Last December the American Civil Liberties Union agreed to join the state to request an end to 12 years of federal monitoring at the Oahu Community Correctional Center and the Women's Community Correctional Center. The reason for that agreement was that overcrowding and other unacceptable conditions at those facilities had been improved.
Now, in the course of a few months, the situation has deteriorated sharply. The women's facility is about 50 percent over its 110-inmate capacity. An ACLU representative told federal Judge Samuel King that some inmates are forced to sleep in the recreation room and the therapeutic room, so they can't be used for the designated purposes. The OCCC is also exceeding its 675-inmate limit. The ACLU's Alvin Bronstein said, "A lot of inmates need treatment, not prison. Right now, they're just throwing everyone in there."
Both the ACLU and the state asked the judge to postpone the hearing until June 19 to give the state time to deal with the overcrowding. A new wing of the women's prison is under construction but its opening has been delayed.
Public Safety Director Keith Kaneshiro said the department hopes to have 300 new beds by June. It is asking the Legislature to fund 718 more beds and the transfer of 300 prisoners to mainland facilities. That would be in addition to 300 already in Texas prisons.
After canceling plans for a prison on the Big Island and stating that he preferred to spend money on schools than on prisons, Governor Cayetano has recognized the need for more prison capacity and has embarked on an expansion program.
Incarceration is not an ideal solution, and more emphasis should be placed on community-based programs for some criminals. However, the fact is that the prisons are overcrowded. The federal courts will not tolerate blatant overcrowding and the state will be forced to relieve the situation somehow.
Early release of convicts is a solution -- not a desirable one, but one that officials might have to resort to in the absence of more capacity. Sending convicts to mainland prisons is a short-term solution but not a desirable one either.
At the same time, the state's financial problems make it difficult to find the money for more prisons. But the need to provide more capacity is inescapable. The delay in lifting the federal monitoring of the prison underscores that point.
However, Saddam Hussein does not seem like a person who could reasonably claim damages for defamation of character. What character?
Yet the Iraqi despot is suing a left-wing French magazine and its editor for defamation in a Paris court. Saddam evidently could take being called a butcher, assassin and monster, but not cretin. We'll remember that the next time we write about him.
Rupert E. Phillips, CEO
John M. Flanagan, Editor & Publisher
David Shapiro, Managing Editor
Diane Yukihiro Chang, Senior Editor & Editorial Page Editor
Frank Bridgewater & Michael Rovner, Assistant Managing Editors
A.A. Smyser, Contributing Editor