House and Senate, but even supportive lawmakers have expressed some concern over the costs of the pilot sites. Sheldon said the savings are worth any investment. And he said he can gradually get the pilots going by using money that would have been budgeted for new mental health beds.
"Some say, don't do something innovative in a tight budget year," Sheldon said. "I think this is the perfect time. Otherwise, this population is going to bust the bank."
an article by Shannon Colavecchio published in the St. Petersburg Times on Saturday, April 19, 2009
People with schizophrenia or other mental illnesses who get arrested are sent to expensive mental health facilities, where they're stabilized for the sole purpose of appearing in court. Most get released on time served, only to get sick again for lack of medication and treatment. They commit more crimes, and the process starts all over.
Florida spends $140,000 for each of 1,700 of these mental health beds, for a total of $250 million every year. That represents a third of all mental health funding in Florida.
"It's the worst money we spend," said Department of Children and Families Secretary George Sheldon.
Miami-Dade Judge Steven Leifman, tapped by the Florida Supreme Court to help reduce the number of mentally ill in Florida's corrections system, calls it "the insanity of all insanities."
Now, nearly three years after Pinellas-Pasco Public Defender Bob Dillinger sued the DCF over its lack of mental health beds for criminals, the Legislature is close to overhauling Florida's treatment of the mentally ill. If the proposed legislation becomes law, Florida would become the first state to take such an innovative approach, Leifman said.
And in a recession year when saving money is at the top of lawmakers' priority list, the changes could save the state tens of millions in taxpayer dollars.
"This will save us money, and it will help these people," said the bill's sponsor, Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey. "Because they're not going to get the services they need sitting in the county jail."
The Department of Corrections, the DCF and the Agency for Heath Care Administration all support the proposal (HB7103, SB2018), which would treat and rehabilitate some of Florida's mentally ill in more comprehensive but affordable community facilities.
The latter two agencies would develop a plan for long-term services for the mentally ill who are at risk of ending up in the corrections system. A mentally ill inmate would first go to a locked facility for stabilization, then to a step-down facility that provides job skill training, drug and psychological treatment, and a case manager.
Leifman said the treatment would cost $25,000 per patient. But it would cost Florida less than that because the bill allows the state to apply for Medicaid money to pay for about two-thirds of the costs, which now have to be covered by general revenue.
The changes also would help some of the 4,000 or so people with serious mental illness who are sentenced to Florida's prisons each year. About half of those prisoners reoffend after they're released, so the new system would provide them the treatment they need to be healthy, functioning citizens.
The Pinellas-Pasco Circuit has already changed the way it deals with the mentally ill, and Sheldon considers its success a model for what the proposed statewide overhaul can achieve.
Dillinger a couple of years ago used $80,000 from the DCF to expand its jail diversion program for the mentally ill. Now in its fifth year, the program has diverted over 2,000 people from county jails into community facilities that provide housing, transportation, job transportation and therapy. The sites cost $800 a month per person, compared to $3,000 a month to house them in jail, Dillinger said.
The proposed legislation would create three pilot sites, including one in South Florida and one in Central Florida, to serve up to 1,000 people in ways similar to what Dillinger's program does.
"If you divert 1,000 people this year, you're talking about saving tens of millions of dollars," Leifman said. "This is serious bucks. And you're going to improve public safety because these people are much less likely to reoffend."
The legislation, sponsored by Fasano and Rep. William Snyder, R-Stuart, is based on recommendations issued by the Florida Supreme Court in a 2007 report that was commissioned after Dillinger sued then-DCF Secretary Lucy Hadi for not moving mentally ill jail inmates to hospitals.
"This is the most important mental health bill since the Baker Act in the 1970s," said assistant DCF Secretary Bill James. "We are talking about changing the system."
The proposal is making its way through the House and Senate, but even supportive lawmakers have expressed some concern over the costs of the pilot sites. Sheldon said the savings are worth any investment. And he said he can gradually get the pilots going by using money that would have been budgeted for new mental health beds.
"Some say, don't do something innovative in a tight budget year," Sheldon said. "I think this is the perfect time. Otherwise, this population is going to bust the bank."
an article by Shannon Colavecchio published in the St. Petersburg Times on Saturday, April 19, 2009
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Debtor Prisons?
In a little-noticed trend blamed on the state's hard economic times, several courts in Florida have resurrected the de facto debtor's prison — having thousands of Floridians jailed for failing to pay assessed court fees and fines. The shortsighted plan threatens to run afoul of the U.S. Constitution. It appears to generate little additional revenue relative to the misery it causes, and it should be stopped.
A recent report by the nonprofit Brennan Center at New York University School of Law highlights the difficulty of trying to get what one researcher called "blood from stone." In Leon County's Collection Court, defendants who fail to pay their court-ordered costs and fines — often hundreds of dollars — are notified to appear at Collections Court and later arrested if they don't show. In the 12 months studied, there were 838 arrests for not appearing in court or failing to pay what was owed. Most people spent hours in jail, but some were held for a week or more.
At $53 per day of incarceration, it is an expensive way to try to collect from people who generally are struggling to meet the expenses of daily living. The center calculated that those incarcerated cost the system $62,085 to bring in $80,450 in debts.
Jail time for being broke is no way to help people get back on their feet after a run-in with the legal system. Judges should be exercising the option in state law that allows them to convert court-ordered obligations into community service. But with the Florida Legislature looking for revenue to fund the courts and other state services, judges are under pressure to wring every available penny out of those who owe.
The nonpayment problem is only likely to worsen. In Tallahassee, lawmakers are debating raising court fees and fines even further to raise general revenue for the state. Meanwhile, the state's rising unemployment rate will make it tougher for Floridians with a criminal record to find a decent job. Do we really want our jails filled with people whose only "crime" is that they are poor?
About a third of Florida counties use collections courts, but even those without them jail people for their debts. In Pinellas, Hillsborough and Hernando counties, collection agencies are used to extract the overdue fines and fees. But defendants who violate their probation by failing to pay can find themselves in jail if a judge believes they have not coughed up what they can.
Author Charles Dickens familiarized his readers with England's system of squalid debtors' prisons. Dickens' father was imprisoned in Marshalsea for debts and Dickens set Little Dorrit there. But that country saw the light in the mid 19th century and outlawed jail for debtors.
In the United States, it is unconstitutional to incarcerate someone solely for failing to pay a debt. Florida officials get around this by claiming the defendants are going to jail not for their debts but for violating a court order. That is what you would call a self-serving technicality. The truth is that Florida has enthusiastically resurrected debtors' prison. How Dickensian is that?
An editorial from the St. Petersburg Times published April 13, 2009
A recent report by the nonprofit Brennan Center at New York University School of Law highlights the difficulty of trying to get what one researcher called "blood from stone." In Leon County's Collection Court, defendants who fail to pay their court-ordered costs and fines — often hundreds of dollars — are notified to appear at Collections Court and later arrested if they don't show. In the 12 months studied, there were 838 arrests for not appearing in court or failing to pay what was owed. Most people spent hours in jail, but some were held for a week or more.
At $53 per day of incarceration, it is an expensive way to try to collect from people who generally are struggling to meet the expenses of daily living. The center calculated that those incarcerated cost the system $62,085 to bring in $80,450 in debts.
Jail time for being broke is no way to help people get back on their feet after a run-in with the legal system. Judges should be exercising the option in state law that allows them to convert court-ordered obligations into community service. But with the Florida Legislature looking for revenue to fund the courts and other state services, judges are under pressure to wring every available penny out of those who owe.
The nonpayment problem is only likely to worsen. In Tallahassee, lawmakers are debating raising court fees and fines even further to raise general revenue for the state. Meanwhile, the state's rising unemployment rate will make it tougher for Floridians with a criminal record to find a decent job. Do we really want our jails filled with people whose only "crime" is that they are poor?
About a third of Florida counties use collections courts, but even those without them jail people for their debts. In Pinellas, Hillsborough and Hernando counties, collection agencies are used to extract the overdue fines and fees. But defendants who violate their probation by failing to pay can find themselves in jail if a judge believes they have not coughed up what they can.
Author Charles Dickens familiarized his readers with England's system of squalid debtors' prisons. Dickens' father was imprisoned in Marshalsea for debts and Dickens set Little Dorrit there. But that country saw the light in the mid 19th century and outlawed jail for debtors.
In the United States, it is unconstitutional to incarcerate someone solely for failing to pay a debt. Florida officials get around this by claiming the defendants are going to jail not for their debts but for violating a court order. That is what you would call a self-serving technicality. The truth is that Florida has enthusiastically resurrected debtors' prison. How Dickensian is that?
