8-16-2009 National:
When felons are released from prison, what is the best way to give them back their freedom but make sure they don't commit a crime again?
Trial judges across the country are struggling with that question, particularly as they confront a rise in federal sex-offense cases, some of which involve computer downloads of illegal pornography. The debate has intensified as some judges impose what felons say are broad or arbitrary restrictions on how they live once they are freed from prison, from bans on alcohol and gambling to constraints on housing arrangements.
In 2007, Briane Woods, a single mother of one in Odessa, Texas, was convicted of distributing crack cocaine and received a 10-year prison sentence. U.S. District Judge Robert Junell in Midland, Texas, ruled that during the first five years after her release, Ms. Woods couldn't live with anyone other than a relative or spouse, restrictions that the judge said were needed to impose "stability" in her home.
Last year, an appeals court struck down that ruling, saying it deprived Ms. Woods of "her constitutional right to liberty."
The details of supervised release, which entails monitoring felons after they leave federal prison, are spelled out by judges when they issue sentences. Some defendants have successfully challenged the release terms on the grounds that they would impede rehabilitation, or by arguing that the restrictions were unrelated to the original crime.
Supervised release became standard in 1987, after Congress established new guidelines for sentencing federal felons, eliminating the possibility of early parole and imposing restrictions on released felons.
During supervised release, felons are prohibited from breaking any laws and are required to submit to drug testing. Those convicted of domestic violence or drug crimes must attend rehabilitation programs during this period. The penalty for violating these conditions can be more federal prison time.
As of September 2008, more than 95,000 convicts were serving a term of supervised release, up from 51,000 in 1997, according to the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.
Judges are allowed to impose special conditions during supervised release, as long as the conditions are related to the crime and don't cause "unnecessary deprivations" of liberty. For example, judges can forbid ex-convicts from associating with people who helped them commit crimes in the past.
In some cases, judges have barred felons from using the Internet, while others have prevented sex offenders from driving a car or said they must wear "appropriate" clothing.
Until recently, challenges to supervised release conditions were rare. Most defendants who pled guilty focused their appeals on challenging prison time, lawyers say. But that might be changing.
"I tell my clients now they need to worry just as much about the supervised release as about the sentence because it will have equally long-lasting life consequences for them," said Troy Stabenow, a federal public defender in Jefferson City, Mo.
One of Mr. Stabenow's clients, William Robert Bender, served roughly four years in prison for engaging in sexual acts with a teenager when he was 27 years old. After he was released last year, he violated the conditions of his supervised release by viewing adult pornography online, which occurred at a public library. He received an 18-month federal prison sentence.
The judge also imposed a 10-year term of supervised release during which Mr. Bender wouldn't be allowed to possess a computer or any pornography, couldn't enter a library or "frequent places where minors are known to frequent" without prior approval. On appeal, a higher court struck down those special conditions, except for the computer ban. Mr. Bender and his probation officer declined to comment.
U.S. District Judge Scott O. Wright of Kansas City, Mo., who imposed the special conditions on Mr. Bender, said in an interview that he did so at the recommendation of the local probation office. He added that he had doubts about some of the conditions at the time, and didn't disagree with the appeals court's decision.
Determining how best to rehabilitate sex offenders is difficult, Judge Wright said. "When you understand there's no cure for them, the only thing you can do is try to help them live in a somewhat normal condition."
Appeals courts that have struck down Internet bans say former convicts can't make a transition to normal life without using the Web, even at work. "Is someone going to be sent back to prison for using an iPhone?" asked Doug Berman, a law professor at Ohio State University who researches sentencing issues.
Special conditions on where and how felons live are becoming increasingly difficult to comply with, said Mr. Stabenow, the public defender. "Frankly they are often crazy," he said. "Where are you going to get a job?
Until an appeals court overturned special conditions in two cases last year, Judge Junell of the Texas district court routinely required that felons only live with family members following their release from prison.
"If you throw people back to the same structure they were in when they committed the crime, odds are they will commit the crime again," he said in an interview. After the appeals court rejected the conditions on constitutional grounds, Mr. Junell stopped the practice. ..Source.. by Amir Efrati
August 16, 2009
Courts Face Growing Battle Over Limits on Ex-Convicts
August 11, 2009
TX- Sex offender policy on parolees troubling
8-11-2009 Texas:
A case pending before U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks of Austin raises some serious concerns about the way the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles conducts business.
The board apparently has established a policy that allows corrections officials to classify some parolees as sex offenders although they have not been convicted of a sex crime.
The finding does not involve a jury or judge. It is based on a psychiatric evaluation ordered by the state and an internal finding that the parolee could pose a public safety threat.
Until June, the parolees were not given copies of the state-mandated evaluation and they and their lawyers were not allowed to attend the hearings.
That policy was modified as the case before Sparks prepared to go to trial. Still, parole officials insist there is no legal requirement for a live hearing and note that to give everyone a hearing would cost $1.7 million in additional staff, according to the Austin American-Statesman.
There are apparently about 650 parolees who have been placed under sex-offender rules without sex-crime convictions.
In the case pending before Sparks, parolee Ray Curtis Graham claims the restrictions imposed on him by state corrections officials meant he had to undergo sex-abuse therapy and barred him from becoming a minister and going to church, the Austin newspaper reports.
There have been at least three other similar lawsuits filed in Austin over the board's policy, along with more than a dozen other lawsuits across the state.
This type of policy undermines the criminal justice system and is not good public policy.
The courts are looking over this issue and several federal judges have questioned the legality of the state's policy. But it could take years in the legal system before the matter is resolved.
