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FCI Dublin Is Closed But The Controversy Keeps Swirling – LISA Newsletter For June 17, 2024

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We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

THE BAND PLAYS ON…

BOPbus240429Acting with efficiency and consideration for the well-being of prisoners, the Federal Bureau of Prisons closed FCI Dublin two months ago.  This is the BOP version.

Acting precipitously, hiding its intentions, and with all the care and haste of a concentration camp evacuation in front of the advancing enemy, the BOP shuttered FCI Dublin, treated inmates like cattle while they were being transferred to other facilities in order to stop or at least hobble investigations into the inmate abuse at BOP facilities. This is the critics’ version.

Three Senators and 19 Representatives wrote to BOP Director Colette Peters last Thursday to get to the bottom of the unprecedented prison closure.  

rios-marques240617The letter they sent asks who made the decision to close Dublin and when the decision was made. The request focuses on the role of Regional Director Rios-Marques in the culture of abuse at FCI Dublin, “including her selection of a succession of wardens who have been at best ineffective and at worst complicit in retaliation and intimidation,” and wants to know whether she was following BOP policy “when she refused to advise [the Special Master appointed by the court to oversee Dublin] of the impending closure, which would begin the next day, even when asked directly on April 14?”

Madam Regional Director, you’ve got 29 years in at the BOP. It might be a good time to contemplate retirement.

The letter hints at a credibility gap forming between Congress and the BOP. “[T]here has been a tragic and unacceptable history of long-term abuse of [prisoners] at FCI Dublin,” the letter says. “Up until weeks before the closure of FCI Dublin, BOP leadership and their counsel repeatedly asserted that conditions and care at FCI Dublin were constitutionally adequate, and repeatedly denied allegations of staff misconduct and retaliation.”

cattle240617The letter also recounted that the legislators were concerned “about shocking abuses that allegedly took place during the mass [prisoner] transfers,” noting that “this level of disregard for human dignity cannot be tolerated. Additionally, the frantic nature of the closure of FCI Dublin reflects a lack of adequate planning and proper safeguards to protect the rights of [prisoners].”

[I have replaced the letter’s use of “AIC” — Peters’s kinder, gentler “Adult in Custody” term — with “prisoner.”  Peters says “AIC” but other BOP employees call them “bitches.” These women are ‘prisoners’ and ‘inmates’ until such a time as BOP line employees start treating them like AICs, or at least treat them like human beings and not like cattle, Director Peters’s “feel-good” relabeling notwithstanding.]

BOP officials have stated that the Dublin closure plan was “carefully considered over months,” an assertion that would have made Pinnochio blush.

The legislators want written answers by July 10, 2024.

Pinocchio160812Meanwhile two advocacy groups last Wednesday asked U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, the Northern District of California jurist overseeing the class action case against the BOP for Dublin sexual abuse, to unseal court records and preserve public access to hearings.

The legal nonprofit Public Justice and the ACLU of Northern California jointly filed a motion for increased transparency in the case, which is set for trial in June 2025. In the last two months, Judge Gonzalez Rogers has held a series of closed hearings to address the Dublin closure. “These hearings took place without prior notice, and in many instances, the docket does not reflect that they even occurred,” the groups said in a statement.

Letter from Sens Mark DeSaulnier, Laphonza Butler and Richard J. Durbin (and others) to BOP Director Colette Peters (June 13, 2024)

Associated Press, Legal advocates seek public access to court records about abuse at California women’s prison (June 12, 2024)

– Thomas L. Root

A Short Rocket – Update for June 7, 2024

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We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

rocket-312767Today (and not necessarily in honor of NASA’s long-awaited success in getting the Boeing Starliner to fly), a short rocket of some stories you might have missed.

OREGON LAWMAKERS WANT ANSWERS ON SHERIDAN

Six Oregon members of Congress wrote to BOP Director Colette Peters on May 24th about the “deeply concerning allegations made by the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General regarding conditions at FCI Sheridan.”

letter161227The letter, from Senators Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley, and Representatives Val Hoyle, Earl Blumenauer, Andrea Salinas and Suzanne Bonamici (all Oregon Democrats), “demand[ed] swift action to address staffing shortages, inmate medical needs, and other alarming shortcomings placing staff and inmates at significant risk.”

The letter noted that the report “raises new questions about FCI Sheridan’s certification as a Medical Care Level 2 institution. According to BOP regulations, Medical Care Level 2 institutions must be able to provide routine outpatient services to prisoners. However, DOJ OIG found inmates frequently could not get timely outpatient care.”

The lawmakers posited 15 questions about staff shortages, medical care, RDAP and security on which a BOP response is sought.

Letter from Sen Ron Wyden and others to Colette Peters (May 24, 2024)

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WELL, THIS IS A SURPRISE…

A national study performed by a collaboration between the University of California at Irvine and Brigham and Women’s Hospital found that at the peak of the COVID pandemic in 2020, people inside prisons died almost three and a half times more frequently than the free population.

deadcovid210914Over 6,000 incarcerated people died in the first year of the pandemic, researchers found, using numbers they collected from state prison systems and the BOP. A Marshall Project analysis of data the researchers released shows the prison mortality in the BOP increased by 41% between 2019 and 2020.

At the same time, incarceration rates dropped during the first year of the pandemic, but not because an extraordinary number of people were released. Instead, data show that fewer people than in a typical year were let out in 2020. According to The Marshall Project, the reduction in population was due to a dramatic reduction in prison admissions.

The study warned that death rate spikes “in 2020 probably underestimate the true rise in death rates, since many prison populations fell as the year went on.”

Marshall Project, Officials Failed to Act When COVID Hit Prisons. A New Study Shows the Deadly Cost (April 18, 2024)

Science Advances, Excess mortality in U.S. prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic (Dec 1, 2023)

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DEPENDS ON WHOSE OX IS BEING GORED

Less than a week after the DOJ OIG issued a scathing report on the BOP’s operation at FCI Sheridan—which incidentally included a finding that the facility kept lousy records on inmate-to-inmate sexual abuse—BOP Director Colette Peters found the time and inclination to praise a May 14th sentencing of an unnamed federal inmate for having masturbated in front of a BOP employee.