An editorial from the St. Petersburg Times published April 13, 2009
Monday, March 23, 2009
Crime-reduction means changing attitudes and treatment
Of necessity, and with some common sense applied, Florida's way of dealing with inmates is changing.
Rather than build 19 new prisons at a cost of $100 million each over the next five years — the state's projected need — Department of Corrections Secretary Walter McNeil and other highly placed public state officials and the courts are working to change the lives of inmates through education and rehabilitation.
Their cost-saving goal is to build fewer prisons, redirect resources and be able to release those who aren't imprisoned for the most serious crimes with a far better chance of not re-offending and not returning, as about a third now do, to prison.
One avenue for change that's been proving successful here in Leon County emulates this call for change. That's the mental health court, which has for nearly three years been working to re-direct the lives of men and women who are charged with substance-abuse crimes by getting them into rehabilitation settings instead of cells.
Leon County Judge Jonathan Sjostrom told the editorial board of the Democrat on Thursday that the problem of jailing substance-abusers was becoming so undeniably large that law enforcement was first to call for relief. "They told us this is a jail, not a hospital," Mr. Sjostrum said, speaking of the Leon County Jail but knowing the situation is prevalent statewide. "But we'd found that, while there were many resources to fix things, the courtroom was an impediment," he said. Courts use a traditional criminal-justice model of dealing with offenders, he said, rather than recognizing and addressing the complex array of health problems and traumas that lead to the preponderance of drug-related crimes that crowd today's court dockets.
Legislation is being championed this session to continue this impulse to change the system. Mr. Sjostrum, as well as Dade County Judge Steven Leifman, special adviser to the Florida Supreme Court on criminal justice and mental health, are working with Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, sponsor of SB 2018, the Community Mental Health and Substance Abuse Treatment and Crime Reduction Act.
"The bill redirects resources from the criminal justice system to community-based care where people can be stabilized with medication and supports," George Sheldon, secretary of the Department of Children and Families, explained earlier this month. A national advocacy group recently gave Florida a "D" for its public mental health care system, which includes our habit of incarcerating people with mental illnesses and substance abuse problems, often on minor charges.
The evaluation by NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) was worse this year than in previous years, an indication of the steady decline in our approach to not only public safety but public wisdom.
"We need to face the fact that our current mental health system is in need of a major overhaul," said Mr. Fasano. Of some 600,000 individuals with mental illnesses in Florida, about 125,000 requiring immediate treatment are booked into jails and prisons annually and begin a downward spiral that cannot be broken with intervention and treatment.
"Fiscally we have no choice but to act," Mr. Fasano said. "Morally, this course is also the humane thing to do."
Key to the support of this bill, which enjoys bipartisan support, is that it is revenue-neutral, said Mr. Leifman. It moves money from incarceration to diversionary and rehabilitative programs such as the mental health court that being used in Leon County, and it amends the state's Medicaid plan so that 60 percent of the coordinated treatment efforts would come from federal Medicaid funds.
The legislation doesn't provide a pass for hardened criminals, said Mr. Leifman. "It is trying to decriminalize mental illness."
We urge lawmakers to support this exceptionally strong and commendable redirection of state policy.
An Editorial from the Tallahassee Democrat published March 23, 2009
Rather than build 19 new prisons at a cost of $100 million each over the next five years — the state's projected need — Department of Corrections Secretary Walter McNeil and other highly placed public state officials and the courts are working to change the lives of inmates through education and rehabilitation.
Their cost-saving goal is to build fewer prisons, redirect resources and be able to release those who aren't imprisoned for the most serious crimes with a far better chance of not re-offending and not returning, as about a third now do, to prison.
One avenue for change that's been proving successful here in Leon County emulates this call for change. That's the mental health court, which has for nearly three years been working to re-direct the lives of men and women who are charged with substance-abuse crimes by getting them into rehabilitation settings instead of cells.
Leon County Judge Jonathan Sjostrom told the editorial board of the Democrat on Thursday that the problem of jailing substance-abusers was becoming so undeniably large that law enforcement was first to call for relief. "They told us this is a jail, not a hospital," Mr. Sjostrum said, speaking of the Leon County Jail but knowing the situation is prevalent statewide. "But we'd found that, while there were many resources to fix things, the courtroom was an impediment," he said. Courts use a traditional criminal-justice model of dealing with offenders, he said, rather than recognizing and addressing the complex array of health problems and traumas that lead to the preponderance of drug-related crimes that crowd today's court dockets.
Legislation is being championed this session to continue this impulse to change the system. Mr. Sjostrum, as well as Dade County Judge Steven Leifman, special adviser to the Florida Supreme Court on criminal justice and mental health, are working with Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, sponsor of SB 2018, the Community Mental Health and Substance Abuse Treatment and Crime Reduction Act.
"The bill redirects resources from the criminal justice system to community-based care where people can be stabilized with medication and supports," George Sheldon, secretary of the Department of Children and Families, explained earlier this month. A national advocacy group recently gave Florida a "D" for its public mental health care system, which includes our habit of incarcerating people with mental illnesses and substance abuse problems, often on minor charges.
The evaluation by NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) was worse this year than in previous years, an indication of the steady decline in our approach to not only public safety but public wisdom.
"We need to face the fact that our current mental health system is in need of a major overhaul," said Mr. Fasano. Of some 600,000 individuals with mental illnesses in Florida, about 125,000 requiring immediate treatment are booked into jails and prisons annually and begin a downward spiral that cannot be broken with intervention and treatment.
"Fiscally we have no choice but to act," Mr. Fasano said. "Morally, this course is also the humane thing to do."
Key to the support of this bill, which enjoys bipartisan support, is that it is revenue-neutral, said Mr. Leifman. It moves money from incarceration to diversionary and rehabilitative programs such as the mental health court that being used in Leon County, and it amends the state's Medicaid plan so that 60 percent of the coordinated treatment efforts would come from federal Medicaid funds.
The legislation doesn't provide a pass for hardened criminals, said Mr. Leifman. "It is trying to decriminalize mental illness."
We urge lawmakers to support this exceptionally strong and commendable redirection of state policy.
An Editorial from the Tallahassee Democrat published March 23, 2009
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Dollars for Death: Executions' moral, fiscal costs burden society
The death penalty is ineffective as a deterrent to murder. Jurisdictions with capital punishment see no reduction in the rate of violent crime and the American south, where 80 percent of U.S. executions occur, has a considerably higher murder rate than the northeast, responsible for only 1 percent of American executions.
The death penalty is racially and economically biased. Murderers who kill Caucasians or can't afford private attorneys are more likely to be sentenced to death.
The death penalty creates a potential for irrevocable error. Florida leads the nation with 22 death row exonerations over the past 35 years, and it's almost a certainty that several innocent people were executed before DNA-testing technology became widespread.
The death penalty is barbaric. Most democratic countries have outlawed its use.
For a brief time, the second argument -- that the death penalty is racially biased -- convinced the U.S. Supreme Court to outlaw its practice. And the specter of executing people who were potentially innocent convinced then-Illinois Gov. George Ryan in 2003 to commute the sentences of 167 people from death to life in prison.
But none of these points has ever convinced the average American that the death penalty is barbaric or wrong. And for the most part, their elected state leaders have followed along.
One argument is making headway, however -- and it's the most venal of considerations. Last month, Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley told that state's Senate that enforcing the death penalty simply cost too much, with the average death-penalty prosecution and appeals costing three times as much as a murder case bringing a sentence of life in prison. Maryland lawmakers are seriously considering O'Malley's recommendation to drop capital punishment; Montana and New Mexico are looking at similar measures.
Shutting down death row makes financial sense. One analysis by the Palm Beach Post showed Florida spent an average of $24 million apiece for each of the 44 executions the state carried out between 1976 and 2000, and that enforcing the death penalty costs about $55 million a year.
What did the state get for that money? A heaping dose of uncertainty. Last month the state executed Wayne Tompkins, convicted of the 1983 murder of a Pinellas County teenager. But despite the fact that Tompkins' case had dragged on for more than 25 years, the state fought efforts to conduct further scientific tests that might have cast doubt on Tompkins' guilt. Attorneys for the Innocence Project of Florida, which took Tompkins' case, say they aren't even sure the bones identified as those of Lisa DeCarr have been accurately identified.
Society would have been just as safe had Tompkins been kept in prison for life. The state would have had a chance to test his conviction against the latest scientific evidence. And the state would not have spent millions to put him to death -- money that could have, instead, been allocated to more police officers to keep all Floridians safer.
