Colorado Inmates Out, Arizona Inmates In

A private prison is planning to transfer its Colorado inmates to other facilities to make room for 752 inmates from Arizona.

[Sam Haskins]

We in Arizona are tired of having loved ones shipped to other states to be housed. If the Judicial system was truly about justice and not about money we probably would not have an overcrowding situation not to mention the inmates that are transferred here from other states that take beds away from the inmates that are sentence to serve their time in the Arizona Department of Corrections not the Colorado, Oklahoma, Indiana, Texas, etc... Departments of Corrections. Maybe if the Federal and State started making them pay taxes as a business which is what the system has become then they just might go back to a justice system instead of a legal system. Then we might ask our electric companies why they Department of Corrections does not get their electricity turned off for nonpayment of bills, and why we can afford to put 3 million dollars into new showers and toilets that will flush only once every 15 minutes yet we cannot afford to pay our electric bills or feed the inmates. Why we can only feed them food that is not always fit for human consumption. How can we afford to ship them to other states with the state of the economy. How they are to build any kind of family bonds on a continuous basis if the families cannot afford to go visit them. I could go on about it, but really can someone please answer even these few questions.

[Misanthrope]

If the so-called loved ones were not criminals there would be no need to incarcerate them. They are leeches and they should go where they may accomodated. THey should pay for all cost incurred to house them. I have no sympathy except for the victim.

[know2whay]

To misanthrope, what about inocent people that have gotten caught up in the system? You should have someone mistakenly come to your home, and try to kill you while high on drugs and drunk, then you MIGHT think differently

[Nancy]

I don't care where they go as long as they stay locked up.

[mary]

I think that they should stay in their own state instead of being transfered to another state but they don't have an option.

[Ms Tyree]

There are many families who have persons that they Love in the justice system. They are there to serve there time and pay for what they have done. For my Son of 16 years old convicted as an adult and moved from Arizona to Colorado, how can I as his Mother have a relationship with him when he's so far away? I do believe the justice system tries to keep families together, right, especially when parents are putting there children outside to sleep and abusing them in various ways????????
This move was not justified, in this economy especially. He gets out in 7 months, why would you fly someone to another state just to turn around and fly them back so soon??????? For the people in Walsenberg, I sympathise with you also, I wouldn' want more prisoners in my backyard either.
Robin Tyree

[denisha]

Im sure everyone has there different view on things and thats okay. I am here in indiana waiting for my loved one and would more than happy to take off of your hands where I know he belongs instead of him being in Colorado.

[Nancy]

There are some hardship cases where it is difficult for the parent or loved one to travel to a different state--those people I sympathize with, but I'm talking about elderly people or those who are too sick to even consider making a trip out of state.

[Inmate Joe]

its funny how some people that have once commited crimes and didnt get caught " as a lot of people do" then they look down on those that get caught..the irony is bittersweet

[Mother of a leech]

Misanthrope wrote:

If the so-called loved ones were not criminals there would be no need to incarcerate them. They are leeches and they should go where they may accomodated. THey should pay for all cost incurred to house them. I have no sympathy except for the victim.

My son is not a hardened criminal. He was a good solid B student who graduated from high school. He was attending college. He was in band for 9 years, boy scouts for 4 years, and attended church regularly. One awful day, he was in a car accident and there was fatality. Now he's serving 9 years. Just like that - not a long hardened criminal and no record. He's been in for 2 and I've had to go visit at Yuma, Indiana, Douglas, and now Colorado. Not everyone in the Arizona system are hardened career criminals. And there are many more the same. Your view is very closed and narrow minded.

[HumanSpirit]

No good has ever come of the "Republican sponsored" Private prison system over the years.

Sentences are based on the trickle down economics of food, housing, medical care (including the historic corruption of the mental health industry and using prisoners as Guinea pigs for pharmaceutical drug testing) clothing, building and construction and payoff and kickbacks to politicians and judges.

It has nothing to do with punishment for a crime. It's meant to bleed the States and Federal government of monies.

The juvenile system is the same.

U.S. judges admit to jailing children for money
Thu Feb 12, 2009 5:36pm EST
By Jon Hurdle

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters)- Two judges pleaded guilty on Thursday to accepting more than $2.6 million from a private youth detention center in Pennsylvania in return for giving hundreds of youths and teenagers long sentences.

Judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan of the Court of Common Pleas in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, entered plea agreements in federal court in Scranton admitting that they took payoffs from PA Childcare and a sister company, Western PA Childcare, between 2003 and 2006.

"Your statement that I have disgraced my judgeship is true," Ciavarella wrote in a letter to the court. "My actions have destroyed everything I worked to accomplish and I have only myself to blame."

Conahan, who along with Ciavarella faces up to seven years in prison, did not make any comment on the case.

When someone is sent to a detention center, the company running the facility receives money from the county government to defray the cost of incarceration. So as more children were sentenced to the detention center, PA Childcare and Western PA Childcare received more money from the government, prosecutors said.

Teenagers who came before Ciavarella in juvenile court often were sentenced to detention centers for minor offenses that would typically have been classified as misdemeanors, according to the Juvenile Law Center, a Philadelphia nonprofit group.

One 17-year-old boy was sentenced to three months' detention for being in the company of another minor caught shoplifting.

Others were given similar sentences for "simple assault" resulting from a schoolyard scuffle that would normally draw a warning, a spokeswoman for the Juvenile Law Center said.

The Constitution guarantees the right to legal representation in U.S. courts. But many of the juveniles appeared before Ciavarella without an attorney because they were told by the probation service that their minor offenses didn't require one.

Marsha Levick, chief counsel for the Juvenile Law Center, estimated that of approximately 5,000 juveniles who came before Ciavarella from 2003 and 2006, between 1,000 and 2,000 received excessively harsh detention sentences. She said the center will sue the judges, PA Childcare and Western PA Childcare for financial compensation for their victims.

"That judges would allow their greed to trump the rights of defendants is just obscene," Levick said.

The judges attempted to hide their income from the scheme by creating false records and routing payments through intermediaries, prosecutors said.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court removed Ciavarella and Conahan from their duties after federal prosecutors filed charges on January 26. The court has also appointed a judge to review all the cases involved.

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTR...

[vegazzchik]

Sam Haskins wrote:

We in Arizona are tired of having loved ones shipped to other states to be housed. If the Judicial system was truly about justice and not about money we probably would not have an overcrowding situation not to mention the inmates that are transferred here from other states that take beds away from the inmates that are sentence to serve their time in the Arizona Department of Corrections not the Colorado, Oklahoma, Indiana, Texas, etc... Departments of Corrections. Maybe if the Federal and State started making them pay taxes as a business which is what the system has become then they just might go back to a justice system instead of a legal system. Then we might ask our electric companies why they Department of Corrections does not get their electricity turned off for nonpayment of bills, and why we can afford to put 3 million dollars into new showers and toilets that will flush only once every 15 minutes yet we cannot afford to pay our electric bills or feed the inmates. Why we can only feed them food that is not always fit for human consumption. How can we afford to ship them to other states with the state of the economy. How they are to build any kind of family bonds on a continuous basis if the families cannot afford to go visit them. I could go on about it, but really can someone please answer even these few questions.

My husband is one of the inmates moved from Huerfano Cty Correctional Ctr to Bent County Correctional Facility to make room for the 752 Arizona inmates. I agree that each state should keep their own inmates in their own system and not transfer them out of state, but some states do not have any policies on giving/receiving out-of-state inmates and can transfer them wherever they want, or whatever state will take them for the money. This privatization of prisons is getting out of hand. It sickens me to see that CCA is on the NYSE and they're one of few in this economy right now making money on the stock market!!! It's called modern-day slavery. I don't have to deal with traveling any farther to see my husband, but I have to deal with how BCCF is now worse than HCCC...and I thought HCCC was bad!!! This stresses me out too...anything they'll do for money. It's wrong, so wrong!!

[Sam]

vegazzchik wrote:

<quoted text>
My husband is one of the inmates moved from Huerfano Cty Correctional Ctr to Bent County Correctional Facility to make room for the 752 Arizona inmates. I agree that each state should keep their own inmates in their own system and not transfer them out of state, but some states do not have any policies on giving/receiving out-of-state inmates and can transfer them wherever they want, or whatever state will take them for the money. This privatization of prisons is getting out of hand. It sickens me to see that CCA is on the NYSE and they're one of few in this economy right now making money on the stock market!!! It's called modern-day slavery. I don't have to deal with traveling any farther to see my husband, but I have to deal with how BCCF is now worse than HCCC...and I thought HCCC was bad!!! This stresses me out too...anything they'll do for money. It's wrong, so wrong!!