It seems that on May 14, 2024, U.S. District Judge Iain D. Johnston of the Northern District of Illinois hammered a USP Thomson prisoner with a 364-day consecutive sentence under the Assimilative Crimes Act for violating an Illinois disorderly conduct statute by… well, you know… in front of a correctional officer.

oxgored240607Director  Peters expressed “strong support” for this decision, with the BOP PR flack quoting her as saying “This sentencing is a clear message that misconduct, particularly actions that threaten the safety and integrity of our institutions, will not be tolerated. We stand resolute in our mission to foster a humane and secure environment and protect our employees and incarcerated people from any form of sexual harassment and assault.”

Tough words, which makes it all the more surprising that the Director failed to send a “clear message” to her 36,000 underlings about the mess at FCI Sheridan or, for that matter, the announcement two days later that a former correctional officer at FCI Milan had been charged with the felony of having sex with a prisoner and smuggling contraband into the facility.

Fortunately for Peters, the PR task was covered by Eastern District of Michigan US Attorney Dawn Ison, who said:

Every day, federal corrections officers display uncompromising integrity in carrying out their duties and maintaining the safety and security of our federal prisons. Unfortunately, the allegations in today’s indictment reflect a failure on the part of one corrections officer to maintain that standard. Sexual misconduct by prison officials compromises the safety and security of the whole institution and is completely unacceptable at Milan or any other correctional facility.

When a single inmate commits a misdemeanor, the Director is Jenny-on-the-spot to denounce what is otherwise a pedestrian (if disgusting) offense. But with over a dozen cases of BOP employees being charged with or convicted of sex offenses against inmates in the last year, you’d think that Ms. Peters would issue a press release on that, or at least that a government official’s comment could drop the “display uncompromising integrity” blather.

BOP,  Director Peters Commends Sentencing (May 28, 2024)

Ann Arbor News, Former federal prison guard charged for having sex with prisoner, smuggling in contraband (May 30, 2024)

– Thomas L. Root

The Wheels On The Bus – Update for April 29, 2024

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We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

PUNISHING THE VICTIMS, DISSING THE JUDGE

wheelsonbus240429Nearly all inmates had been transferred out of the beleaguered Bureau of Prisons women’s facility FCI Dublin by last Tuesday, according to a BOP spokesman, with only about 23-40 prisoners–all of whom have pending releases or halfway house/home confinement transfers scheduled–remaining at the facility.

Several news outlets last week reported that the hasty transfers bore more than a passing resemblance to the Bataan Death March. Inmates reported they went without water or sanitary products, and some ended up sitting in their own excrement. A prisoner’s parent told KTVU-TV in Oakland that when the inmates asked where they were going, 

“They were told ‘none of your business,’ or ‘SFTU, see, this is why Dublin is closing, you all need to learn to keep your mouths shut. I gave up my Saturday off to move you girls.’ The other CO said, ‘I came out of retirement to help move you bitches.’

“The bus driver played a children’s recording of the Wheels on the Bus over and over again at full volume, and then played loud rap music with sexually explicit language about sex acts.

“He told them the more they fussed, the louder it was going to be,” [the parent wrote to the TV station]. “All thru the 12 hours they were called bitches. They were told they were the reason for the closing of Dublin. They should have kept their mouths shut.”

BOPbus240429The San Jose Mercury News reported that one source said of the closure and transfer, “I have witnessed people fighting. I have witnessed people crying. I have witnessed people drinking pills because they just want to pass out and not think about it. I have witnessed people vomiting. Another lady over here next to me, she was cutting herself. We have witnessed all of that. And even officers over here are crying because that’s how crazy it is.”

Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee sent a letter to BOP Director Colette S. Peters expressing concern over claims of a chaotic transfer. The letter, signed by Committee Chairman Richard Durbin (D-IL) and four others, alleged that

“concerned stakeholders and advocates have made alarming reports about the ensuing chaos. These reports include: unavailability of medical staff; inadequate-to-no medical attention, including for individuals expressing suicidal ideation; improper medical clearance prior to transport; lack of food and water for those remaining in the facility awaiting transfer; mistreatment, harassment, neglect, and abuse while in transit; and confiscation of personal property. This reporting is appalling and even more concerning in light of the well-documented abuses that have taken place previously at FCI Dublin…”

The letter demanded that the BOP director provide the Committee with information on how the agency has prepared to close FCI Dublin, including its written plans on the “safe and humane release from custody.”

On that same day that the BOP announced Dublin would close, U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, the Oakland, California, judge overseeing the class action suit against Dublin officials, ordered a halt in the transfers so that the special master she had appointed to oversee Dublin could review the process. A review of each prisoner’s status would “ensure inmates are transferred to the correct location,” the judge wrote in her April 15 order. “This includes whether an inmate should be released to a BOP facility, home confinement, or halfway house, or granted a compassionate release.”

bird240429The BOP pushed back, filing a motion for relief from the Judge’s order, questioning the authority of the special master and complaining that the judge’s order amounts to “a de facto requirement” that the BOP keep the prison open. “The Court not only lacks jurisdiction to impose such a requirement, but it is also antithetical to the overall objective of safeguarding inmate safety and welfare,” the motion complains. “Extensive resources and employee hours have already been invested in the move.”

As of yesterday, the motion has not been ruled on. Given that the BOP has already transferred up to 96% of the Dublin inmates–many in horrific conditions–the BOP appears to have presented Judge Gonzalez Rogers with a fait accompli that the Court is unlikely to be able to undo,

goodjobhomer240429In a case of the BOP really not getting it, KTVU reported that in an interoffice memo sent last week, Director Peters “commended her staff for their ‘tireless efforts in facilitating the successful transition’ of women from FCI Dublin… Peters said that the transfer involved ‘careful planning and coordination to ensure the safe transfer of women to other facilities, with special attention given to their unique programming, medical, and mental health requirements’.”