In a time when Florida lawmakers are struggling with billions of dollars in budget deficits, lavishing money on an archaic, ineffective and error-prone means of punishment makes little sense. If lawmakers won't kill the death penalty because it's wrong, they should kill it because it costs too much.
An Editorial from the Daytona News-Journal Corporation. ® www.news-journalonline.com published 3/11/09
The death penalty is racially and economically biased. Murderers who kill Caucasians or can't afford private attorneys are more likely to be sentenced to death.
The death penalty creates a potential for irrevocable error. Florida leads the nation with 22 death row exonerations over the past 35 years, and it's almost a certainty that several innocent people were executed before DNA-testing technology became widespread.
The death penalty is barbaric. Most democratic countries have outlawed its use.
For a brief time, the second argument -- that the death penalty is racially biased -- convinced the U.S. Supreme Court to outlaw its practice. And the specter of executing people who were potentially innocent convinced then-Illinois Gov. George Ryan in 2003 to commute the sentences of 167 people from death to life in prison.
But none of these points has ever convinced the average American that the death penalty is barbaric or wrong. And for the most part, their elected state leaders have followed along.
One argument is making headway, however -- and it's the most venal of considerations. Last month, Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley told that state's Senate that enforcing the death penalty simply cost too much, with the average death-penalty prosecution and appeals costing three times as much as a murder case bringing a sentence of life in prison. Maryland lawmakers are seriously considering O'Malley's recommendation to drop capital punishment; Montana and New Mexico are looking at similar measures.
Shutting down death row makes financial sense. One analysis by the Palm Beach Post showed Florida spent an average of $24 million apiece for each of the 44 executions the state carried out between 1976 and 2000, and that enforcing the death penalty costs about $55 million a year.
What did the state get for that money? A heaping dose of uncertainty. Last month the state executed Wayne Tompkins, convicted of the 1983 murder of a Pinellas County teenager. But despite the fact that Tompkins' case had dragged on for more than 25 years, the state fought efforts to conduct further scientific tests that might have cast doubt on Tompkins' guilt. Attorneys for the Innocence Project of Florida, which took Tompkins' case, say they aren't even sure the bones identified as those of Lisa DeCarr have been accurately identified.
Society would have been just as safe had Tompkins been kept in prison for life. The state would have had a chance to test his conviction against the latest scientific evidence. And the state would not have spent millions to put him to death -- money that could have, instead, been allocated to more police officers to keep all Floridians safer.
In a time when Florida lawmakers are struggling with billions of dollars in budget deficits, lavishing money on an archaic, ineffective and error-prone means of punishment makes little sense. If lawmakers won't kill the death penalty because it's wrong, they should kill it because it costs too much.
An Editorial from the Daytona News-Journal Corporation. ® www.news-journalonline.com published 3/11/09
Sunday, March 08, 2009
In hard times, a hard calculus for states: Execution more costly than life in prison
After decades of moral arguments reaching biblical proportions, after long, twisted journeys to the nation's highest court and back, the death penalty may be abandoned by several states for a reason having nothing to do with right or wrong:
Money.
Turns out, it is cheaper to imprison killers for life than to execute them, according to a series of recent surveys. Tens of millions of dollars cheaper, politicians are learning, during a tumbling recession when nearly every state faces job cuts and massive deficits.
So an increasing number of them are considering abolishing capital punishment in favor of life imprisonment, not on principle but out of financial necessity.
"It's 10 times more expensive to kill them than to keep them alive," though most Americans believe the opposite, said Donald McCartin, a former California jurist known as "The Hanging Judge of Orange County" for sending nine men to death row.
Deep into retirement, he lost his faith in an eye for an eye and now speaks against it. What changed a mind so set on the ultimate punishment?
California's legendarily slow appeals system, which produces an average wait of nearly 20 years from conviction to fatal injection — the longest in the nation. Of the nine convicted killers McCartin sent to death row, only one has died. Not by execution, but from a heart attack in custody.
"Every one of my cases is bogged up in the appellate system," said McCartin, who retired in 1993 after 15 years on the bench.
"It's a waste of time and money," said the 82-year-old, self-described right-wing Republican whose sonorous voice still commands attention. "The only thing it does is prolong the agony of the victims' families."
In 2007, time and money were the reasons New Jersey became the first state to ban executions since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976.
Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine commuted the executions of 10 men to life imprisonment without parole. Legal costs were too great and produced no result, lawmakers said. After spending an estimated $4.2 million for each death sentence, the state had executed no one since 1963. Also, eliminating capital punishment eliminated the risk of executing an innocent person.
Out of 36 remaining states with the death penalty, at least eight have considered legislation this year to end it — Maryland, Nebraska, Colorado, New Mexico, Montana, New Hampshire, Washington and Kansas — an uncommon marriage between eastern liberals and western conservatives, built on economic hardship.
"This is the first time in which cost has been the prevalent issue in discussing the death penalty," said Richard Dieter, director of the Death Penalty Information Center, a data clearinghouse that favors abolition of capital punishment.
The most recent arguments against it centered on the ever-increasing number of convicts cleared by DNA evidence.
Some of the worst cases occurred in Illinois. In 2000, then-Gov. George H. Ryan placed a moratorium on executions after 13 people had been exonerated from death row for reasons including genetic testing and recanted testimony. Ryan declared the system "so fraught with error that it has come close to the ultimate nightmare, the state's taking of innocent life."
He commuted the sentences of all 167 death row convicts, most to life imprisonment without parole. His moratorium is still in effect.
Across the country, the number of prisoners exonerated and released from death row is more than 130, with thousands of appeals clogging the courts.
Death penalty trials are more expensive for several reasons: They often require extra lawyers; there are strict experience requirements for attorneys, leading to lengthy appellate waits while capable counsel is sought for the accused; security costs are higher, as well as costs for processing evidence — DNA testing, for example, is far more expensive than simple blood analyses.
After sentencing, prices continue to rise. It costs more to house death row inmates, who are held in segregated sections, in individual cells, with guards delivering everything from daily meals to toilet paper.
In California, home to the nation's biggest death row population at 667, it costs an extra $90,000 per inmate to imprison someone sentenced to death — an additional expense that totals more than $60 million annually, according to a 2008 study by the state's Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice.
The panel, which agreed with California Chief Justice Ronald M. George that the state's death penalty system was "dysfunctional," blamed exorbitant costs on delays in finding qualified public defenders, a severe backlog in appellate reviews, and a high rate of cases being overturned on constitutional grounds.
"Failures in the administration of California's death penalty law create cynicism and disrespect for the rule of law," concluded the 117-page report.
Some prominent Californians have asked Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to get rid of executions. Especially now, as service cuts and tax increases are pegged to fill a $42 billion budget hole. But it appears that the Republican governor will not abandon capital punishment anytime soon.
Meanwhile, the nationwide number of death sentences handed down has declined over the past decade, from 284 in 1999 to 111 in 2008. Reasons differ significantly, depending on who's providing them: Pro-death penalty activists say it's because crime rates have declined and execution is a strong deterrent; abolitionists say it's because jurors and judges are reluctant to risk taking a life when future scientific tests could prove the accused not guilty.
Executions, too, are dropping. There were 98 in 1999; 37 in 2008.
Still, the costs of capital punishment weigh heavily on legislators facing Solomon-like choices in these dismal economic times.
In Kansas, Republican state Sen. Caroline McGinn is pushing a bill that would repeal the death penalty effective July 1. Kansas, which voted to suspend tax refunds, faces a budget deficit of nearly $200 million. McGinn urged fellow legislators "to think outside the box" for ways to save money. According to a state survey, capital cases were 70 percent more expensive than comparable non-death penalty cases.
In New Mexico, Gov. Bill Richardson recently said his longtime support of capital punishment was wavering — and belt-tightening was one the reasons. As the state tries to plug a $450 million budget shortfall with cuts to schools and environmental agencies, a bill to end executions has already passed the House as a cost-saving measure. The state supreme court has ruled that more money must be given for public defenders in death penalty cases, but legislators have yet to act.
In Maryland, a 2008 Urban Institute study said taxpayers forked out at least $37.2 million for each of five executions since the death penalty was re-enacted in 1978. The survey, which examined 162 capital cases, found that simply seeking the death penalty added $186 million to prosecution costs. Gov. Martin O'Malley, who disdains the death penalty on moral and financial grounds, is pushing a bill to repeal it.
There are many, of course, who refuse to change their minds, believing execution is the ultimate wage of the ultimate sin. They also say that death penalty cases don't have to be so expensive.
