The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current, March 23, 1987, Image 6

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Page 6/The Battalion/Monday, March 23, 1987
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Criminologist: Prison crowdin
could have been stopped ea
A&M professor says Legislature failed to probe options
By Cindy Bomba
Reporter
Overcrowding in Texas prisons started in the
mid-1970s, but at that time the Texas Legislature
spent little time and money investigating options
which may have solved the problem before it de
veloped into a state crisis, a Texas A&M profes
sor says.
It’s been 10 years since the Texas Department
of Corrections recognized its problem, but the
Legislature, citizens and criminal justice system
can no longer ignore the TDC, says Dr. Ben
Crouch, A&M criminologist and associate profes
sor of sociology.
sometimes again and again. We just cut them a
lot of slack.”
The trend of overcrowded prisons started in
the 1970s and wasn’t restricted to Texas, but in
volved the entire country, Crouch says.
Throughout the 1960s, the nation saw a rise in
the number of crimes committed by young peo
ple, he adds.
“We had an inclination not to treat youths
harshly,” he says. “We put them on probation,
Texas citizens and legislators finally decided
they had had enough, and more convicted crimi
nals were sentenced to prison, Crouch says.
Texas has always had a unique approach to crimi
nal law and there are two major reasons for it, he
says.
“One reason is a general tough attitude toward
crime,” Crouch says. “The belief that, by gosh, if
you’re going to commit the crime you’re going to
serve the time. We also have the inclination to use
prison and we’re inclined to give stiff sentences.
“So, what happened in the 1970s is that the
amount of time an inmate took to prison in
creased. The time actually served increased, and
parole was niggardly given.”
Overcrowding also was complicated by a 1977
legislative move in Texas called the “aggravated
law,” which said that any person convicted of a
felony involving a weapon would be sent to
prison to serve one calendar third of his sentence
before becoming eligible for “good time.”
Good time is time an inmate can earnil
dnc e his sentence for staying out of trouble,!
in prison.
“So if you had a 60-year sentence todi.y
says, “you would serve now until 2007.1®
care if you were St. Francis of Assisi whiiEI
were inside. That adjective "aggravated":j|j
you’d serve a calendar third.”
Texas has limited options to solve the ®
lem, he says. The state can send fewerpeefi
prison, let more people out or build mor(||
ons.
Dan Beto, chief probation officer forjL
County, says his department uses intern.M
pet vision to help alleviate overcrowding.iJ
in the program must visit probation offop
ei v week and are given urine tests regular^ |
The Brazos County Probation Officehai I
felony offenders, 1,023 misdemeanor ofIe;|
and 105 intensive .supervision offendersoiS
bation.
Matching prisoners to beds
confusing for TDC officials
HUNTSVILLE (AP) — In the old
days, when the Texas prison system
had 15 or 20 percent of its beds va
cant, Scotty Kyle’s job was much eas
ier.
Now, with prisons near capacity,
the process of matching inmates
with prisons and cell block wings
based on their crimes and back
ground has turned into an ordeal.
Kyle heads a four-man committee
that meets in a cramped second-
floor meeting room of the Texas De
partment of Corrections Diagnostic
Unit. The committee that receives
prisoners from the county jails
opens its doors two days a week now
and gets as many prisoners in that
amount of time as it used to get in a
five-day week.
-«■ The Texas prison system, the na
tion’s third-largest, has been operat
ing under a cycle of being open two
days and closed five because the
population within the 26-unit system
has exceeded a state-mandated 95-
percent capacity.
Prison officials don’t know how
many inmates to expect from the
state’s county jails, nor do they know
how many inmates are going to be
released on a given day by the Texas
Board of Pardons and Paroles until
the day before the release.
Add to that some internal confu
sion when space is especially tight,
and three sets of administrators
might be filling one open bed with
three inmates.
“It borders on chaos,” says Carl
Reynolds, general counsel for the
Senate Criminal Justice Committee.
“It’s a logistical nightmare.”
It’s a nightmare Kyle lives.
“I come in at 7 a.m. with a pot of
coffee and get going,” he says. “No
body leaves this room unless they
“I come in at 7 a.m. with a
pot of coffee and get
going. Nobody leaves this
room unless they have to
go to the bathroom. . . .
We stay until we finish. ”
— TDlC official Scotty
Kyle
have to go to the bathroom. Nobody
leaves to eat. I don’t take phone calls.
We stay until we finish.”
He sits at a long conference table.
In a briefcase at his side are files on
inmates who will be classified that
day. A computer terminal on the
other side shows where the vacancies
are. In the old days, he used to work
on a stack of files, carry them down
to the computer room to be entered
into the system. He can’t do that any
more.
“If I wait that long, the count will
have already changed,” he says.
meaning he would have to redo the
classification.
He says a five-percent buffer,
which is supposed to give the prison
system flexibility in times of crowd
ing, isn’t what it seems.
Because of special designations,
some cells are set aside and can’t be
used for the general population,
Kyle says.