It is perhaps unsurprising that the Federal Prison Oversight Act (H.R. 3019), introduced a year ago, was approved earlier this month by the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability.

Under the bill, which still must be approved by the full House and Senate before becoming law, the Dept of Justice’s Inspector General would conduct periodic prison inspections of BOP facilities. The bill would require the attorney general to ensure the inspectors have “access to any covered facility, including the incarcerated people, detainees, staff, bargaining unit representative organization, and any other information” needed. The assessments “may include” incarceration conditions; staff adequacy and working conditions; availability of FSA programs; SHU practices; prison medical and mental health services; and violence, sexual abuse and excessive-force allegations.” The bill would establish an ombudsman to whom prisoners and loved ones could complain.

Associated Press, Senators demand accounting of rapid closure plan for California prison where women were abused (April 24, 2024)

KTVU, FCI Dublin prison closure: Women describe horrific journey across US (April 22, 2024)

KTVU-TV, U.S. Senators call FCI Dublin transfer of women ‘appalling’ (April 25, 2024)

Senators Richard Durbin, Cory Booker et al., Letter to Colette S Peters (April 24, 2024)

San Jose Mercury News, Chaotic Dublin prison closure leads to fighting, crying, cutting, inmates say (April 24, 2024)

Associated Press, Feds push back against judge and say troubled California prison should be shut down without delay (April 18, 2024)

KTVU, BOP director commends FCI Dublin staff, despite accounts of abusive behavior (April 24, 2024)

HR 3019, Federal Prison Oversight Act

– Thomas L. Root

Last One Out of FCI Dublin, Lock the Sallyport – Update for April 23, 2024

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BOP GIVES UP ON FCI DUBLIN

shutitdown240424Bureau of Prisons Director Colette Peters imposed the death penalty on the notorious FCI Dublin (California) prison last week, announcing that despite the agency’s “unprecedented steps and provid[ing] a tremendous amount of resources to address culture, recruitment and retention, aging infrastructure and—most critical—employee misconduct… we have determined that FCI Dublin is not meeting expected standards and that the best course of action is to close the facility.”

The Associated Press said that closing the woman’s low-security facility called “The Rape Club” by some BOP staff “represents an extraordinary acknowledgment by the Bureau of Prisons that its much-promised efforts to improve the culture and environment there have not worked.”

finemess190129Only two weeks ago, US District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers—who has described Dublin as “a dysfunctional mess”—appointed a special master to oversee the prison, largely in response to staff claims of retaliation against female inmates for reporting alleged misconduct.

In 2019, the House Subcommittee on National Security found that widespread misconduct in the federal prison system had been tolerated and routinely covered up or ignored.

Eight Dublin employees, including the former warden, have been charged with sexually abusing inmates with five having pleaded guilty.

The BOP has not provided a timeline or details about the shutdown, but rather has simply framed its planning for the move as “ongoing.” Peters was quoted in the San Jose Mercury as saying, “The closure of the institution may be temporary but certainly will result in a mission change.”

No employees will lose their jobs as a result of the planned closure, the BOP said, but they may have to move.  

That certainly ought to cull the bad apples from the barrel.

Susan Beatty, a lawyer representing a number of Dublin inmates, said the timing of the closure announcement shows the BOP seeks “to evade… outside accountability and transparency.” She said the plaintiffs’ attorneys were “inundated” with calls from Dublin inmates on Monday, many of whom said they were only told of the closure that morning, given trash bags, and told to pack out.

dublinprotest240424

At a rally last Friday outside the prison, a group called Dublin Prison Solidarity Coalition demanded that abused inmates be released. According to KPIX-TV, the advocates said that “chaos unfolded” at the facility since the announcement, “traumatizing incarcerated people who have already been subjected to immense harm by the BOP, including rampant staff sexual abuse, retaliation, and medical neglect.”

A Dublin inmate reported to me:

We woke up this morning to an announcement by the Warden that effective immediately, Dublin FCI–including the camp–will be closed. There are buses for transport and hundreds of officers at the FCI taking inmates away. We were informed that some of the women at the camp will leave today. We are waiting for staff to come around and let those individuals know who will leave today. This comes after the special master came last week and introduced herself and her team to take over. The consensus is that this is the big F.U. to [Judge Gonzalez] by the BOP. “Instead of allowing someone to come in and run it, we will shut down…” The inmates at the FCI were the ones who prepared our food since the camp’s kitchen is closed due to mold and asbestos. Now that it is shut down, we don’t know how we will even be fed.

Associated Press, Bureau of Prisons to close California women’s prison where inmates have been subjected to sex abuse (April 15, 2024)

Courthouse News Service, Feds shuttering scandal-ridden Bay Area women’s prison (April 15, 2024)

San Jose Mercury News, Scandal-plagued FCI Dublin women’s prison to close after years of concerns over sexual abuse, retaliation (April 15, 2024)

KPIX, Rally urges FCI Dublin inmates released as prison at center of sex abuse scandal closes (April 19, 2024)

– Thomas L. Root

Peters May Be The One – Update for March 5, 2024

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PETERS BLUNT WITH SENATORS ABOUT BOP TROUBLES

No one who’s ever had a beef with what I publish in this blog – and there surely are a lot of people who have complaints – has ever accused me of being an apologist for the Federal Bureau of Prisons. But here goes…

cucumber240305Watching BOP Director Colette Peters testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week was a refreshing departure from her previous appearances and a downright treat after enduring years of painful appearances by her clueless predecessor Michael Carvajal.

“The Feds survey says the Federal Bureau of Prisons is the worst place to work in federal government, so we have a lot of work to do,”  Peters candidly told the Committee last Wednesday during the hearing Committee Chairman Richard Durbin (D-IL) called in response to a DOJ Inspector General report on inmate deaths in federal prison.