Kent Scheidegger, legal director of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, a pro-capital-punishment group, said, "Having an effective appeals process might very well cost less."
States "calculate the cost as if these people are going to spend their whole lives on death row. We should be revamping the appeals process so that these cases move more quickly," Scheidegger said.
But court systems and their costs vary greatly among states, as does the time it takes to exhaust appeals. It's doubtful that change could come quickly enough to generate savings during this roiling recession.
"It's all about money," said McCartin, the former California judge. "The reasons I changed my mind were between that and how the victims' families just get raped during appeals."
But if convicted killers get life imprisonment instead of death, is that letting them off easy?
Not a chance, says 52-year-old Gordon "Randy" Steidl. He lived on death row and then in the general prison population, after his sentence was commuted to life. He preferred his former accommodations.
Steidl was released in 2004 after being exonerated of the 1986 stabbing deaths of a newlywed couple in Paris, Ill. He had an alibi for the night of the murders, corroborated by others. But he was convicted on eyewitness testimony provided by the town drunk and the town drug addict. Both later recanted.
The state of Illinois spent $3.5 million trying to execute him, "only to end up giving me a life sentence," Steidl said. "And then 5½ years after that, I was exonerated."
He spent 12 years in a tiny cell on death row. Then he was thrown into "gen pop," with its snarling mass of an open cellblock, where the prospect of being stabbed, raped or worse loomed constantly, alongside deafening noise and psychotic cell mates.
"If you really want to kill someone, give them life without parole," Steidl said in an even voice. He speaks of his troubled past as if it was trapped under glass or locked behind bars — visible but no longer able to torture him.
"It's worse than dying."
By DEBORAH HASTINGS
AP National Writer
6:10 PM EST, March 7 2009
Money.
Turns out, it is cheaper to imprison killers for life than to execute them, according to a series of recent surveys. Tens of millions of dollars cheaper, politicians are learning, during a tumbling recession when nearly every state faces job cuts and massive deficits.
So an increasing number of them are considering abolishing capital punishment in favor of life imprisonment, not on principle but out of financial necessity.
"It's 10 times more expensive to kill them than to keep them alive," though most Americans believe the opposite, said Donald McCartin, a former California jurist known as "The Hanging Judge of Orange County" for sending nine men to death row.
Deep into retirement, he lost his faith in an eye for an eye and now speaks against it. What changed a mind so set on the ultimate punishment?
California's legendarily slow appeals system, which produces an average wait of nearly 20 years from conviction to fatal injection — the longest in the nation. Of the nine convicted killers McCartin sent to death row, only one has died. Not by execution, but from a heart attack in custody.
"Every one of my cases is bogged up in the appellate system," said McCartin, who retired in 1993 after 15 years on the bench.
"It's a waste of time and money," said the 82-year-old, self-described right-wing Republican whose sonorous voice still commands attention. "The only thing it does is prolong the agony of the victims' families."
In 2007, time and money were the reasons New Jersey became the first state to ban executions since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976.
Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine commuted the executions of 10 men to life imprisonment without parole. Legal costs were too great and produced no result, lawmakers said. After spending an estimated $4.2 million for each death sentence, the state had executed no one since 1963. Also, eliminating capital punishment eliminated the risk of executing an innocent person.
Out of 36 remaining states with the death penalty, at least eight have considered legislation this year to end it — Maryland, Nebraska, Colorado, New Mexico, Montana, New Hampshire, Washington and Kansas — an uncommon marriage between eastern liberals and western conservatives, built on economic hardship.
"This is the first time in which cost has been the prevalent issue in discussing the death penalty," said Richard Dieter, director of the Death Penalty Information Center, a data clearinghouse that favors abolition of capital punishment.
The most recent arguments against it centered on the ever-increasing number of convicts cleared by DNA evidence.
Some of the worst cases occurred in Illinois. In 2000, then-Gov. George H. Ryan placed a moratorium on executions after 13 people had been exonerated from death row for reasons including genetic testing and recanted testimony. Ryan declared the system "so fraught with error that it has come close to the ultimate nightmare, the state's taking of innocent life."
He commuted the sentences of all 167 death row convicts, most to life imprisonment without parole. His moratorium is still in effect.
Across the country, the number of prisoners exonerated and released from death row is more than 130, with thousands of appeals clogging the courts.
Death penalty trials are more expensive for several reasons: They often require extra lawyers; there are strict experience requirements for attorneys, leading to lengthy appellate waits while capable counsel is sought for the accused; security costs are higher, as well as costs for processing evidence — DNA testing, for example, is far more expensive than simple blood analyses.
After sentencing, prices continue to rise. It costs more to house death row inmates, who are held in segregated sections, in individual cells, with guards delivering everything from daily meals to toilet paper.
In California, home to the nation's biggest death row population at 667, it costs an extra $90,000 per inmate to imprison someone sentenced to death — an additional expense that totals more than $60 million annually, according to a 2008 study by the state's Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice.
The panel, which agreed with California Chief Justice Ronald M. George that the state's death penalty system was "dysfunctional," blamed exorbitant costs on delays in finding qualified public defenders, a severe backlog in appellate reviews, and a high rate of cases being overturned on constitutional grounds.
"Failures in the administration of California's death penalty law create cynicism and disrespect for the rule of law," concluded the 117-page report.
Some prominent Californians have asked Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to get rid of executions. Especially now, as service cuts and tax increases are pegged to fill a $42 billion budget hole. But it appears that the Republican governor will not abandon capital punishment anytime soon.
Meanwhile, the nationwide number of death sentences handed down has declined over the past decade, from 284 in 1999 to 111 in 2008. Reasons differ significantly, depending on who's providing them: Pro-death penalty activists say it's because crime rates have declined and execution is a strong deterrent; abolitionists say it's because jurors and judges are reluctant to risk taking a life when future scientific tests could prove the accused not guilty.
Executions, too, are dropping. There were 98 in 1999; 37 in 2008.
Still, the costs of capital punishment weigh heavily on legislators facing Solomon-like choices in these dismal economic times.
In Kansas, Republican state Sen. Caroline McGinn is pushing a bill that would repeal the death penalty effective July 1. Kansas, which voted to suspend tax refunds, faces a budget deficit of nearly $200 million. McGinn urged fellow legislators "to think outside the box" for ways to save money. According to a state survey, capital cases were 70 percent more expensive than comparable non-death penalty cases.
In New Mexico, Gov. Bill Richardson recently said his longtime support of capital punishment was wavering — and belt-tightening was one the reasons. As the state tries to plug a $450 million budget shortfall with cuts to schools and environmental agencies, a bill to end executions has already passed the House as a cost-saving measure. The state supreme court has ruled that more money must be given for public defenders in death penalty cases, but legislators have yet to act.
In Maryland, a 2008 Urban Institute study said taxpayers forked out at least $37.2 million for each of five executions since the death penalty was re-enacted in 1978. The survey, which examined 162 capital cases, found that simply seeking the death penalty added $186 million to prosecution costs. Gov. Martin O'Malley, who disdains the death penalty on moral and financial grounds, is pushing a bill to repeal it.
There are many, of course, who refuse to change their minds, believing execution is the ultimate wage of the ultimate sin. They also say that death penalty cases don't have to be so expensive.
Kent Scheidegger, legal director of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, a pro-capital-punishment group, said, "Having an effective appeals process might very well cost less."
States "calculate the cost as if these people are going to spend their whole lives on death row. We should be revamping the appeals process so that these cases move more quickly," Scheidegger said.
But court systems and their costs vary greatly among states, as does the time it takes to exhaust appeals. It's doubtful that change could come quickly enough to generate savings during this roiling recession.
"It's all about money," said McCartin, the former California judge. "The reasons I changed my mind were between that and how the victims' families just get raped during appeals."
But if convicted killers get life imprisonment instead of death, is that letting them off easy?
Not a chance, says 52-year-old Gordon "Randy" Steidl. He lived on death row and then in the general prison population, after his sentence was commuted to life. He preferred his former accommodations.
Steidl was released in 2004 after being exonerated of the 1986 stabbing deaths of a newlywed couple in Paris, Ill. He had an alibi for the night of the murders, corroborated by others. But he was convicted on eyewitness testimony provided by the town drunk and the town drug addict. Both later recanted.
The state of Illinois spent $3.5 million trying to execute him, "only to end up giving me a life sentence," Steidl said. "And then 5½ years after that, I was exonerated."