The parole board needs to reconsider this policy before the taxpayers are left with a huge tab for legal fees over a very questionable policy. ..Editorial.. by Express-News
August 8, 2009
MI- Kuipers wants sex offender answers
Apparently Kuipers has forgotten what political speeches have done to sex offenders in the public eye.. Time for lawmakers to wake up and take ownership of the problem....
8-8-2009 Michigan:
Parolees living in state-paid motels
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) - Why is the state paying for 60 paroled sex offenders to live in a motel that welcomes families and children?
That's one of the questions state Sen. Wayne Kuipers wants answered.
"Any rational person looking at this goes, what are you guys thinking?" said Kuipers, the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Target 8 investigators found three West Michigan motels housing paroled sex offenders on the state's tab. Sixty are living at the Grand Rapids Inn, and more than a third of them are there for crimes involving children. There are 17 at the Grand Inn on Plainfield Avenue, and another 17 at the Airport Inn in Portage.
These sex offenders are staying there -- at a cost to the state of $550 each a month -- through the Michigan Prisoner Re-entry Program, which is meant to return them to society.
At the same time, the Pure Michigan travel web site links to the Grand Rapids Inn, where children stay free.
To be sure, Kuipers, a Holland Republican, voted for the law that keeps sex offenders 1,000 feet from school property. That gives the state few choices when looking for a place to keep paroled sex offenders.
"I understand the situation that the Department of Corrections is in, I do," Kuipers told Target 8 investigators, "but I think if they spend a little bit of time exploring different housing options, they could come up with something a little more appropriate than a hotel where on the other side of a locked door, you have families and kids."
Kuipers heads the committee that has oversight of the prison system. He says DOC officials assured him they wouldn't be quick to parole sex offenders through the re-entry program.
Prison officials, he says, haven't returned his phone calls. He wants answers, he says, before calling for a hearing.
"We've been trying to get some information out of the department. They have not been very quick in responding to our calls."
Kuipers says he expects answers from prison officials by next week. Depending on what they tell him, he may call for hearings. ..Source.. by WOOD TV
July 2, 2009
MI- Mistakenly released sex offenders back in custody
Michigan is a state full of fools all working for the DOC! How difficult is it for a Parole Officer to tell a parolee, hey instead of going to Program A you will go to Program B. Instead of following a logical procedure, they reincarcerate the parolees to simply tell them the same thing, but now they have to go through all the paperwork of releasing them back into the community. Forrest Gump once said: Stupid is as stupid does.
7-2-2009 Michigan:
Parolees weren't placed in correct treatment programs
Michigan prison officials scrambled in the last week to reincarcerate 62 paroled sex offenders who were released without appropriate treatment plans in place, a Michigan Department of Corrections spokesman said today.
The inmates were released June 22-24 after completing pre-parole programming at the Mound and Ryan Correctional facilities in Detroit, but without having been assigned to continuing sex offender therapy, said MDOC spokesman Russ Marlan.
The oversight came to light last week, and all of the prisoners have been returned to custody or placed in an authorized program for parolees, he said.
The sex offender inmates, all of whom had been approved for parole, were to have been placed in one of three programs -- in-patient, out-patient or continued in a secure setting (like prison), Marlan said. But a pair of psychologists who work with the offenders at Mound and Ryan mistakenly placed them in a fourth category not authorized by the department, he said.
State Rep. Rick Jones, R-Grand Ledge, said he was “shocked” by the mistake and has urged Corrections Director Patricia Caruso to make sure it doesn’t reoccur.
Marlan said the release of paroled sex offenders was suspended while the department addresses the issue. ..Source.. by Dawson Bell • Free Press Lansing Bureau
June 30, 2009
IA- Parole officers brace for increase in sex offenders being released
6-30-2009 Iowa:
Iowa parole officers are bracing for a dramatic increase in the number of sex offenders who're under supervision after being released from prison. In 2005, the Iowa Legislature voted to require lifetime supervision for the most dangerous sex offenders and ten years of parole for those who commit lesser sex crimes. Four years later, some of those convicted under the 2005 law are being released from prison.
Sally Kreamer is director of the Department of Correctional Services for the Eighth Judicial District in southeast Iowa. She says parole officers will keep closer tabs on these sex offenders "If we don't feel like we know this client very well, we're not going to take the risk and not put them on electronic monitoring or not supervise them at a high level in the beginning...because it's one thing if you have somebody write another bad check," she says.
"It's another thing if you have somebody who goes out and hurts a child." Ron Mullen, superintendent of the Mount Pleasant Correctional Facility, says it'll mean higher case loads for parole officers, too. "I've told many of them, 'Get braced for the new type of offender you're going to be supervising because the rapist or another individual that may have discharged their sentence in prison and walked away, you're going to have them for the rest of their life,'" he says.
"That is a different type of offender than we're used to." A parole officer typically supervises between seven-hundred and eight-hundred people, but that could jump to 2,400 within five years if the state does not hire more parole officers. Mullen had been assistant director of field services in the Eighth Judicial District in southeast Iowa before his appointment as superintendent of the state prison facility in Mount Pleasant. ..Source.. by O.Kay Henderson
June 25, 2009
MI- Oakland prosecutor sues state over list of felons planned for release
6-25-2009 Michigan:
Pontiac -- The Oakland County Prosecutor's Office is suing the Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) for a list of state felons scheduled for potential early release this October.