That report, issued two weeks before, found that systemic and operational failures contributed to scores of prisoner deaths over the years. Durbin convened the hearing to underscore the report findings that – among others – suicide accounted for over half of the deaths reviewed by the IG.

Sharing the witness stand with DOJ IG Michael Horowitz, Peters was the target of most of the senators’ questions. But unlike her stumbling performances in prior Congressional hearings, Peters was confident, direct and armed with facts and numbers during the 2-hour session. And when Sen John Kennedy (R-LA) hectored her in one of the most bizarre barrage of questions in recent memory, she cooly stared him down while undoubtedly controlling the urge to ask him who tied his shoes for him every morning.

But back to the hearing.

Paters laid most of the blame for the issues raised in the report on BOP’s chronic staffing shortages. She told the senators that the data on BOP correctional officers are “startling,” rattling off the stats:

One in three have symptoms of PTSD. That means more anxiety, more depression, [and] that means more reliance on substance abuse and higher levels of divorce. Over 90% are obese or in the overweight category, over 90% have hypertension or pre-hypertension… What we’re finding across the country, in some places they can leave the [BOP] and work for state corrections and make two to three times more, let alone the bonuses that we’re battling against at fast food organizations. So it is incredibly difficult… I also want to remind the committee that the average onboarding for law enforcement in this country is 21 weeks [of training] and our officers receive about six. It’s truly unfortunate.

psy170427The IG report found that a shortage of psychiatric services employees “strained the ability of staff” in facilities where prisoners died “to provide adequate care to mentally ill inmates.” This has been a chronic BOP problem, where a dearth of mental health resources has led to many people being underdiagnosed, a 2018 Marshall Project investigation found. In the Senate hearing, Horowitz noted that over 60% of people who died by suicide in federal prisons had been on the Mental Health Care Level 1, meaning the BOP had determined that they did not need regular care mental health care.

Peters and Horowitz both pointed to staffing shortages as a key driver of the problems. A lack of clinical staff like psychologists and corrections officers has been an endemic challenge in many BOP facilities, the Marshall Project reported last weekend.

Horowitz also suggested that the BOP’s problems may be more than just staffing. Talking about contraband, he that “we’ve had a staff search policy recommendation open for years that has not been implemented, the basic search policy for staff coming into the facility, that hasn’t happened, either…” Several senators cited a GAO report last month that the BOP has failed to implement 58 of 87 recommendations on improving restrictive housing (also known as Special Housing Units, or SHUs) practices.

Kennedy tried to beat up Peters with a theatrical performance accusing her of using the First Step Act to release 30,000 criminals, 12% of whom have been recidivists (as though the decision when to release prisoners is her responsibility). Punctuating his questions with dramatic eye rolls and sighs of “Wow,” Kennedy sought to blame Peters for releasing thousands of violent criminals to prey on helpless civilians.

Kennedy: “How many criminals have you released under the First Step Act?”

Peters: “We have about 30,000 individuals that have been released since the passage of the First Step Act.”

Kennedy: “All right, so you’ve released 30,000 criminals under the First Step Act, okay? . . . Before you released them, did you contact any of their victims to say, ‘We’re about to let this guy out’?”

Peters: “Senator, it’s my understanding that that notification happens through the U.S. Attorney’s Office, but I will check into that and get back to you.”

Kennedy: “You don’t know?”

Peters: “Senator, I don’t.”

Kennedy: “Wow. Okay, of the 30,000 criminals you let free, how many of them have come back, have committed a crime again, hurt somebody else?”

Peters: “So, that number is one that we’re still looking at as it relates to the recidivism rate for those that were released on the First Step Act.”

Kennedy: “You don’t have any idea?”

Peters: “No, Senator.”

The implication that Peters and the BOP should be responsible for victim notification – a duty of the US Attorneys offices – or maintaining recidivism records is risable. It’s like asking the Veterans Administration how much ammo the Defense Dept has.

tieshoes240305Beyond that, suggesting that somehow Peters was releasing BOP prisoners on her whim, rather than in response to the court-ordered sentences ending or statutory mandates requires a special kind of ignorance of the law unbecoming of a man who was Phi Beta Kappa and with years of experience as a lawyer. That makes his embarrassing performance all the more puzzling.

He did not embarrass Peters, who was calmly unfazed by his attack. Committee Chairman Richard Durbin (D-IL) finally braced Kennedy: “Don’t put your head in a bag… The First Step Act was a constructive reform of the penal system and I think it was a good idea and I stand by it.”

Sen Cory Booker (D-NJ) said the BOP has simply not been provided enough resources. “I have a lot of frustrations obviously with what’s going on. But I’ve watched you now as a professional struggle mightily to meet the demands that are put on you in a moment where Congress is not giving you the resources necessary to do your job,” Booker said.

Sen Chris Coons (D-DE) told Peters that she has “inherited a deeply troubled institution and I suspect you some days feel like your job is more akin to trying to change the direction of an aircraft carrier than lead an agile and well-resourced organization because the BOP is frankly neither and I appreciate the determination, openness and vigor with which you’ve approached this task.”

Almost half of the suicides took place in a “restrictive housing setting,” the IG Report said. Durbin told Peters that “despite the decrease in Bureau of Prisons total population since you were sworn in as director in August of 2022 the percentage and total of number of individuals and restricted housing is actually higher than it was at that time…”

shucell240212Peters said that almost 40%t of those who lived in restrictive housing did so by their own choice. Nevertheless, she admitted that “everyone who is in restrictive housing has or will suffer from some form of mental or physical damage. I think even those that are agreeing or wanting to be in restrictive housing need to be educated on the fact that that isn’t where they belong and that we need to be able to safely house them in [general population]. Just because they’re volunteering to be there doesn’t mean that the physical and mental wear and tear isn’t happening for them as well.”

“It’s time for solutions and change,” Durbin agreed. “The lives of hundreds of Americans in Bureau of Prisons custody are at risk.”