He spent 12 years in a tiny cell on death row. Then he was thrown into "gen pop," with its snarling mass of an open cellblock, where the prospect of being stabbed, raped or worse loomed constantly, alongside deafening noise and psychotic cell mates.
"If you really want to kill someone, give them life without parole," Steidl said in an even voice. He speaks of his troubled past as if it was trapped under glass or locked behind bars — visible but no longer able to torture him.
"It's worse than dying."
By DEBORAH HASTINGS
AP National Writer
6:10 PM EST, March 7 2009
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Montana Senate Passes bill Abolishing the Death Penalty:
With a 27 to 23 vote, Montana State senators on Tuesday approved a bill that would abolish capital punishment. Montana is one of 36 states that currently has the death penalty and bill sponsor, Democrat Dave Wanzenried of Missoula, hopes that will change. His bill would replace the death penalty with life in prison without the possibility of parole.
In addressing the Senate, Wanzenried said the death penalty is costly and cumbersome, with appeals of the sentence wearing on a victim’s family.
“Life without the possibility of parole, on the other hand brings about an immediate sentence: life in prison without the possibility of parole, away from the public eye no publicity.”
Wanzenried says the death penalty is not a deterrent to murder and cited neighboring state North Dakota having a lower homicide rate with no death penalty.
Republican Dan McGee of Laurel opposes the bill and says the state needs to have an ultimate form of punishment.
“For those people who have done something so egregious in society that society has a bounded duty to take that person out of society forever.”
Republican Gary Perry of Manhattan says he’s spent his entire life believing in the death penalty.
“A sentence of life without parole with the only means of leaving the prison being a body bag and a toe tag is a life sentence, but according to God’s time table. And the only avenue to freedom is through death.”
Perry says for those who are against abortion voting for the bill shows consistency in those beliefs. Perry voted for the bill.
Montana currently has two people on death row. The bill must pass another vote before heading to the House.
Natalie Neumann is reporting from the state capitol for the University of Montana’s Legislative News Service.
In addressing the Senate, Wanzenried said the death penalty is costly and cumbersome, with appeals of the sentence wearing on a victim’s family.
“Life without the possibility of parole, on the other hand brings about an immediate sentence: life in prison without the possibility of parole, away from the public eye no publicity.”
Wanzenried says the death penalty is not a deterrent to murder and cited neighboring state North Dakota having a lower homicide rate with no death penalty.
Republican Dan McGee of Laurel opposes the bill and says the state needs to have an ultimate form of punishment.
“For those people who have done something so egregious in society that society has a bounded duty to take that person out of society forever.”
Republican Gary Perry of Manhattan says he’s spent his entire life believing in the death penalty.
“A sentence of life without parole with the only means of leaving the prison being a body bag and a toe tag is a life sentence, but according to God’s time table. And the only avenue to freedom is through death.”
Perry says for those who are against abortion voting for the bill shows consistency in those beliefs. Perry voted for the bill.
Montana currently has two people on death row. The bill must pass another vote before heading to the House.
Natalie Neumann is reporting from the state capitol for the University of Montana’s Legislative News Service.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Is it time to end the death penalty in Florida?
Florida is facing the worst budgetary crisis of our lifetime. Essential services like education, health care and law enforcement are facing tremendous cuts in the upcoming legislative session. It is estimated that each year, the State of Florida spends an extra fifty million dollars to pursue the death penalty in a small number of cases. The alternative to the death penalty under Florida law is life in prison without possibility of parole. If in these lean budget times, every governmental program is truly on the table, shouldn't we consider eliminating one of the most expensive and least effective? For further information, please go to a new web-page: http://www.sensiblesolutionsforflorida.com/index.html
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Montana Senate endorses bill to abolish death penalty
After a 90-minute, emotionally charged debate, the Republican-controlled state Senate today endorsed a bill to abolish the death penalty in Montana.
Supporters of Senate Bill 236 said the death penalty is a costly, imperfect penalty that doesn't deter crime and does more harm than good for the families of those who are horribly murdered.
"In order for punishment to be effective, it must be swift and it must be sure," said Sen. Dave Wanzenried, D-Missoula, the sponsor of SB236. "The death penalty is neither."
Opponents argued just as passionately that Montana should maintain the harshest penalty for those who commit the most heinous crimes.
"This state needs to have an ultimate form of punishment for those people who have done something that is so egregious to society that we have a bounded duty to take that person out of society," said Sen. Dan McGee, R-Laurel.
Yet by a 27-23 vote, supporters of the bill carried the day, setting up a final, binding vote Tuesday that would send the measure to the House, which is split evenly between the two parties.
Six Republicans joined 21 Democrats in the Senate for SB236, while 21 Republicans and two Democrats voted "no."
By MIKE DENNISON
Gazette State Bureau
Supporters of Senate Bill 236 said the death penalty is a costly, imperfect penalty that doesn't deter crime and does more harm than good for the families of those who are horribly murdered.
"In order for punishment to be effective, it must be swift and it must be sure," said Sen. Dave Wanzenried, D-Missoula, the sponsor of SB236. "The death penalty is neither."
Opponents argued just as passionately that Montana should maintain the harshest penalty for those who commit the most heinous crimes.
"This state needs to have an ultimate form of punishment for those people who have done something that is so egregious to society that we have a bounded duty to take that person out of society," said Sen. Dan McGee, R-Laurel.
Yet by a 27-23 vote, supporters of the bill carried the day, setting up a final, binding vote Tuesday that would send the measure to the House, which is split evenly between the two parties.
Six Republicans joined 21 Democrats in the Senate for SB236, while 21 Republicans and two Democrats voted "no."
By MIKE DENNISON
Gazette State Bureau
Thursday, February 12, 2009
New Ideas on Prisons
Florida's budget crisis may bring a modicum of reasonableness to the debate over criminal justice policy. Instead of the "tough on crime" mantra that politicians spout to win elections and that usually leads to more prison beds, suggestions are cropping up for alternatives as a way to save big bucks. These ideas are not percolating up from liberal sources alone. Some of the most ardent supporters for a more measured approach to crime and criminals include a conservative Republican lawmaker and a fiscal watchdog group.
Florida houses 100,000 inmates in prison and expects to house another 15,000 by 2014. Three new prisons are on the drawing board. This fiscal year $340 million was allocated for prison construction, and much more will be required in the years to come.
State Sen. Victor Crist, R-Tampa, is deeply concerned about the way the prisons are eating up Florida's revenues when the state has pressing priorities in education, public health and elsewhere. As chairman of the Criminal and Civil Justice Appropriations Committee, Crist's ideas would eliminate the need for thousands of prison beds. And these ideas have the added benefit of being sensible criminal justice reforms.
In "Ideas for Fiscally Responsible Justice," Crist has laid out options intended to conserve spending on corrections and reduce recidivism while not jeopardizing public safety. They include:
• Establishing an experimental diversion program at buildings vacated by the Department of Juvenile Justice to give nonviolent felons access to substance abuse programs and life-skills training.
• Giving judges discretion to sanction probation violators to more appropriate settings than a maximum security prison bed when their infractions are minor, including the option of expanded electronic monitoring.
• Creating a "community-based incarceration" program for select inmates who are serving the last year of their sentence and have successfully participated in a work-release program.
This program, Crist says, would cut in half housing costs per inmate. Offenders would live in a supervised facility in their home cities. During the day they would be electronically monitored and employed in a job they could potentially retain after release. Crist points out that the program would give soon-to-be released prisoners a way to reintegrate themselves into society, putting them near family with a way to support themselves.
These are good ideas that deserve serious attention. Crist's ideas on expanded work release are similar to those offered by Florida TaxWatch, a fiscal watchdog group that recommends doubling the capacity of work-release programs to include an additional 3,000 inmates.
The organization also has endorsed the reintroduction of "gain time" for good behavior for nonviolent offenders. That would reduce overcrowding and offer another tool to maintain order in prisons. Just these two steps alone, Florida TaxWatch says, would eliminate the need for new prisons.
Florida's budget crisis offers the state an opportunity to move beyond the "lock 'em up and throw away the key" rhetoric that has substituted for criminal justice policy for far too long. A more nuanced, pragmatic approach to nonviolent offenders of the sort that Crist and Florida TaxWatch are proposing would save money that would otherwise be spent on prisons and would provide inmates a better opportunity to stay out of trouble when they are released. Every dollar saved by building fewer prisons is a dollar that can be used to spare public education and social services from deeper spending cuts.
A St. Petersburg Times Editorial published February 12, 2009
Florida houses 100,000 inmates in prison and expects to house another 15,000 by 2014. Three new prisons are on the drawing board. This fiscal year $340 million was allocated for prison construction, and much more will be required in the years to come.