The 27-page lawsuit, filed Wednesday in Oakland Circuit Court, said the prosecutor's office has been rebuffed several times -- both informally and pursuant to the Michigan Freedom of Information Act -- by the MDOC when it asked for a list of inmates to be interviewed in 2009 by the Parole and Commutation Board for potential early release.
In an MDOC program described as "Rightsizing Prisons," between 3,000 and 5,000 prisoners would be released by October as part of a cost-savings measure. Oakland County Prosecutor Jessica Cooper described the plan as "cost shifting" in a press release.
"While many individuals may be safely released after serving their minimum sentence, some are too dangerous to be released early," said Cooper. "When an inmate is released who has a high probability of re-offending, MDOC may be saving money out of its budget. However, the community in which the inmate has been released that bears the true costs. There are incalculable costs to a victim, the costs of a police investigation, the costs of another prosecution, the costs associated with the use of the court to obtain a new conviction."
Cooper and prosecutors Kym Worthy of Wayne County and Eric Smith of Macomb County have met with MDOC officials about concerns and their respective need to see a list of those who might be released. Oakland County is appealing the parole of Charles Raymond Feuquay, who was convicted on a no contest plea in February 1997 of two counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct. Feuquay, who assaulted, bound, terrorized and sexually abused his wife, according to the complaint, was sentenced to 15 to 30 years in prison in 1997 but is now eligible for early parole on his 15-year minimum sentence. He was granted parole on June 8.
Cooper said, "It is unfortunate that this office must resort to formal litigation to obtain this information but my duty is to protect the public."
The lawsuit has been assigned to Oakland Circuit Court Judge Nanci J. Grant. ..Source.. by Mike Martindale / The Detroit News
June 22, 2009
MI- Woman lives in fear of rapist's release from prison
Obviously the reporter tells this story to get an effect from readers; sensationalizing. It is clear that the woman is still living the horror of the crime and I wonder if she has had any therapy to help her with those feelings. Now, the reporter is at fault here because ONLY one side of a story is told, no interview with any Parole Board member to see why they would have paroled this man, obviously he met their criteria. Also, no interview with the man to see what his feelings are TODAY, it is possible his comment which has her so afraid, was said in anger BACK THEN and he may not feel that way TODAY, we do not know! Finally, Michigan has a sex offender therapy program and this article fails to tell us whether he participated. This article is a poor example of journalism as it is missing many facts necesary for one to make a reasonable decision about this man TODAY!
6-22-2009 Michigan:
Editor's note: The Daily Press & Argus is using the pseudonym Mary because the victim spoke on the condition of anonymity. Her location also is not being identified for her safety.
A woman — who was repeatedly raped by a male acquaintance who slid a knife over her body while threatening to kill her — said her rapist's expected release from prison is an example of parolees about to flood communities due to an early release plan aimed at reducing prison populations.
The woman doesn't agree with state officials who say that only nonviolent prisoners who are eligible for parole will be released. The woman, whom the Daily Press & Argus is calling Mary because she asked for anonymity, still recalls the letter her rapist wrote her 12 years ago.
"I'll see you in 15," it read, referring to what was expected to be a minimum sentence of 15 years for the violent attack.
"I fear for my safety and my life," Mary said quietly, her voice cracking as she twisted her shirt sleeve between her fingers while glancing around her home as if the devil himself sat next to her.
"I'm so angry with (the governor)," she added. "Why is she releasing violent ... rapists on the street to perpetuate crimes against women and children?"
Michigan Department of Corrections spokesman John Cordell said no inmate is being granted early release. Rather, he said, the parole board has been reviewing the estimated 12,000 inmates who have served time beyond their earliest release date. Among those, an estimated 3,500 could be granted release by the parole board.
Cordell acknowledged that the department is shrinking the prison population on a quicker timetable because of the budget crisis. He said only offenders posing the lowest risk are being paroled sooner than they might otherwise have been released.
Among those granted approval is Mary's rapist — Oakland County resident Charles R. Feuquay, who has served 12 years of his 15-year to 30-year sentence for two counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct.
On a fall night in 1996, Feuquay jumped on Mary's chest while she was in bed, wrapped her head, mouth and nose in duct tape, tied her to a bed at her Oakland County home and repeatedly raped her for more than five hours.
"I had to claw the tape away from my nose in order to breathe," Mary said, demonstrating with her hands as she spoke, her watery eyes round with fear.
State: Safety No. 1
Liz Boyd, spokeswoman for Gov. Jennifer Granholm, said the state is "not interested in releasing prisoners who pose a danger to the public." Its No. 1 priority, she said, is public safety.
"With that said, we are embarking on policies that will help us control what has become a huge budget problem for the state of Michigan," she noted.
Granholm's newly expanded parole board is releasing more inmates who have served beyond their minimum sentence.
The parole board is following recommendations from independent experts who found Michigan inmates stay in prison longer than the nationally average, despite the inmates receiving similar minimum sentences.
The prison population has fallen by 4,000 inmates since peaking at a record 51,454 in December 2006.
Officials credit the decline to more paroles and commutations, fewer felony convictions and prison intakes, more Global Positioning System monitoring, and an expanded program to keep parolees from committing new crimes.
The number of criminals entering prisons dropped 9 percent in 2008, officials said, and was down 4 percent through April of this year.
The experts are helping the state develop parole policies and recommendations on ways to control costs while maintaining public safety, Boyd said.
Mary said she thinks state officials are lying about the danger the parolees represent.
She still recalls how Feuquay bragged while raping her that he had harmed other women. She said Feuquay, whom she calls "evil," had a sleeping bag near her bed, which he said he was going to use to carry her in.