Roll Call, Federal prison director tells senators about staffing ‘crisis’ (February 28, 2024)

Capital News Service, Deaths in federal prisons draw fire from Senate panel (February 29, 2024)

DOJ, Office of Inspector General, Evaluation of Issues Surrounding Inmate Deaths in Federal Bureau of Prisons Institutions (February 15, 2024)

The Marshall Project, How Federal Prisons Are Getting Worse (March 2, 2024)

WHBF-TV, Senate Judiciary Committee grills Bureau of Prisons chief on staffing, inmate deaths (February 28, 2024)

Sen John Kennedy, Kennedy questions Bureau of Prisons on early release of criminals: “You don’t have the slightest idea how many of them committed another crime and came back?” (February 28, 2024)

– Thomas L. Root

BOP Director On Senate Judiciary Hot Seat Tomorrow – Update for February 27, 2024

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JUDICIARY COMMITTEE WANTS ANSWERS ON BOP INMATE DEATHS

critic160816The impact of a trio of government reports berating the Federal Bureau of Prisons continued to reverberate last week. A scheduled appearance of BOP Director Colette Peters and her new nemesis, Dept of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz, before the Senate Judiciary Committee tomorrow promises that the cascade of criticism will continue pouring down on the agency..

A February 6 Government Accountability Office report chastised the BOP for implementing fewer than half of prior GAO recommendations on the use of restrictive housing (such as the SHU and Communications Management Units). The report blamed the BOP for failing to “assign[] responsibility for implementing these recommendations to the appropriate officials.”

A February 15 DOJ Office of Inspector General report found that “a combination of recurring policy violations and operational failures” – including deficiencies in inmate assessments and Mental Health Care Level assignments, holding inmates at risk for suicides in single cells, lack of urgency in responding to medical emergencies, and poor after-the-fact recordkeeping – contributed to inmate deaths.

A companion management advisory also issued on February 15 advised the BOP of the OIG’s “concerns” about the “inadequacy” of BOP policies on retaining records of rounds made by SHU COs “to ensure the preservation of those original documents as evidence when allegations of misconduct are raised.”

documentretention240227A Washington Post opinion column by Joe Davidson, who covers federal government issues in the Federal Insider, flayed the BOP as “an agency in crisis.” “The Federal Bureau of Prisons has been a profoundly broken agency for a very long time now,” he quoted David C. Fathi, American Civil Liberties Union National Prison Project director, as saying.

Laura Rovner, director of the University of Denver’s Civil Rights Clinic, who has represented isolated prisoners, is quoted as saying the BOP “is lacking the ability or the will to change, possibly both of those things.”

Last week, Government Executive – a publication aimed at federal managers – reported that the IG found “wildly different document retention standards, ranging from as little as one month to the recommended six months, to as long as 10 years.” The report itself noted that “OIG has conducted numerous investigations of allegations that BOP employees falsified round documentation; thus, such documentation is often important evidence in criminal investigations and prosecutions,” Horowitz wrote. “If documentation related to potential staff misconduct, such as mandatory round logs, are only retained for six months, such evidence may be destroyed before the discovery that a crime occurred.”

bureaucraticgobbledygook24019In her response, Peters called the inspector general’s findings “troubling” and agreed with all of the report’s recommendations, though she stressed that the misconduct cited was one by a “very small percentage of the approximately 35,000 employees . . . who continue to strive for correctional excellence every day.”

Sen Dick Durbin (D-IL), who chairs the Judiciary Committee, has been a supporter of Director Peters but said this month that he was “extremely disappointed” and “disheartened” that BOP officials “have not implemented multiple recommendations to curb restrictive housing. This issue has been studied extensively, and now is the time for action.”

bureaucracybopspeed230501Committee members expressed some frustration with Ms. Peters at the BOP oversight hearing last October for the agency’s habit of being nonresponsive to their written questions, many of which have gone unanswered for over a year. It is unlikely that her effort to palm problems off onto “a very small percentage” of employees or to mouth platitudes about “35,000 employees… who continue to strive for correctional excellence every day” will let her leave the hearing unscathed.

Senate Judiciary Committee, Hearing on Examining and Preventing Deaths of Incarcerated Individuals in Federal Prisons (set for February 28, 2024)

GAO, Bureau of Prisons: Additional Actions Needed to Improve Restrictive Housing Practices (February 6, 2024)

DOJ OIG, Evaluation of Issues Surrounding Inmate Deaths in Federal Bureau of Prisons Institutions (February 15, 2024)

DOJ OIC, Notification of Concerns Regarding Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Policies Pertaining to Special Housing Unit Logs Used to Record Mandatory Rounds and the Retention Period for the Original Logs (February 15, 2024)

Washington Post, Watchdog reports cite long-standing crises in federal prisons (February 23, 2024)

Govt Executive, Federal prison employees falsified logs in case where inmate committed suicide, IG says (February 21, 2024)

– Thomas L. Root

BOP’s Ambitious “Framework for the Future’s” Overshadowed Launch – Update for February 22, 2024

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IG REPORT RAINS ON DIRECTOR’S PARADE

rainparade240222The tsunami of the Inspector General’s bad news (which I reported on Monday) threatened to wash away BOP Director Colette Peters’ rollout earlier last week of the agency’s “Framework for the Future,” an ambitious and obese plan “encompassing seven goals and over 180 unique initiatives… set to redefine the Bureau’s operations,” according to the BOP press release, which gushed:

The Executive Team, consisting of Regional Directors, Assistant Directors, and key figures from within the Director’s office, is personally overseeing these initiatives. Their unwavering commitment is geared towards propelling the agency forward, fostering a humane and secure environment, and preparing individuals for successful reentry into communities.

The BOP told employees in a video message last week that Peters had introduced the “Framework for the Future” and “engage[d] and empower[ed] the agency’s dedicated workforce with details about the seven goals.”

somebull240222C’mon, Ms. Peters, please empower your dedicated PR flacks to spare us the bureaucratic happy talk BS, And while we’re at it, seven goals?  One hundred eighty unique initiatives? Let’s keep it simple.