State Sen. Victor Crist, R-Tampa, is deeply concerned about the way the prisons are eating up Florida's revenues when the state has pressing priorities in education, public health and elsewhere. As chairman of the Criminal and Civil Justice Appropriations Committee, Crist's ideas would eliminate the need for thousands of prison beds. And these ideas have the added benefit of being sensible criminal justice reforms.
In "Ideas for Fiscally Responsible Justice," Crist has laid out options intended to conserve spending on corrections and reduce recidivism while not jeopardizing public safety. They include:
• Establishing an experimental diversion program at buildings vacated by the Department of Juvenile Justice to give nonviolent felons access to substance abuse programs and life-skills training.
• Giving judges discretion to sanction probation violators to more appropriate settings than a maximum security prison bed when their infractions are minor, including the option of expanded electronic monitoring.
• Creating a "community-based incarceration" program for select inmates who are serving the last year of their sentence and have successfully participated in a work-release program.
This program, Crist says, would cut in half housing costs per inmate. Offenders would live in a supervised facility in their home cities. During the day they would be electronically monitored and employed in a job they could potentially retain after release. Crist points out that the program would give soon-to-be released prisoners a way to reintegrate themselves into society, putting them near family with a way to support themselves.
These are good ideas that deserve serious attention. Crist's ideas on expanded work release are similar to those offered by Florida TaxWatch, a fiscal watchdog group that recommends doubling the capacity of work-release programs to include an additional 3,000 inmates.
The organization also has endorsed the reintroduction of "gain time" for good behavior for nonviolent offenders. That would reduce overcrowding and offer another tool to maintain order in prisons. Just these two steps alone, Florida TaxWatch says, would eliminate the need for new prisons.
Florida's budget crisis offers the state an opportunity to move beyond the "lock 'em up and throw away the key" rhetoric that has substituted for criminal justice policy for far too long. A more nuanced, pragmatic approach to nonviolent offenders of the sort that Crist and Florida TaxWatch are proposing would save money that would otherwise be spent on prisons and would provide inmates a better opportunity to stay out of trouble when they are released. Every dollar saved by building fewer prisons is a dollar that can be used to spare public education and social services from deeper spending cuts.
A St. Petersburg Times Editorial published February 12, 2009
Sunday, February 08, 2009
Singing the prison blues: Incarceration rate has direct impact on Florida Finances
Everyone in Florida government is singing the Budget Blues. But underlying the melody is a drumbeat many state leaders profess not to hear: The sound of countless prison doors slamming shut. Like it or not, the state's incarceration policies have a direct and growing impact on the current budget crisis.
AN EXPENSIVE HABIT
Florida's prison system is growing faster than that of any other state. According to a report by the Pew Charitable Trust, corrections (which includes state prisons and probation) consumed 9.3 percent of the state budget in 2007. The only states to allocate a greater portion of their budget were Oregon and Michigan.
And that only accounts for direct prison and probation spending -- it doesn't encompass increased public support for the families prisoners leave behind, or the burden on city and county governments that have to build additional jail space and employ more public-safety workers. Meanwhile, the state -- whose daily average prison population is projected to top 100,000 this year -- will need to build new facilities this year or face overcrowding. Department of Corrections Secretary Walter McNeil has requested $439.2 million in the coming budget year to add capacity.
Few people are pushing for dangerous murderers and rapists to be released. But neither can they dispute that Florida's incarceration spree occurred at a time when crime rates were actually trending downward. Florida hasn't become a more dangerous place to live, it's just become one that has become politically addicted to the idea of increasingly harsh punishments.
HANDCUFFING JUDGES
One of the more important checks against legislative excess has been hobbled. Lawmakers have significantly eroded the ability of judges to determine fair, justifiable sentences for a wide range of crimes.
Florida, like many states, adopted sentencing guidelines as a way to keep sentences relatively fair across geographic and racial lines. After sentencing guidelines passed in 1983, courts used a "score sheet" that added points for the particulars of an offense, the criminal background of an offender and other relevant considerations. The resulting score was then matched to a "guideline" range of prison and/or probation time -- but judges could depart from the guidelines if they found good reason to do so. That approach used fairness as a base line, giving judges the ability to tailor sentences to circumstances.
That changed in the mid-1990s, when the Legislature passed a series of laws aimed at stripping discretion from judges. There were "minimum mandatory" laws that demanded specific sentences for specific crimes, regardless of circumstances. Habitual offender statutes added more prison time, again taking away judges' discretion and resulting in cases like that of a burglar who received a life sentence for stealing a handful of children's videotapes.
In 1997, the Legislature erased the "ceiling" for guideline sentences; judges were not allowed to sentence a defendant to a sentence lower than the guidelines called for, but were permitted (even encouraged) to levy the statutory maximum sentence even if the guidelines called for a much lower penalty. As a result, the state could see a dramatic growth in sentencing disparity, with more politically minded judges levying unnecessarily harsh sentences in an attempt to appear tougher.
A final change -- setting zero-tolerance policies for many prisoners on probation -- has pushed thousands more people back behind bars, often for relatively minor offenses.
FINDING A SOLUTION
Restoring the intent of Florida's sentencing guidelines, and returning discretion to judges, would be a good start. The state also can ease the burden on prisons by matching offenders with programs that reduce the chances that they will commit more crimes. Specialized courts -- such as drug or mental health courts -- generally operate outside sentencing guideline requirements. And these programs work, significantly reducing the number of offenders who are rearrested.
Last month, the state Senate Criminal Justice Committee heard about other measures that could reduce prison population -- such as a controlled release program or prison diversion measures. These are worth exploring, but they would be no replacement for a careful, analytical approach to each case that a judge could offer.
Undoing these dubious reforms would restore equity to sentencing in Florida, and help restore the emphasis of the state's correctional mission -- to reform prisoners and turn them away from a life of crime -- and reducing the burden on Florida's taxpayers, who are feeding ever-increasing sums of money into a prison system that doesn't make them any safer.
By The Numbers
· 9.3 percent -- portion of Florida budget (2007) spent for corrections (prison and probation)
· 100,000 -- state's projected daily average prison population for 2009
· $439.2 million -- requested in coming budget year to add capacity
An editorial from the Daytona News Journal published February 8, 2009
AN EXPENSIVE HABIT
Florida's prison system is growing faster than that of any other state. According to a report by the Pew Charitable Trust, corrections (which includes state prisons and probation) consumed 9.3 percent of the state budget in 2007. The only states to allocate a greater portion of their budget were Oregon and Michigan.
And that only accounts for direct prison and probation spending -- it doesn't encompass increased public support for the families prisoners leave behind, or the burden on city and county governments that have to build additional jail space and employ more public-safety workers. Meanwhile, the state -- whose daily average prison population is projected to top 100,000 this year -- will need to build new facilities this year or face overcrowding. Department of Corrections Secretary Walter McNeil has requested $439.2 million in the coming budget year to add capacity.
Few people are pushing for dangerous murderers and rapists to be released. But neither can they dispute that Florida's incarceration spree occurred at a time when crime rates were actually trending downward. Florida hasn't become a more dangerous place to live, it's just become one that has become politically addicted to the idea of increasingly harsh punishments.
HANDCUFFING JUDGES
One of the more important checks against legislative excess has been hobbled. Lawmakers have significantly eroded the ability of judges to determine fair, justifiable sentences for a wide range of crimes.
Florida, like many states, adopted sentencing guidelines as a way to keep sentences relatively fair across geographic and racial lines. After sentencing guidelines passed in 1983, courts used a "score sheet" that added points for the particulars of an offense, the criminal background of an offender and other relevant considerations. The resulting score was then matched to a "guideline" range of prison and/or probation time -- but judges could depart from the guidelines if they found good reason to do so. That approach used fairness as a base line, giving judges the ability to tailor sentences to circumstances.
That changed in the mid-1990s, when the Legislature passed a series of laws aimed at stripping discretion from judges. There were "minimum mandatory" laws that demanded specific sentences for specific crimes, regardless of circumstances. Habitual offender statutes added more prison time, again taking away judges' discretion and resulting in cases like that of a burglar who received a life sentence for stealing a handful of children's videotapes.
In 1997, the Legislature erased the "ceiling" for guideline sentences; judges were not allowed to sentence a defendant to a sentence lower than the guidelines called for, but were permitted (even encouraged) to levy the statutory maximum sentence even if the guidelines called for a much lower penalty. As a result, the state could see a dramatic growth in sentencing disparity, with more politically minded judges levying unnecessarily harsh sentences in an attempt to appear tougher.