The number of beds in the system
is 42,241, but 808 beds are in the in
firmary and solitary sections and are
automatically excluded. That leaves
a capacity of 41,433, but even that
number changes daily because of
court-ordered single-cell housing.
With an inmate count of 38,773
earlier this month, the system was
94.75 percent capacity. It had 1,658
free beds. But af ter the hundreds re
served for the infirmary, death row,
women and the mentally ill, the ac
tual number of beds that could be
used for the general population was
264.
Debbie Roberts, manager for the
prison’s social services, says, “When
you talk about a system as large as
Texas, that’s not a lot of flexibility.”
If there is no room, sometimes in
mates are held over at Diagnostic or
the nearby Goree Unit — also used
for intake of inmates — until room is
found.
Some relief, however, is in sight.
A new 2,500-inmate prison is sched
uled to open in September.
Texas inmate
seeks repriei
in court revie
HUNTSVILLE (AP)-
death row inmate Jem
hopes the Texas CourtofO
nal Appeals will grant hint
prieve to prevent his
execution before dawn Tuk
1 he state apjjeals courtm
❖
tin is expected to reviewH«
case today, his attorney, Re
Alley of Fort Worth, said
“I feel like the man'senD-;
have his case heard,” AUp
“Whether or not the coun
hear it, I don’t know.” »
Hogue. 36, a former wa® sr
builder in Fort Worth, wai
victed of capital murder fa
Jan. 13, 19/9 lire death o;
year-old Jayne Markham.
hands and legs were tied bdi
her hac k. She died in her
whic h prosecutors say waste
fire by Hogue.
I u a recent death row
view, Hogue said, "The do
sentence is wrong. It’s toot
for a person to be sentence;
death who is innocent.I’yeah
claimed that I was innocent
Alley said the appeal foras
challenges the death penal; 1
unconstitutional and claims
fective counsel during the
and inadequate jury selectio:
that the- trial judge did nous
standard accepted by theUS
preme Court.
❖
Legislature fighting $1 billion deficit
in budget at halfway mark of sessid
AUSTIN (AP) — The Legislature
reaches the halfway mark of its 140-
day session today, embroiled over a
$ V billion budget deficit.
State Comptroller Bob Bullock
has asked the state attorney general
whether the deficit projected for the
end of the fiscal year, Aug. 31, can
be carried over to the next biennium
or if Texas’ constitutional “pay-as-
you-go” provision would prohibit
such a move.
A ruling by Attorney General Jim
Mattox that the deficit must be
erased would force lawmakers to
raise $ 1 billion in new revenue in the
remaining five months of the cur
rent two-year spending cycle.
Rep. Stan Schlueter, chairman of
the House Ways and Means Com
mittee, said this would require a
“surcharge on existing taxes” since
there would not be enough time to
expand the sales tax base and bring
in $ 1 billion by Sept. 1.
In committee today, House mem
bers will hear Texas health officials
Economy forces resignations
of top Dallas oil executives
DALLAS (AP) — A growing num
ber of Dallas oil companies are say
ing goodbye to long-time employees
with six-figure incomes.
In the last 13 months, six top ex
ecutives of leading public energy
companies have stepped down un
der pressure, and industry observers
say others are likely to follow.
Some say the trend reflects the
turmoil in the oil industry, but oth
ers say it is a rejection of old-fash
ioned management and wasteful
wildcat drilling strategies of the past.
“It doesn’t have anything to do
with some great watershed period, a
new crop of managers or whatever,”
said Charles Ramsey, former presi
dent and chief executive of May Pe
troleum, who now is an investment
banker for a brokerage.
Other industry observers, critical
of oil company management, said
the changes reflect a much-needed
shift from outdated strategies to
more professional, risk-manage
ment approaches.
talk about AIDS, and senators will
review a proposal to strengthen the
1967 Open Meetings Act.
The House Committee on Public
Health said in a statement that seven
health officials, including Dr. Peter
Mansell, medical director of the In
stitute of Immunological Diseases at
Houston, would appear at the AIDS
session.
The Senate State AffairsCot
tee has scheduled a hearingom
by Sen. Kent Caperton, D Bn
amend the Open MeetingsAci
Chairman Jeffrey BruceoH
Media, a coalition of thestaif
jor journalism groups, said tli(
tion has been meeting for six#
“with statewide organization-
resenting public officials thai
historically expressed co«
about amending this law.”
Bi nee said Texas Media lx !
the Caperton bill “both solves
serious problems with thee
law” and also addresses theco^
of such organizations as the 1
Municipal League and Texas
ciations of counties, school ai
mistrators and school boards
The Senate Criminal Justice^
mittee agenda for Tuesday^
Sunset legislation on the B»'
Pardons and Paroles, Adult ^
tion Commission and Texas!
of Corrections, which oversee
state prison system.
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APRIL lOthi
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f must present coupon before processing 3
good from April 1 thru May 15, 1987 ■
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