Goddard urges Brewer to review prison system in special session

Terry Goddard (AP file photo)

In the wake of a prison break that set three convicted murderers free, Attorney General Terry Goddard called on Gov. Jan Brewer to amend her special session call to include a review of budget and privatization issues that he said have weakened Arizona’s corrections system.

Goddard, the Democratic nominee for governor, urged his campaign rival to implement a five-point plan he unveiled on Aug. 9. He said the plan is needed to ensure that other Department of Corrections facilities, especially private prisons, are not vulnerable to future escapes.

“I believe the overreliance by this governor and leadership in the Legislature on for-profit prisons has served our state badly, and I believe that this escape is a proper example of public safety being left in the lurch,” Goddard said. “Without immediate action by the governor, I’m afraid that future escapes are almost inevitable.”

The components of Goddard’s five-point plan include:

• An immediate review of the location and security risk of all violent prisoners in Arizona.
• The reassignment of violent prisoners who are currently housed in minimum or medium security facilities.
• An immediate review of all private prisons in the state, including a reassessment of their security classification.
• A moratorium on violent prisoners being housed in private prisons.
• Appoint an independent blue-ribbon commission, not associated with the Department of Corrections, to investigate the escape, and fine Management and Training Corp., the Utah-based company that operates the Mohave County prison.

Convicted murderers John McCluskey, Terry Province and Daniel Renwick on July 30 escaped from a privately run, medium security prison outside Kingman after McCluskey’s fiancé threw a pair of wire cutters over a fence, according to the Department of Corrections. Police believe McCluskey and Province murdered an Oklahoma couple in New Mexico after their escape. Of the three, only McCluskey remains at large.

Shortly after the escape, Goddard slammed Brewer for approving what he said was $67 million in budget cuts to the Department of Corrections. In a press conference at Arizona Democratic Party headquarters, the gubernatorial hopeful laid out a specific plan that he said would reduce the risk of future breakouts. From 2005 to 2009, corrections spending increased an average of $77 million per year, he said.

“I don’t see that there’s any way that that could’ve taken place without the security of our prisons being substantially compromised,” Goddard said of Brewer’s cuts to the Department of Corrections.

Goddard said he did not believe that the Kingman prison reduced personnel as a result of the recent budget cuts, but said the $67 million in cuts compromises the safety of the prison system as a whole.

“I think we have pushed a large number – a much larger number than I think people are aware of – of the total violent offenders into private prisons. I personally was under the impression that the more violent offenders were kept in the state system,” Goddard said. “Where the budget cuts come in is that as the state system is unable to handle them, apparently they’ve been pushed back or reclassified and moved into private prisons.”

Brewer spokesman Paul Senseman dismissed Goddard’s proposal as a publicity stunt, and said most facets of his plan – such as the reviews of all violent prisoners or private prison security – have already been done. He also disputed Goddard’s figures on cuts to the corrections system, saying Department of Corrections funding increased by about $48 million from the 2010 fiscal year to 2011. He did not know whether funding was cut during the course of the 2010 fiscal year.

“This appears to be more of a whim of a losing political candidate, not a specific plan or a reasonable request, given the facts of the situation,” Senseman said. “This is more likely exactly what it appears to be – it is a press event at the Democratic Party headquarters, on the orders of the public employees unions that are supporting him for political office.”

The prisoner classification system that placed the three escaped inmates in the Kingman prison was revised in 2005 after a 15-day standoff at the Arizona State Prison Complex-Lewis, Senseman said.

“I do not recall the attorney general requesting a special session to reverse or void the adoption of that new system,” Senseman said.

Goddard also urged Brewer to cancel an open bid for 5,000 privately prison beds. He said private prisons have a place in Arizona’s corrections system, but should be used for non-violent prisoners such as DUI offenders.

After Goddard began criticizing Brewer over the prison break, the governor said the classification system that led to convicted murderes being placed in a medium security prison has been in use since 1978, and was revised in 2005. She said Proposition 100, a temporary sales tax increase that she spearheaded, protected the Department of Corrections from additional cuts during the state’s protracted budget crisis.

Brewer said she is a supporter of private prisons, and that an investigation of the escape is underway. She echoed Department of Corrections Director Charles Ryan in blaming human error by prison staff for the escape.

Goddard wants his five-point proposal included in the special session, which Brewer called to make changes to a ballot measure aimed at protecting secret ballot voting in union elections.