Mary said that less restrictive parole standards are "why we're seeing cases like Nevaeh (Buchanan)."
Buchanan, 5, disappeared in May from her apartment complex in Monroe. Two fishermen found her body in a hole along the River Raisin on June 4. No arrests have been made, although two "persons of interest" are convicted sex offenders who are being held in a Jackson prison pending parole revocation hearings for having associated with Nevaeh's mother, among other violations.
Parole granted
Feuquay was first eligible for parole in April and on June 8 the parole board granted him release with "no fixed date," meaning he can be released once he completes the parole placement process, which usually takes up to 30 days, Cordell said.
Feuquay is housed in a minimum-security prison — Hiawatha Correctional Facility in the Upper Peninsula town of Kincheloe, which is one of eight prisons slated to close. Feuquay had to be deemed low-risk according to a confidential psychological screening used by the department in order to be paroled, Cordell said.
Mary said she believes the 48-year-old Feuquay was granted parole earlier than usual due to Granholm's desire to reduce the prison population of 47,550 to below 45,000 by Oct. 1.
Paul Walton, deputy chief with the Oakland County prosecutor's office, could not say that the parole board's decision to release Feuquay was specifically due to budget cuts, but he did note that it is unusual for the board to grant release to a sex offender on the first try.
That view is supported by Michigan Department of Corrections statistics, which show that 74 percent of Michigan's prisoners are granted parole on the first try, while that number is significantly lower — 22 percent to 25 percent — for sex offenders.
The end result was a "significant" number of sex offenders remaining in prison, but that appears to be changing.
MDOC on new path
As a result of the higher number of sex offenders remaining in prison, the Michigan Department of Corrections has adopted alternate screening tools to evaluate sex offenders' risk to society.
Walton, who described Mary's ordeal as "a very brutal rape," said that recent policy change is a problem in the Feuquay case.
"In this case, that's one reason we are appealing — we feel his sexual assessment shows he's at risk," said Walton, who could not elaborate because the assessment is confidential. "We believe he should have been denied parole."
The Oakland County prosecutor's office is so passionate about its stance that Prosecutor Jessica Cooper will appeal the parole board's decision — a move the office hasn't made in 10 years, Walton noted.
The appeal is expected to be heard July 1 before Judge Michael Warren in 6th Circuit Court in Pontiac.
"From our perspective, it would be extremely upsetting seeing someone coming back into society with (Feuquay's) past," Oakland County Undersheriff Mike McCabe agreed.
Local law enforcement said the state is simply dumping its problems on local governments, which will have to deal with those inmates who were released too early.
"They aren't closing eight prisons and keeping the same number (of inmates)," said Livingston County prosecutor David Morse. "They are letting ... the inmates out."
Morse said the number of parole notices from the state to his office has increased four-times to five-times from previous levels. An estimated half-dozen of those inmates returning to Livingston County are committing new crimes, he said.
Morse said the state needs to recognize that the more it relaxes its standards and releases inmates early, the more crimes that will be committed by the parolees.
"It will be people in our communities being the victims of those crimes," he said. "To take a risk when it's you running the risk is one thing, but when it's someone else's risk, that's quite something else."
"You'll see more crimes committed and less people going to prison," Sheriff Bob Bezotte said. ..Source.. by Lisa Roose-Church
May 24, 2009
MI- Are savings from freeing felons worth risk to safety?
5-24-2009 Michigan:
Some fear more crime; state assures safety
A nearly 30-year-old Michigan prison policy -- roughly characterized as: "When in doubt, lock 'em up" -- is ending.
In the midst of -- and partly in response to -- the economic crisis, many of the state's expensive prison cells are being emptied.
Gov. Jennifer Granholm announced in February plans to downsize the state's prison population, by about 3,000 by Oct. 1, effectively ending an era in which policymakers built more prisons, enacted tougher sentences and hired parole board members conditioned to "just say no."
The questions are: Who are the people the state has decided don't belong in prison? Can we be comfortable with them on our streets and in our neighborhoods?
The Free Press attempted to answer the first question by looking at 318 parolees released in December under similar criteria to those being released this year. Most have committed violent acts in the past -- murder, armed robbery, rape and assault, among others. But relatively few -- 29 of the 318 as of late last week -- had gone off the tracks again. None had committed a new, violent crime in the latest months of parole.
The answer to the second question depends on whom you ask. Granholm and top corrections officials insist downsizing can be done safely if enough care is taken to manage parolees before and after their release.
Skeptics, led by the state's elected county prosecutors, doubt it will happen.
"There will be more crime," says Saginaw County Prosecutor Mike Thomas.
Free Press analysis shows risk
Ex-convicts aren't choirboys. By definition, each of the hundreds of Michigan prisoners slated for accelerated release this year under Gov. Jennifer Granholm's aggressive prison-downsizing plan is a criminal.
But neither are they psycho killers. And every one, barring death, will be back on the street.
To better understand who is being released, the Free Press analyzed the records of 318 prison inmates paroled in December after serving more than their judicially imposed minimum sentence. All were participants in the Michigan Prisoner Re-Entry Initiative, the principal tool being using by the Department of Corrections to accelerate parole.
Now in its sixth year, MPRI aims to increase the success of parolees by improving their work and life skills before release and providing more intensive supervision afterward.
Corrections officials are adamant that MPRI reduces recidivism and, in time, will make Michigan safer.
Still, MDOC Director Patricia Caruso acknowledges: "Some people will fail. We can't eliminate risk; we can only manage it."