A final change -- setting zero-tolerance policies for many prisoners on probation -- has pushed thousands more people back behind bars, often for relatively minor offenses.
FINDING A SOLUTION
Restoring the intent of Florida's sentencing guidelines, and returning discretion to judges, would be a good start. The state also can ease the burden on prisons by matching offenders with programs that reduce the chances that they will commit more crimes. Specialized courts -- such as drug or mental health courts -- generally operate outside sentencing guideline requirements. And these programs work, significantly reducing the number of offenders who are rearrested.
Last month, the state Senate Criminal Justice Committee heard about other measures that could reduce prison population -- such as a controlled release program or prison diversion measures. These are worth exploring, but they would be no replacement for a careful, analytical approach to each case that a judge could offer.
Undoing these dubious reforms would restore equity to sentencing in Florida, and help restore the emphasis of the state's correctional mission -- to reform prisoners and turn them away from a life of crime -- and reducing the burden on Florida's taxpayers, who are feeding ever-increasing sums of money into a prison system that doesn't make them any safer.
By The Numbers
· 9.3 percent -- portion of Florida budget (2007) spent for corrections (prison and probation)
· 100,000 -- state's projected daily average prison population for 2009
· $439.2 million -- requested in coming budget year to add capacity
An editorial from the Daytona News Journal published February 8, 2009
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Letting Go of the Death Penalty
Most states are facing drastic cuts in vital services because of the recession. Schools, health care, and law enforcement will have to get by with less. Death penalty cases, however, stand out, demanding more money even as executions become less likely. In this economic climate, they may be a luxury we can no longer afford.
According to a recent report released by the Death Penalty Information Center, the death penalty is being used less and executions are being carried out in only a few states. Yet the costs are becoming more of an issue as the pressure to avoid the mistakes of the past has grown. There were 37 executions in 2008; 95% of them were in the South and almost half were in just one state -- Texas. Executions and death sentences have been steadily dropping throughout the current decade. But millions of taxpayer dollars have to be spent to keep the vast apparatus of capital punishment in place.
California, for example, has 670 people on death row. Each one of them costs the state about $90,000 per year over what it would cost to keep them in prison if they were condemned to permanent imprisonment instead. In total, the state is spending $138 million per year, but only executes less than one person every two years, according to a recent state commission report. In fact, it's been almost three years since the state carried out any executions. California is now planning a new death row that will cost an additional $400 million. At the same time, the state is facing an unprecedented deficit of billions of dollars and is cutting many vital services. The state commission called the death penalty system "broken," "dysfunctional," and "close to collapse." Only more expenditures, they said, could possibly save it.
Almost every state is facing a financial crisis and 36 states have the death penalty. In Maryland, a state commission heard testimony that the costs of the death penalty over the past 28 years amounted to $37 million per execution. In Florida, home to the second largest death row in the country, the cost estimates are $24 million per execution. The Los Angeles Times estimated that California spends $250 million per execution, when all the system's costs are taken into account.
There is no easy solution to this problem. Speeding up the appeals process or not paying lawyers adequate fees will end up costing states even more as trials will have to be done over a second time, or worse, result in the execution of innocent people. One hundred and thirty people have been exonerated from death row since 1973, including four in 2008. It took over 9 years on average between the conviction and the exoneration in these cases.
With all of these mistakes, the death penalty system has become slower and shows no signs speeding up. The average time between sentencing and execution increased to 12.7 years for those executed in 2007, the third year in a row in which the time has been over 12 years. For some cases in California, it took 25 years for a capital case to be completed, according to the state commission.
All of this expense and delay might be justified if there were some tangible benefit resulting from the death penalty. But for many victims' family members and representatives of law enforcement, the frustration and uncertainty of the death penalty make the option of a sentence of permanent imprisonment more reasonable. Only about 1% of the murders committed in this country result in a death sentence, and only a small percentage of those sentenced to death are ever executed many years later. Such a system makes little sense financially, or even retributively.
In the past, people were often scared into believing that the death penalty was needed to be tough on crime. Today, the death penalty is more like a bridge to nowhere--an expensive government program that does not advance the general good. It may be time to let this extravagance go.
By Richard Dieter Executive Director of the Death Penalty Information Center
This post first appeared on the Huffington Post at:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-c-dieter/letting-go-of-the-death-p_b_157597.html
According to a recent report released by the Death Penalty Information Center, the death penalty is being used less and executions are being carried out in only a few states. Yet the costs are becoming more of an issue as the pressure to avoid the mistakes of the past has grown. There were 37 executions in 2008; 95% of them were in the South and almost half were in just one state -- Texas. Executions and death sentences have been steadily dropping throughout the current decade. But millions of taxpayer dollars have to be spent to keep the vast apparatus of capital punishment in place.
California, for example, has 670 people on death row. Each one of them costs the state about $90,000 per year over what it would cost to keep them in prison if they were condemned to permanent imprisonment instead. In total, the state is spending $138 million per year, but only executes less than one person every two years, according to a recent state commission report. In fact, it's been almost three years since the state carried out any executions. California is now planning a new death row that will cost an additional $400 million. At the same time, the state is facing an unprecedented deficit of billions of dollars and is cutting many vital services. The state commission called the death penalty system "broken," "dysfunctional," and "close to collapse." Only more expenditures, they said, could possibly save it.
Almost every state is facing a financial crisis and 36 states have the death penalty. In Maryland, a state commission heard testimony that the costs of the death penalty over the past 28 years amounted to $37 million per execution. In Florida, home to the second largest death row in the country, the cost estimates are $24 million per execution. The Los Angeles Times estimated that California spends $250 million per execution, when all the system's costs are taken into account.
There is no easy solution to this problem. Speeding up the appeals process or not paying lawyers adequate fees will end up costing states even more as trials will have to be done over a second time, or worse, result in the execution of innocent people. One hundred and thirty people have been exonerated from death row since 1973, including four in 2008. It took over 9 years on average between the conviction and the exoneration in these cases.
With all of these mistakes, the death penalty system has become slower and shows no signs speeding up. The average time between sentencing and execution increased to 12.7 years for those executed in 2007, the third year in a row in which the time has been over 12 years. For some cases in California, it took 25 years for a capital case to be completed, according to the state commission.
All of this expense and delay might be justified if there were some tangible benefit resulting from the death penalty. But for many victims' family members and representatives of law enforcement, the frustration and uncertainty of the death penalty make the option of a sentence of permanent imprisonment more reasonable. Only about 1% of the murders committed in this country result in a death sentence, and only a small percentage of those sentenced to death are ever executed many years later. Such a system makes little sense financially, or even retributively.
In the past, people were often scared into believing that the death penalty was needed to be tough on crime. Today, the death penalty is more like a bridge to nowhere--an expensive government program that does not advance the general good. It may be time to let this extravagance go.
By Richard Dieter Executive Director of the Death Penalty Information Center
This post first appeared on the Huffington Post at:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-c-dieter/letting-go-of-the-death-p_b_157597.html
Monday, January 05, 2009
Know Your Rights: A Student Civil Liberties Forum
Be sure to tell your High School student to attend this important forum on Wednesday, January 7 from 3:30 -5:00, at the Selby Library. Panelists will include Sarasota Police Chief Peter Abbott, criminal defense attorney Adam Tebrugge, ACLU attorney Becky Steele, and others. Pizza will be served!
Monday, December 22, 2008
The Florida Criminal Justice System Needs Reform
That Florida's prison population has now reached 100,000 inmates is not a point of pride. It is, quite likely, a designation that should give all thoughtful people Floridians a chance to consider whether there is a way to turn things around and reduce the need to keep building more prisons.
As Department of Corrections Secretary Walt McNeil describes them, the state's 137 facilities could almost be described as having revolving doors. That's because incarceration in and of itself does not do much to change behaviors, habits or crime rates.
The emphasis has absolutely got to shift to rehabilitation programs and education that will alone or together have a chance of sending inmates back into society equipped to live self-sufficiently, without the need for larceny and worse.
"Sometime in the next 20 or 30 years, some 80,000 of those 100,000 prisoners will be coming back to our communities," the former longtime Tallahassee police chief said. "That's why we want to emphasize reentry and rehabilitation, to protect our citizens against them re-offending and preying on society."
This is, clearly, no soft-on-crime approach; it is a realistic, if not easy, way to change one riveting statistic: Of the 40,000 prisoners released each year from the state's 60 prisons, work camps, halfway houses and other lock-ups, roughly 13,000 are back in custody within three years. More than 40 percent come back into the system two and three times.