Writing in Forbes, Walter Pavlo said, “Peters was given a mandate by Congress to improve the BOP but many of those needed improvements have been problems for years. Office of Inspector General and Government Accountability Office have both authored scathing reports on the BOP. Peters, who appeared on 60 Minutes earlier this month, understands that the BOP cannot continue to operate inefficiently, and in some cases inhumanely, as it has for decades.”

Pavlo says many believe that Peters is “the agent of change needed to overhaul the BOP… which has been plagued by employee misconduct… increases in healthcare costs, understaffing, and infrastructure decay. The BOP has also had difficulty implementing the First Step Act… Delays in implementation have been caused by early misinterpretation of the law, computer glitches and a shortage of halfway house capacity.”

“The BOP has challenges and now Peters has outlined a plan to overcome them,” Pavlo says, but he warns that “it will not be easy.”

listenup240222Peters has taken a deliberate approach to the problems, which are legion. During her first year as Director, Peters conducted “listening sessions,” including the novel but quite reasonable requirement for wardens of the BOP’s 122-odd facilities to listen to former prisoners, crime victims, subordinates in prison management and line workers, and advocates for change in the system. Writing in a Federal News Network story, Pavlo and attorney Alan Ellis predicted that “[i]t will take another year to judge the new direction Peters wants to take the agency, but expect her to double down on her message of a more humane federal prison system.”

Last summer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) proposed making the director of the Bureau of Prisons a Senate-confirmed position in S.2284, the Federal Prisons Accountability Act of 2023. The same measure has been filed in the House of Representatives as H.R.4138 by Rep. Glenn Thompson (R-PA), a member of the House BOP Reform Caucus.

Pavlo and Ellis observed that “Director Peters has enjoyed a long honeymoon with lawmakers, but they will be looking for results in 2024 — and so will many prisoners and BOP staff members.”

Bureau of Prisons, Reforming the Federal Bureau of Prisons (February 12. 2024)

Forbes, Bureau of Prisons Director Lays Out Goals For Improving Agency (February 13, 2024)

Federal News Network, The Bureau of Prisons and the challenges going into 2024 (February 21, 2024)

S.2284 – Federal Prisons Accountability Act of 2023

– Thomas L. Root

BOP Negligence Causes Inmate Deaths, DOJ Says – Update for February 19, 2024

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We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

DEPT OF JUSTICE BLASTS BOP NEGLIGENCE IN PREVENTING INMATE DEATHS

fail200526Chronic failures by the Federal Bureau of Prisons have contributed to the deaths of hundreds of inmates, the Dept of Justice’s Inspector General concluded last Thursday in a report that CNN called “blistering.”

The Report found that

a combination of recurring policy violations and operational failures contributed to inmate suicides, which accounted for more than half of the 344 inmate deaths reviewed. We identified deficiencies in staff completion of inmate assessments, which prevented some institutions from adequately addressing inmate suicide risks. We also found potentially inappropriate Mental Health Care Level assignments for some inmates who later died by suicide. More than half of the inmates who died by suicide were single-celled, or housed in a cell alone, which increases inmate suicide risk.

DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz said, “Today’s report identified numerous operational and managerial deficiencies, which created unsafe conditions prior to and at the time of a number of these deaths.

The media were more savage: “A combination of negligence, operational failures and a blundering workforce has contributed to hundreds of inmate deaths in federal custody,” The Washington Post wrote.

CNN said that

For years, the embattled Bureau of Prisons has been the subject of accusations by politicians, prisoner advocacy groups for mistreating or neglecting inmates.

The Justice Department itself has issued scathing rebukes against BOP, outlining serious mistakes that have led to the deaths of high-profile inmates like notorious Boston gangster and convicted murderer James “Whitey” Bulger, who was killed shortly after being transferred to a new prison, and financier Jeffrey Epstein, who died by suicide in his jail cell.

But the circumstances that led to Bulger and Epstein’s deaths are emblematic of wide-ranging and recurring issues within the federal prison system that affect hundreds of inmates across the country, the DOJ’s Office of Inspector General found in its report that outlined a system in crisis failing to protect its charges.

NPR was terser: “The BOP is a mess.”

Many of the Report’s findings have applicability beyond the suicide issue. The IG said that “some institution staff failed to coordinate efforts across departments to provide necessary treatment or follow-up with inmates in distress.” Staff deficiencies in responding to medical emergencies “ranged from a lack of urgency in responding, failure to bring or use appropriate emergency equipment, unclear radio communications, and issues with naloxone administration in opioid overdose cases.”

failuretocommunicate221027The Report found deficiencies extended to after-action documentation. “The BOP was unable to produce documents required by its own policies in the event of an inmate death for many of the inmate deaths we reviewed,” the Report said. “The BOP requires in-depth After-Action Reviews only following inmate suicides but not for inmate homicides or deaths resulting from accidents and unknown factors. The BOP’s ability to fully understand the circumstances that led to inmate deaths and to identify steps that may help prevent future deaths is therefore limited.”

The Report examined four categories of BOP non-medical deaths between 2014 and 2021, suicide, homicide, accident, and unknown factors (where the BOP could not determine the cause of death). Of the 344 non-medical deaths during that time period, 54% were suicides, 26% were homicides, 16% were accidents. Under four percent were from unknown factors. Most of the suicides occurred when inmates were locked up in single cells.

The BOP’s non-medical death count climbed 68% between 2014 and 2021 while the prison population fell 27%. In 2014, there were 38 inmate deaths by unnatural causes. In 2021, that number was 57 inmates.

The Report noted that the BOP has policies in place to prevent inmate suicides. But it found “numerous instances of potentially inappropriate” mental health assessments for inmates who later killed themselves. What’s more, BOP staff “did not sufficiently conduct required inmate rounds or counts in over a third of inmate suicides,” and they sometimes “failed to communicate with each other and coordinate efforts across departments to provide necessary treatment or follow-up with inmates in distress,” the Report found.