A closer look at December's 318 delayed-release MPRI parolees helps explain why:
• More than two-thirds (218) were convicted of at least one violent felony.
• Eighteen have served time for murder; another eight committed assaults so potentially deadly that they were convicted of attempted murder.
• One in four (74 parolees) have at least five felony convictions.
• Nearly half (46%) have been paroled before and failed, 83 having committed what the department calls "technical violations," and 65 having committed new crimes.
Twenty-nine of the 318 December parolees had run afoul of the law again -- and were either back in custody or missing -- by late last week.
Prison officials said they aren't deceiving themselves about those returning to the streets.
"One hundred percent of the people we parole have a crime in their past," said Caruso, a former warden herself.
But, she adds, every one is going to be paroled eventually. The question is: when and under what conditions?
On the other hand, many Michigan prosecutors believe the department, in league with advocates for prison downsizing, have soft-pedaled the risk of returning so many of the felons to Michigan's neighborhoods.
The idea that state prisons are packed with mild-mannered, nonviolent offenders is just wrong, said Saginaw County Prosecutor Mike Thomas.
"The people who are in Michigan prisons are people we should be afraid of because they're dangerous," Thomas said.
"Judges try to keep people out of prison," said Oakland County's Prosecuting Attorney Jessica Cooper, herself a former trial and appeals court judge. "The people who get sent to prison are people who need to be sent, who need to be off the streets."
The argument that Michigan has too many people behind bars is complex, and at times contradictory.
Michigan, like almost all of the United States, has a relatively high rate of incarceration compared to other nations. But the state is in the middle of the pack nationally (505 Michigan inmates per 100,000 population vs. a national rate of 509 in 2008). And the state's prison population has fallen markedly -- from nearly 51,500 in 2006, to about 47,700 -- recently.
An exhaustive analysis by the Justice Center at the Council of State Governments, released earlier this year, found that, compared with other states, Michigan:
• Has more violent crime -- 562 crimes per 100,000 residents, highest in the Midwest and 10th highest in the country.
• Catches fewer violent criminals -- only 28% of violent crimes resulted in arrest in Michigan in 2007, compared with 44% nationally.
• Sends relatively fewer of those caught and convicted to prison -- 23% of convicted felons go to prison in Michigan vs. a national rate of 40%.
But for another complex set of reasons -- more high-security prisoners and higher labor costs to name two -- it also costs more to keep someone behind bars in Michigan (about $31,000 a year on average) than in most states. Ohio, for instance, pays about $24,000 a year per prisoner; in Texas, it's about $16,000.
One thing appears clear: Locking up criminals in Michigan increasingly costs more than state taxpayers can afford. Michigan's prison budget tops $2 billion a year and eats up more than 20% of the state's discretionary spending.
Granholm's downsizing is forecast to cut about $180 million from the prison budget in 2010. Some of the savings -- about $70 million -- is slated for so-called reinvestment, prisoner and parolee programs to increase oversight and improve the odds for parolee success.
Michigan's tether/GPS system, which allows the state to track the location of parolees from an office in Lansing, is the nation's largest, Caruso said, with about 3,700 parolees under electronic watch. The parole board itself has been expanded from 10 to 15 to handle more cases.
Many prosecutors and other skeptics argue that the department has moved ahead with accelerated parole without adequate preparation.
State Sen. Alan Cropsey, R-DeWitt, chairman of the committee that handles the budget for prisons, says that while some useful investment has been made in parole preparation and supervision, much more needs to be done to beef up local police protection and deal with probationers so their criminal activities don't escalate.
"There just aren't enough cops on the streets," Cropsey said. "Look at the City of Detroit. They're less well-equipped to deal with a 1,000 extra ex-cons than they were eight to 10 years ago. And that's what they're going to get."
Caroline, a 46-year-old single mother and crime victim in Detroit who asked that her real name not be published, shares Cropsey's apprehension. Five years ago, she and a male acquaintance were shot inside a Detroit nightclub by her ex-boyfriend. She testified against him and he was convicted and sentenced to 5 to 10 years. He was released on parole last month.
Caroline said she has been assured her attacker is closely monitored with GPS. She's unimpressed. At the time of the shooting, she says, she had a personal protection order, barring him from making contact with her. It was in her purse when she shot. She brought the blood-stained document to his trial to show the judge.
"What is a tether going to do that that piece of paper didn't?" she asked.
"I know they've got to save some money. But if they're going to parole 'em early and lay off police, what are we going to do? I say, 'Everybody get a gun.' "
Caruso believes that in the long run, communities -- and victims like Caroline -- will be safer because more parolees will be better prepared to succeed. She said the main goal of the accelerated parole program isn't about saving money.
"We were forced to do it because of the economic crisis, but that's not why we're doing it," she said. "We're doing it because it's the right thing to do." ..News Source.. by DAWSON BELL • FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER
March 29, 2009
KS- GROUP HOME'S CLOSING SENDS PAROLEES OUT ON THEIR OWN
3-29-2009 Kansas:
Parolees sent out on own after cuts
WICHITA - For the past decade, some of the most troubled convicts released from state prisons have lived temporarily in a Wichita group home.
The prefab building -- at 3820 N. Toben, in an industrial park in northeast Wichita -- has housed the kind of men nobody wants as neighbors.
The group home's 46 beds were almost always taken.
But now, because of state budget cuts, the parolees who had been living at the Toben facility are having to move to neighborhoods around Wichita and live on their own -- without the monitoring they had at the Toben building.
A Wichita deputy police chief says it raises the risk to public safety.