This revolving door effect, coupled with the current incarceration rates, would mean the state would need to build another 19 prisons of 1,300 inmates each over the next five years.
Taxpayers cannot afford to endlessly build prisons, nor are they really protected by this current system that almost ignores the possibility of reform, rehabilitation and life going forward.
Virtually all leaders in key state agencies, from corrections to juvenile justice to the state judiciary have expressed their support for more alternative programs for substance abusers who turn to crime, and education for those who may prey on society because they are not educated or trained to earn a legal living.
Lawmakers have $2.3 billion worth of worries on their minds, all involving how to cut the costs of government. One abundantly obvious one is to reduce the need to build prisons endlessly when there are cheaper, more effective ways to keep the public safe.
An editorial from the Tallahassee Democrat
As Department of Corrections Secretary Walt McNeil describes them, the state's 137 facilities could almost be described as having revolving doors. That's because incarceration in and of itself does not do much to change behaviors, habits or crime rates.
The emphasis has absolutely got to shift to rehabilitation programs and education that will alone or together have a chance of sending inmates back into society equipped to live self-sufficiently, without the need for larceny and worse.
"Sometime in the next 20 or 30 years, some 80,000 of those 100,000 prisoners will be coming back to our communities," the former longtime Tallahassee police chief said. "That's why we want to emphasize reentry and rehabilitation, to protect our citizens against them re-offending and preying on society."
This is, clearly, no soft-on-crime approach; it is a realistic, if not easy, way to change one riveting statistic: Of the 40,000 prisoners released each year from the state's 60 prisons, work camps, halfway houses and other lock-ups, roughly 13,000 are back in custody within three years. More than 40 percent come back into the system two and three times.
This revolving door effect, coupled with the current incarceration rates, would mean the state would need to build another 19 prisons of 1,300 inmates each over the next five years.
Taxpayers cannot afford to endlessly build prisons, nor are they really protected by this current system that almost ignores the possibility of reform, rehabilitation and life going forward.
Virtually all leaders in key state agencies, from corrections to juvenile justice to the state judiciary have expressed their support for more alternative programs for substance abusers who turn to crime, and education for those who may prey on society because they are not educated or trained to earn a legal living.
Lawmakers have $2.3 billion worth of worries on their minds, all involving how to cut the costs of government. One abundantly obvious one is to reduce the need to build prisons endlessly when there are cheaper, more effective ways to keep the public safe.
An editorial from the Tallahassee Democrat
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
It's Time to Expand Drug Court Programs
The New York Times reports that drug courts have been a successful experiment. They reduce prison populations and recidivism by substituting treatment and supervision for incarceration in prosecutions of drug offenders.
Experts say drug courts have been the country’s fastest-spreading innovation in criminal justice, giving arrested addicts a chance to avoid prison by agreeing to stringent oversight and addiction treatment. Recent studies show drug courts are one of the few initiatives that reduce recidivism — on average by 8 percent to 10 percent nationally and as high as 26 percent in New York State — and save taxpayer money.
Although there are about 2,100 drug court programs providing treatment at any given time to about 70,000 offenders, that number represents a small percentage of the addicts who are charged with drug crimes. Drug courts have high up-front costs, but they save money in the long term by keeping offenders out of prison and by reducing crime. We need more of them. [more ...]
This criticism of drug courts isn't particularly worrisome:
Some lawyers also say the courts can infringe on the rights of defendants given that offenders usually must acknowledge guilt to enter the court, or in some places have already agreed to a plea bargain and sentence. Thus an addict might opt for drug court to avoid prison or with sincere intentions of going straight, but if treatment fails and he is expelled from the program, he must serve a sentence without having seriously fought the charges. His total time in court custody, between drug court and then prison, may be longer than it would have been otherwise.
True, but defendants who go on probation and get revoked often serve more time than they would have served if they opted for a straight sentence in the first place. That alternatives to incarceration don't always work out is no reason not to provide alternatives.
Nobody compels drug defendants to enter drug court. If they have a strong defense, they should opt for a trial. If they know they can't succeed in a treatment program, they should bargain for the best sentence they can get. Drug court isn't for everyone. Defense lawyers are capable of assessing the offender and the evidence and advising a client whether drug court is right for him or her. After a thorough discussion of the risks and rewards, the defendant can make an informed choice whether to try a drug court program.
Another criticism:
Critics also worry that the courts can monopolize scarce drug-treatment slots at the expense of other addicts seeking help.
That's not an indictment of drug courts, but of the lack of adequate funding for treatment programs.
Mark Kleinman suggests a modified alternative:
Dr. Kleiman advocates a slimmed-down system that does not initially require costly treatment, as drug courts do, but simply demands that offenders stop using drugs, with the penalty of short stays in jail when they fail urine tests. Such an approach has shown promise with methamphetamine users in Hawaii, he said, and because it is far cheaper, it can be applied to far more offenders.
True addicts aren't likely to stop using drugs without treatment, and even then lapses are nearly inevitable (a fact that most drug courts recognize). On the other hand, not every person arrested for a drug crime is an addict who needs treatment to stop using drugs. For those, Kleiman's suggestion (which seems similar to probation with a condition of mandatory urine testing) makes sense.
There isn't a "one size fits all" solution to crime, but incarceration should always be a last resort, reserved for violent or incorrigible offenders. Many alternatives don't work well because they lack the resources to be effective. Studies like those cited in the Times article teach us that funding an expansion of drug court programs is change we can all believe in.
From the Blog "Talk Left"
By TChris, Section Crime Policy
Posted on Wed Oct 15, 2
Experts say drug courts have been the country’s fastest-spreading innovation in criminal justice, giving arrested addicts a chance to avoid prison by agreeing to stringent oversight and addiction treatment. Recent studies show drug courts are one of the few initiatives that reduce recidivism — on average by 8 percent to 10 percent nationally and as high as 26 percent in New York State — and save taxpayer money.
Although there are about 2,100 drug court programs providing treatment at any given time to about 70,000 offenders, that number represents a small percentage of the addicts who are charged with drug crimes. Drug courts have high up-front costs, but they save money in the long term by keeping offenders out of prison and by reducing crime. We need more of them. [more ...]
This criticism of drug courts isn't particularly worrisome:
Some lawyers also say the courts can infringe on the rights of defendants given that offenders usually must acknowledge guilt to enter the court, or in some places have already agreed to a plea bargain and sentence. Thus an addict might opt for drug court to avoid prison or with sincere intentions of going straight, but if treatment fails and he is expelled from the program, he must serve a sentence without having seriously fought the charges. His total time in court custody, between drug court and then prison, may be longer than it would have been otherwise.
True, but defendants who go on probation and get revoked often serve more time than they would have served if they opted for a straight sentence in the first place. That alternatives to incarceration don't always work out is no reason not to provide alternatives.
Nobody compels drug defendants to enter drug court. If they have a strong defense, they should opt for a trial. If they know they can't succeed in a treatment program, they should bargain for the best sentence they can get. Drug court isn't for everyone. Defense lawyers are capable of assessing the offender and the evidence and advising a client whether drug court is right for him or her. After a thorough discussion of the risks and rewards, the defendant can make an informed choice whether to try a drug court program.
Another criticism:
Critics also worry that the courts can monopolize scarce drug-treatment slots at the expense of other addicts seeking help.
That's not an indictment of drug courts, but of the lack of adequate funding for treatment programs.
Mark Kleinman suggests a modified alternative:
Dr. Kleiman advocates a slimmed-down system that does not initially require costly treatment, as drug courts do, but simply demands that offenders stop using drugs, with the penalty of short stays in jail when they fail urine tests. Such an approach has shown promise with methamphetamine users in Hawaii, he said, and because it is far cheaper, it can be applied to far more offenders.
True addicts aren't likely to stop using drugs without treatment, and even then lapses are nearly inevitable (a fact that most drug courts recognize). On the other hand, not every person arrested for a drug crime is an addict who needs treatment to stop using drugs. For those, Kleiman's suggestion (which seems similar to probation with a condition of mandatory urine testing) makes sense.
There isn't a "one size fits all" solution to crime, but incarceration should always be a last resort, reserved for violent or incorrigible offenders. Many alternatives don't work well because they lack the resources to be effective. Studies like those cited in the Times article teach us that funding an expansion of drug court programs is change we can all believe in.
From the Blog "Talk Left"
By TChris, Section Crime Policy
Posted on Wed Oct 15, 2
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