Many BOP facilities failed to run suicide drills mandated by policy (required three times a year, once for each shift), the Report said. Thirty-five percent of BOP facilities “were unable to provide evidence that they conducted a single mock suicide drill from 2018 through 2020.”
inmatesuicidedeath240219In one suicide case cited by the Report, BOP staff claimed to have searched a cell three times — including the day before the suicide — but found no contraband. After the prisoner died by a self-inflicted overdose, a search of the cell he had been in turned up 1,000 pills, the IG said.

The BOP continues to grapple with a severe staffing shortage, ‘which has a ripple effect across the agency’s institutions,” NBC said. Correctional Officers work multiple shifts and healthcare workers are “augmented” to serve as COs, being pulled from their regular duties. “That translates into less mental health care for inmates,” NPR reported.

“At one facility,” Government Executive reported, “psychiatric staff were reassigned daily for two months straight. In another case, a facility did not have any psychological services personnel on staff… Half of [one] facility’s nursing positions were unfilled. At another facility, employees worked double shifts for three consecutive days. Personnel on staff are often undertrained, the IG found, with the bureau’s after-action reviews identifying insufficient training as an issue in 42% of deaths. They are also improperly disciplined, with employees themselves telling the IG the process was too lengthy and ineffective.

The BOP continues to struggle to keep facilities free of contraband drugs and weapons, which contributed to nearly a third of inmate deaths in the Report.

Sen Richard Durbin (D-IL), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has scheduled BOP Director Colette Peters and DOJ Inspector General Horowitz to testify on February 28th in a Committee hearing focused on federal inmate deaths.

“It is deeply disturbing that today’s report found that the majority of BOP’s non-medical deaths in custody could have been prevented or mitigated by greater compliance with BOP policy, better staffing, and increased mental health and substance abuse treatment,” Durbin said in a statement. “Accountability across the Bureau is necessary and long overdue.”

The IG recommended several changes to BOP procedure, including developing strategies to ensure that inmate mental health is properly evaluated, that prison staff is taught to use defibrillators and naloxone, and to develop procedures that require inmate death records to be consistently prepared.

bureaucraticgobbledygook24019

A BOP spokesperson told CNN last week that the agency “acknowledges and concurs with the need for improvements” and is “dedicated to implementing these changes to ensure the safety and well-being of those in our custody.”

Sure it is, provided its staff isn’t being asked to make rounds, conduct drills or fill out reports.

CNN, DOJ watchdog report finds chronic failures by Bureau of Prisons contributed to the deaths of hundreds of inmates (February 15, 2024)

Dept of Justice, DOJ OIG Releases Report on Issues Surrounding Inmate Deaths in Federal Bureau of Prisons Institutions (February 15, 2024)

NPR, DOJ watchdog finds 187 inmate suicides in federal prisons over 8-year period (February 15, 2024)

Government Executive, Understaffing and mismanagement contributed to hundreds of deaths in federal prisons (February 16, 2024)

NBC, Bureau of Prisons failed to prevent nearly 200 deaths by suicide, DOJ watchdog finds (February 15, 2024)

Washington Post, IG report finds deadly culture of negligence and staffing issues at federal prisons (February 15, 2024)

– Thomas L. Root

Five Years Later, BOP Still Doesn’t Have First Step Act Right – Update For October 27, 2023

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We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

FIVE YEARS SHOULD BE LONG ENOUGH TO GET FIRST STEP ACT RIGHT

firststepB180814The First Step Act, including its innovative system for granting credits to inmates who complete programs designed to reduce recidivism, is 5 years old in less than two months. But it took three years of fits and starts before the Bureau of Prisons pretty much had a final set of rules for administering FSA credits (after a proposal that was as miserly as the final rule was generous hanging around for a year of comments).

Now, almost two years later, the BOP is still muddled in trying to launch a computer program of forward-looking calculation for FSA credits that predicts when a prisoner will leave BOP custody for halfway house or home confinement (HH/HC). The agency still lacks a comprehensive list of what types of inmate employment or education constitutes “productive activities,” which are supposed to continue a prisoner’s earning of FSA credits. And the BOP continues to deny HH/HC placement because it lacks resources, despite First Step’s requirement that inmates be placed to the full extent of their FSA credits.

Writing in Forbes last week, Walter Pavlo observed that “prisoners, mostly minimum and low security, who are eligible for these credits have done their best to try to participate in programs but many complain of a lack of classes, mostly due to the challenges the BOP is having in hiring people. However, beyond that, the BOP has been liberal in accepting that the BOP does not have the staff to fulfill the demand for classes and credits are being given anyway, mostly for participating in productive activities, like jobs. This misses the primary mission of programming meant to have a lasting, positive influence on prisoners after they leave the institution.

“Now,” Pavlo said, “nearly two years since the Federal Register’s Final Rule in January 2022, the BOP still has no reliable calculator to determine the number of FSA credits a prisoner will earn during a prison term… One of the last remaining issues is for the BOP to have a forward-looking calculation for FSA credits that predicts when a prisoner will leave BOP custody. It sounds easy, but the BOP’s current computer program can only assess credits after they are earned each month, and it usually takes a full month after they are earned for them to post. The result is that each month, prisoners’ families look at BOP.gov to see if there are indeed new credits and if the amount they are expecting matches what is expected. This moving date is important because it can also determine when prisoners can leave prison for home confinement or halfway house. The result, prisoners are staying in institutions, institutions that are understaffed, for days, weeks and months beyond when they could be released to home confinement or halfway houses. This is defeating one of the other initiatives of the First Step Act and that was to get more people out of decaying BOP facilities and into another form of confinement that is far less expensive.”

Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Illinois)
Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Illinois)

First Step is important to Congress. When BOP Director Colette Peters appeared for a Senate Judiciary Committee oversight hearing chaired by Senator Richard Durbin (D-IL) last month, “her answer failed to address the continued shortcomings of the implementation,” Pavlo said. “There are thousands of prisoners, many minimum security, who are stuck in prison because of a lack of a computer program that simply calculates forward-looking FSA credits…This computer program was actually alluded to in declarations the BOP submitted to federal courts in 2022 stating that it would be implemented ‘soon.’ Over a year since those declarations, there is still no program to accurately calculate when a prisoner will leave an institution.”