Among the men who have recently lived at the Toben facility: Two have been convicted of sex crimes against 4-year-old girls and must register as sex offenders for the rest of their lives.
A third man has a conviction for aggravated sexual battery against a 16-year-old girl. He has a tattoo of the grim reaper.
Until recently, they and other parolees like them have lived at the Toben facility, usually for two to six months as they ease their way back into society while serving parole -- the period after release from prison during which they have to report to a parole officer and live under restrictions.
The last parolees to live at the Toben site will be re-located by Tuesday.
Their new homes will be wherever they can find rent low enough for their limited incomes. Many of them have few job skills and have difficulty getting jobs. Some of them receive government assistance for disabilities.
In the past, few landlords have been willing to rent to parolees from the Toben facility, said Beverly Metcalf, president and CEO of Mirror Inc., a private, nonprofit corporation that provides community-based correctional services. Mirror has operated the Toben facility under a contract with the Kansas Department of Corrections.
Fifteen staff members who worked at the Toben facility are being laid off because of the closing.
'I'm concerned'
Wichita Deputy Police Chief Tom Stolz said he worries that the closing will put the public at a higher safety risk because the parolees won't have as much monitoring.
The Police Department will be asking the Department of Corrections where the relocated parolees will be living so officers can help "keep an eye on things," Stolz said.
"I'm concerned any time we put sex predators back on the street... even though they were going to go back out there anyway," Stolz said.
"We're going to prematurely put them back out there," he said.
"I'm a firm believer that you don't just dump people from prison into society."
At the Toben site, parolees were monitored by cameras. They had to sign in and out and use a door card.
Secretary of Corrections Roger Werholtz conceded that the parolees are "certainly going to settings where there is less structure."
"It does increase the chances that something bad will happen, but it doesn't mean that something bad will happen," Werholtz said.
Bill Miskell, a Department of Corrections spokesman, said that parolees will still be supervised by parole officers who will periodically meet with them and check on them as part of the basic parole conditions.
"The staff have been put on notice that they have to check in just to see that they are doing OK" in their new homes, Miskell said.
Meanwhile, legislators are trying to restore funding that could allow for a resumption of housing similar to the Toben facility.
The Toben facility is among a number of cuts made to the Department of Corrections budget that will save the state a total of about $640,000.
But even if the funding gets approved, the money would not become available until after July 1, and the contract for future housing would be rebid, Miskell said.
Since 1999, the Toben facility has served as transitional housing for the most-difficult-to-place parolees.
They have a tough time finding a place to live because of medical disabilities, mental health problems and, especially, the severity of their crimes.
Many of them don't have relatives willing to take them in, Miskell said.
Some of the businesses near the Toben facility haven't wanted the parolees, either.
Who they are
Anyone with Internet access can look up the state's list of people who are required to register as offenders because of sex crimes or violent crimes. You can get to the registry by typing in www.accesskansas.org/kbi/ and clicking on the registered offender search option.
If you type "Toben" into the registry's search program, a list of names will appear. They are registered offenders who reported 3820 N. Toben as their address in recent months.
The registry provides information about their convictions, the age and sex of their victims, their vehicles, their mug shots and their identifying marks, including scars and tattoos.
The idea is that residents should be able to learn about offenders living near them.
From July 1 to March 13, the latest period available, 181 offenders have lived at different times at the Toben facility, Miskell said.
Almost one-third of the 181 offenders were sex offenders. The number of violent offenders was not available.
Of the six registered offenders who recently reported the Toben facility as their residence, five are sex offenders.
One of them, a 42-year-old man from Missouri, committed his crime against a 4-year-old girl. He was transferred from Missouri to serve his parole in Wichita.
Another is a 37-year-old convicted of involuntary manslaughter in Montgomery County.
Sixty-seven of the 181 offenders who lived at Toben had some kind of medical problem or, more often, some type of mental health issue, Miskell said. ..News Source.. by TIM POTTER, The Wichita Eagle
February 24, 2009
CA- Parolees to be homeless sooner
2-24-2009 California:
New state policy limits housing help to 60 days
STOCKTON - When Richard, a registered sex offender on parole, was left homeless in December, he built a small trailer to sleep in and hitched it to the back of his truck.
"I got a bedroom on wheels," he said.
Richard, 59, declined to provide his last name. That would cause him too much trouble, he said. He is one of thousands affected by a recent change in state policy to limit housing assistance to parolees to 60 days. Many of them, particularly in Stockton, were housed in motels near freeways and in rundown parts of town, far away from schools and parks.
The change has rendered dozens of registered sex offenders in Stockton homeless and may hurt the livelihoods of local motel operators who have transformed their businesses to accommodate the state's needs.
It also threatens to further stress parole agents who monitor sex offenders and enforce their compliance with parole conditions and laws that limit their movement. When they become transients, they are harder to track. They still wear GPS monitors but are no longer registered to a specific address.
"That definitely always creates some concern for our agents, who already have a difficult task as it is," said Gordon Hinkle, a spokesman for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
Hinkle said the change is not to save money, but to use it more wisely. The money used to house parolees will instead pay for substance abuse programs, job programs and other rehabilitation efforts.
"We think it's especially important with the state in a fiscal crisis to pay close attention to where we put that money," Hinkle said. "There will be an immediate savings, but that money will get re-appropriated."
From February 2008 to Jan. 31, the state spent nearly $20 million on housing assistance for 7,897 parolees. Of those, 4,965 were registered sex offenders who may have been on parole for non-sexual offenses.