I agree, we are currently getting ready to file a formal complaint against the Warden of Huerfano correctional faciliy and CCA for the inhumane treatment of the inmates and thier visitors, the illegal stirp searches of visitors, and the continued singling out of certain visitors for searches. There is a long list of complaints that we have tried to address with CCA and ADOC and have gotten no where. If you would like to share your story your can email me at [e-mail]

[Sam]

Nancy wrote:

I don't care where they go as long as they stay locked up.

I hope that one day one of your loved ones is placed in the system for something that they are not guilty for and you have to go through this same experience and see what your opinion is once you are educated on the Legal system of America which was intended to be a justice system based on guilt or innocence not on money. As of now you speak out of school.

[Sam]

Misanthrope wrote:

If the so-called loved ones were not criminals there would be no need to incarcerate them. They are leeches and they should go where they may accomodated. THey should pay for all cost incurred to house them. I have no sympathy except for the victim.

You are extremely uneducated or a politician, judge, or lawyer. We were meant to have a justice system you know where circumstantial evidence was never to be used only factual. Where guilt or innocence really mattered. What we have is a legal system that is used to make money to support the States who pay the politicians, judges, and lawyers.

[MONIKA]

Sam wrote:

<quoted text>
I agree, we are currently getting ready to file a formal complaint against the Warden of Huerfano correctional faciliy and CCA for the inhumane treatment of the inmates and thier visitors, the illegal stirp searches of visitors, and the continued singling out of certain visitors for searches. There is a long list of complaints that we have tried to address with CCA and ADOC and have gotten no where. If you would like to share your story your can email me at [e-mail]

Hello,

I am one of the people whose husband was moved from AZ to CO as well. We have visited once thus far as we are not able to afford the visits. I must say that we were lucky with timing of the visit. Huerfano has just recently changed the visitation rules. We were allowed to visit for two full 8 hour days. Must say we were treated with respect and have found the guards at the visitation room quite understanding and helpful (I have a three yeard old very active child). They have provided us with a TV and a box of toys and were quite understanding of the fact that our three year old is not going to sit for two straight days. Overall, my husband says the facility us much better than Yuma.

However, the fact that he was moved from AZ to CA has created an immense financial and psychological burden on our family. My husband's parents are elderly and barely able to travel. My daughter is missing her father. Our relationships is falling apart. And like many of the people ahead of me said, my husband is not a hardened criminal. He was involved in a car accident fatality as well. He has never been arrested before and has been a fully contributing member of society. A veteran of the Gulf war... We had good lives, my husband worked as an engineer. Our lives have been affected by this forever. We really need him to be moved abck to AZ even though we know that the facilities here are even worse. The worst thing about this all is that the "decent" guys were send out of state since those are the least "trouble makers", thus cause least problems and cost the least.... I feel that this is unjust. Just wanted to add my two cents.

[know2whay]

Monika, could you email me, I have a couple of questions on how to visit my son in Colorado, He was transferred from AZ as well-Thanks [e-mail]

[Nancy]

Sam wrote:

<quoted text>
I hope that one day one of your loved ones is placed in the system for something that they are not guilty for and you have to go through this same experience and see what your opinion is once you are educated on the Legal system of America which was intended to be a justice system based on guilt or innocence not on money. As of now you speak out of school.

Not a chance of that happening!

[GoneAwhile]

Nancy wrote:

There are some hardship cases where it is difficult for the parent or loved one to travel to a different state--those people I sympathize with, but I'm talking about elderly people or those who are too sick to even consider making a trip out of state.

These inmates have it better in Colorado than anywhere they have been before! Better Food, Clean Housing! Video visits if their family can't come to Colorado. These inmates get waited on hand and foot! Do not feel sorry for these inmates in any way, shape or form. These inamtes have been housed in Indiana, Oklahoma and say they have never had i so good as in Colorado. The Colorado private prison staff is kissing their asses! The inmates love it!!!!!!!!!!

[Cindy]

Not everybody deserves to stay locked up. People make mistakes and deserve a second chance. We all have made mistakes, some worse than others, but who are we to judge? It is so sad to see people who think it will never happen to them or their families. I don't wish the heartache of having a loved one in prison on anybody but some people are in for a rude awakening. Then their eyes will be wide open. Hold on tight...it's a rough ride!