The BOP is facing a substantial halfway house bed shortage as well. There is also the issue of insufficient halfway house space. Unlike HH/HC placement for prisoners without FSA credits, 18 USC 3624(g)(2) does not give the BOP discretion. Subsection 3624(g)(2) says that if a prisoner is eligible (has FSA credits not already applied to a year off of the sentence), he or she “shall be placed in prerelease custody as follows,” describing halfway house or home confinement. There’s nothing hortatory about it. The BOP is required to put the prisoner in HH/HC. Excuses not accepted.

halfway161117Pavlo argued that “the only way to address this situation is to implement a task force to move prisoners through the system and catch up from the failures of the past few years. Systemic challenges of shortages of staff and augmentation which takes away staff like case managers from their jobs, cause continued problems. The BOP needs to get caught up, move prisoners along and develop reliable systems that will assure that the FSA is implemented as the law requires. While the BOP has made great strides, these last challenges of full implementation can be achieved by focusing a concerted effort on three issues; fixing the calculator, assessing the prisoners who will soon be going home as a result of that computer fix, and expanding halfway house capacity to handle them.”

Forbes, Time For A Bureau Of Prisons Task Force To Implement The First Step Act (October 16, 2023)

– Thomas L. Root

Now’s Your Chance, Colette – Update for September 18, 2023

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We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues.

REDEMPTION FOR COLETTE PETERS IS AT HAND

kumbaya221003On Friday, I reported on last week’s furball at the Senate Judiciary Committee oversight committee hearing, at which Bureau of Prisons Director Colette Peters was soundly thrashed by senator after senator about her agency’s poor correspondence record when it comes to responding to Congressional inquiries.

Specifically, after being warned last fall (during an otherwise kumbaya hearing welcoming Peters as the new director after the unlamented departure of Michael Carvajal) that various letters and requests for information the Senate had sent to the BOP over the previous years had gone unanswered, Colette has let another year’s worth of Senate interrogatories pile up. Her excuse that answers to senators’ letters had to go through a “review process” was as lame as it sounded.

Committee chairman Sen Richard Durbin (D-IL) ended the contentious session with some good advice for Peters: “Senators take it very personally when you don’t answer their questions. More than almost any other thing that I would recommend I’d make that a high priority.” She promised to do better, albeit in a fuzzy way that promised no hard deadlines.

mail210312Lucky for Peters, her chance to turn over a new leaf on responding to Senate concerns has already arrived. Last Tuesday, Sens Durbin, Charles Grassley (R-IA), Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) wrote a letter to Peters “regarding allegations of serious misconduct” occurring at FCC Hazelton. The letter asked that DOJ and the BOP “immediately investigate disturbing whistleblower reports of abusive treatment of incarcerated individuals and other employee misconduct… These reports, combined with public reporting on FCC Hazelton’s dire staffing shortages and proliferation of weapons contraband, paint a grim picture of the institution’s inability to ensure a safe environment for those in BOP custody and employees alike.”

hazelton181106The problems at “Misery  Mountain” are nothing new.  The letter to Peters, however, is quite detailed, alleging that:

  • Hazelton staff released the wrong incarcerated individual from the facility after failing to properly identify the correct individual scheduled for release.
  • A group of inmates escaped from the prison camp and supervisory staff attempted to cover it up.
  • Supervisory Hazelton staff falsified documents, encouraged inmate abuse, and covered up alleged abuse and escapes of incarcerated individuals. The falsified documents include medical assessments, incident reports, duty rosters, and time and attendance sheets, along with requests to tamper with corresponding security cameras to cover up inmate escapes. The employees engaged in these practices have not been disciplined, and, in some cases, received promotions, despite open investigations into their misconduct.
  • A staff member punched a prisoner on camera.
  • Staff members use restrictive housing punitively against prisoners and engage in a pattern of physical abuse of inmates in the SHU.
  • Staff repeatedly use racial slurs against other staff members and prisoners.
  • Staff urinated on prisoner property.
  • Staff has forced prisoners to urinate and defecate on themselves as a condition of being released from restrictive custody.
  • Staff assaulted a prisoner, breaking his ribs.
  • Staff beat a SHU prisoner so severely that he had a seizure and had to be hospitalized.
  • Staff shreds personal inmate mail and failing to provide inmates access to their mail. 
  • The existence of an internally organized group comprised of staff at various levels within FCC Hazelton facilities that are partially responsible for the misconduct at the facility, known as the “Good Ol’ Boys Club”. 

The letter asks for information regarding the investigation of abuse by no later than October 3rd, including a list of abuse allegations at FCC Hazelton since 2013, a list of FCC Hazelton staff members who have been promoted or transferred while under investigation for inmate abuse, copies of all documents regarding crimes and transfers of BOP staff who have been charged with a crime at FCC since 2013, and the number of employees who continued to work with inmates while under investigation for inmate abuse

WBOY-TV in Fairmont reported that it asked the BOP for a statement and got this:

The Federal Bureau of Prisons responds directly to Members of Congress and their staff.  Out of respect and deference to Members, we do not share our Congressional correspondence with the media. 

Unbelievable220811That’s rich. According to the Judiciary Committee, the BOP doesn’t even share its Congressional correspondence with Congress.

One would think that the BOP cannot ignore this letter.  But then, no one’s lost money yet betting against Bureau of Prisons transparency.

Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Oversight of the Federal Bureau of Prisons (September 13, 2023)

Associated Press, Senators clash with US prisons chief over transparency, seek fixes for problem-plagued agency (September 13, 2023)

Letter to Merrick Garland and Colette Peters from Sen Richard Durbin et al. (September 12, 2023)

WBOY-TV, Whistleblower alleges staff are covering up abuse, escapes at FCC Hazelton (September 13, 2023)

– Thomas L. Root