Dozens of those were living near the San Joaquin County Fairgrounds at the Stockton Motor Inn, which was recently granted a one-year permit by the Planning Commission to house parolees for the state. The motel had been housing parolee sex offenders, the majority of them from San Joaquin County, since 2007. The owner requested the permit in 2008 after learning it was required by city code.
One of the owners, Mike Kumar, said he worries his business will not survive. To remain profitable, Kumar said, the motel needs to maintain about 80 percent occupancy. The policy change has reduced occupancy to about 70 percent, and he's not sure it will ever catch up if parolees are out after 60 days.
"I don't think so," he said. "There is no way they can fill up this place." And it's virtually impossible now to return to operation as a conventional motel, he said.
"Most of our regular customers are not coming back," he said.
Parole Unit Supervisor Susan Kane said that in Stockton, housing assistance is being cut off slowly, on a case-by-case basis. By midweek, about 20 parolees had re-registered as homeless. Many more, she said, had managed to find other housing arrangements.
Many parolee sex offenders said there are few places in Stockton where they can live that are compliant with Jessica's Law, which forbids them from living within 2,000 feet of any public or private school, or any park where children regularly gather.
"They're going to have a lot of sex offenders running the street," said John Kincaid, 42, who lives at the Stockton Motor Inn. Kincaid has 60 days to find someplace else to live. If he ends up homeless, which he said was likely, he'll get a fishing pole and a tent, and camp down by the river.
"I'm just trying to have good spirits about it," he said. ..News Source.. by Christian Burkin, Record Staff Writer
February 21, 2009
MI- Should inmates be released?
2-20-2009 Michigan:
Linda Woodward’s brother, Melvin Cook, was sent to prison in 1985 for a minimum sentence of 20 years. He’s still there after 24 years.
But that could change under Gov. Jennifer Granholm’s proposal to release nonviolent inmates who have served their minimum sentences.
Cook, 60, wasn’t eligible for another parole hearing until 2010 but he could now appear before an expanded parole board as early as next month for another hearing.
Woodward of Orion Township, said she hopes he gets out soon. Cook’s health isn’t good she says, and her aging mother would like to seem him before she dies, Woodward says. “Twenty-six years is a long time,” Woodward said of her brother’s time in jail, which includes the time prior to his conviction. “I just cry all the time because they won’t give him a chance,” Woodward said. “People kill people and get out with less time then my brother.” Cook is being held at the Ernest C. Brooks Correctional Facility in Muskegon, according to state records.
He was sentenced in Oakland County Circuit Court in 1985 to 20-80 years for breaking and entering with intent to commit a felony and first-degree criminal sexual conduct. The case details were not available in the county’s online records.
Cook was first eligible for parole in December 2004, which was denied. He was also denied parole in 2006, 2007 and 2008.
“The offense he’s serving on has a very low parole rate,” says Department of Corrections spokesman Russ Marlan. “CSC offenders are the lowest parole approval rate of all crime categories.”
But Granholm’s proposed budget for 2010 includes cuts of $120 million to the Department of Corrections, including the closing of some facilities.
As part of the effort to stave off a $1.6 billion state deficit and pare the corrections budget, which accounts for about a third of the state’s general fund spending, prisoners’ sentences are also being reviewed for accelerated parole, if they’ve served their minimum sentence.
Cook is among 12,000 prisoners who have completed their minimum sentences and eligible for review, Marlan said.
The state expects to release about a third of them.
Marlan said the Michigan Parole Board is using an new assessment tool to gauge the risk of a convicted sex offender committing a repeat offense. The tool is called the Vermont Assessment of Sex Offender Risk.
“There’s no guarantee he would be paroled,” Marlan said.
“If the VASOR shows he has a low probability of reoffending, it may give him a greater chance of being paroled.”
Marlan said he can’t specifically comment on the health of any prisoner.
“As far as his health problems, the board is continuously reviewing the population for prisoners whose health condition is deteriorating to the point where it affects their likelihood of engaging in criminal behavior,” Marlan said.
Woodward says her brother no longer poses a risk because of his health issues.
“His liver is real bad, he takes other medication, he hears voices now.” Woodward said.
“My poor mother calls me every day. She just wants to spend some time with him before she dies.” ..News Source.. by CHARLES CRUMM, Of The Oakland Press
October 13, 2008
UT- (Budget) Cuts may result in reoffenders
10-13-2008 Utah:
Sacrificed: Sex, substance abuse therapies
DRAPER -- In response to the recent state budget crunch, the Department of Corrections did not resort to releasing inmates early.
It did, however, reduce funding to such programs as substance abuse and sex offender and mental health treatment, programs that lower the chances of paroled individuals reoffending and ending up back in prison.
-Notice they talk about folks going back to prison, and not about public safety.
"That's the problem that we're having with everything," said department spokeswoman Angie Welling.
"We know for a fact that programming, treatment and education reduce recidivism, so we do what we have to do ... knowing that, in the long run, it costs taxpayers more."
-Again, no mention of public safety, instead, money....
Welling said that, in advance of a special legislative session at the end of September, the state asked the department to propose cuts that would amount to 3 percent of the department's $384 million budget.
To achieve that, the department had a head start.
Planned construction of a new building has been delayed by Salt Lake City officials leery of approving a 300-bed halfway house for parolees planned for their city.
During the last budget process, the department was given $7.6 million to operate the so-called parole violator center, Welling said.
Headlines in other media suggested lawmakers had "yanked" the funding for the center because of the delay, but Welling said about $5.7 million in operating costs for the center was offered for sacrifice from the department.
The money to build the facility was not cut, she said.
Still, more cuts were needed.
Encouraging eligible administrators to retire provided more savings, Welling said.
"We lost quite a bit of personnel. We ultimately ended up losing 35 full-time positions throughout the department."
Half of those eliminated positions had yet to be filled, Welling said, and positions for corrections officers the department has been trying all year to fill were not cut.
More savings were found by cutting programming.
"We've seen cuts to a number of programming things inside and outside the (prison) facilities," she said.
In Davis, Weber, Salt Lake and Tooele counties, for example, sex offenders on parole with electronic monitoring will now pay a fee, about $30 to $50 a month, Welling said.
-Interesting, they say sex offenders must pay, but thats just to make their budget look good. They have full knowledge that sex offenders cannot find jobs, housing, and other services and without money how do they survive must less pay for GPS units.
That move saved another $200,000 and brought offenders in those counties in line with sex offenders statewide. Offenders in all other counties have had to pay for their ankle monitors all along, Welling said.
Funds for the 2007 Drug Offender Reform Act were not cut, she said. DORA reduces incarceration for some first-time drug offenders and increases state-funded rehab programs at little cost to the user.
"(Cuts to DORA) were discussed, and fortunately, that didn't happen this time," she said.
Other programs received reduced funding, but few programs were eliminated outright, Welling said.
"We offer the same range of programming, but perhaps not as many sessions."
The remaining programs will also be offered in fewer locations.
What that means for a facility like Ogden's Northern Utah Community Correction Center is the elimination of a behavioral therapy program for about 35 lower-functioning offenders per year, as well as a substance abuse and life-skills program offered through NUCCC's day reporting center.
Welling said NUCCC's substance abuse program will be replaced soon with "in-house treatment," but she did not say where the funding would come from for it, nor how the replacement might differ from the original.
NUCCC Director Steve Yeates declined to comment unless he got permission from Welling to do so. He did not get permission.
Welling said no other officials within the Department of Corrections would be available for interviews.
"I am the only person speaking on behalf of the department on this issue," Welling said in an e-mail.
When asked whether the department sought or considered an inmate population reduction to save costs and preserve programming options, Welling said it did not.
And, as she said earlier, cutting programming today may cost taxpayers more in the future.
"If recidivism increases as a result of these offenders not having the tools they need to succeed," Welling said, "they're going to come back to prison, and that always costs more." ..News Source.. by JESSE FRUHWIRTH
October 2, 2008
CA- State imposes tough new rules on homeless sex offenders (on parole)
Hopefully parolees are given a watch and an alarm clock, otherwise they could violate parole. This is insanity on the part of the state, overboard to the nth degree.
10-2-2008 California:
Struggling to stop paroled sex offenders from "couch surfing" to skirt the tight living restrictions under Jessica's Law, state officials on Wednesday set new rules concerning where homeless parolees can stay and for how long.
The new policy, sent in a memo to parole agents statewide, bars sex offenders who register as transients from staying at any address more than two hours — or the time it takes to charge their GPS anklets — except for work, business or government reasons or for care or treatment services.
It also requires them to register the address if they stay at any house, apartment, motel, hotel or other building for "at least one full day or night."
Among other provisions, Jessica's Law bans registered sex offenders from living within 2,000 feet of a school or park where children "regularly gather." In many urban areas, that leaves sex offenders who fall under the law few if any options. According to the new policy, however, the 2,000-foot rule does not apply to bridges, homeless camps or bus stops because they have no address.
The policy, which takes effect immediately, mirrors one the state Department of Corrections issued in July, then quickly rescinded after legal questions arose. It comes as the number of transient sex offenders steadily rises two years after voters overwhelmingly passed Proposition 83. As of last week, nearly 1,300 paroled sex offenders in California are registered transient, according to the agency.
Many of them now bounce between motels and other places that fall within the banned zones, corrections officials say. Most wear GPS anklets allowing the state to track their location. Jessica's Law also allows cities to craft tighter restrictions on where registered sex offenders can live, and some have responded with laws further limiting the housing options — increasing the number of transient offenders.
"It is growing," Scott Kernan, the department's acting Undersecretary of Operations, said of the transient numbers. "This policy further strengthens our ability to manage the transient population." Sex offenders and their advocates complain that the new rules threaten to further marginalize them, despite a consensus among experts that a stable environment is key to preventing a reoffense. Ernest Galvan, a San Francisco attorney who represents four parolees in a case challenging part of the 2,000-foot rule, said he was "incredulous" about the new rules.
"At some point prohibiting someone from even going indoors starts to encroach on your basic human rights," he said.
"What if it's raining? At some point you're starting to say the person can't operate as a human."
Until now, some parole agents have worked out arrangements that allow transient sex offenders to live in the gray area of a law that did not clearly define a school, a park or how to measure the 2,000 feet. S.T., a registered sex offender in West Contra Costa, said he pays rent on five rooms around the area while he works as a contractor and cares for his ailing wife, who suffers seizures. His parole agent approves of the arrangement, he said.
He spends about six hours a day with his wife at her apartment — which he can't do under the new rules. He can't live with his wife because her apartment is too close to a school.
"It would have a disastrous effect on her medical care," he said. "If the next thing she's on the floor dead, what's the state going to say about that?"
Kernan acknowledged a public safety concern with sex offenders who have no permanent residence, but said the agency must enforce the law.
"To the extent it imposes some hardships on the offender, we continue to try and work with them to find them compliant housing," he said. ..News Source.. by John Simerman
