State sends
more inmates to
mainland prisons

The 308 prisoners from Halawa
were flown out last night
to Tennessee and Oklahoma

By Gregg Kakesako
Star-Bulletin

The state has transferred 308 inmates from Halawa Correctional Facility to prisons in Tennessee and Oklahoma.

In the state's latest transfer designed to provide temporary relief for the prison overcrowding problem, the inmates were loaded into six buses late yesterday afternoon, then placed on a Tradewinds Airlines charter jet. Each inmate was seen carrying a green bag.

State prison officials declined to provide details about the latest transfer until the inmates were secured in their new homes.

The Legislature this year appropriated $12.5 million and authorized state Public Safety Director Keith Kaneshiro to send another 600 inmates to mainland prisons to ease the state's crowded conditions.

Hawaii's first batch of inmates was sent in 1995 to three Texas jails run by a private company.

Today's move will bring the total to 900, including 64 women.

Once completed, the transfer of all 1,200 inmates will have cost the state more than $18 million.

More than 4,800 inmates are kept at Hawaii's eight major prison facilities, which have been constantly remodified and now hold 2,900 inmates.

Halawa, the state's largest prison, was built and modified and to house 1,046, but before yesterday's transfer its population was nearly 1,600 prisoners.

At Oahu Community Correctional Center in Kalihi, the situation is the same.

Designed and modified to hold 833 inmates, OCCC has a population of 1,179.

The situation has become so bad that state corrections officials have been forced to place three inmates to a cell at OCCC.

On the Big Island, inmates at the Hawaii Community Correctional Center in Hilo have sued the state, charging conditions there amount to cruel and unusual punishment or violations of their due process.

There are now 285 inmates in a facility designed to hold 179.

In the past, Kaneshiro said moving Halawa inmates to the mainland would help alleviate the crowded conditions at OCCC and the neighbor islands since inmates there could be transferred to Halawa.

But even with the latest transfer, Dan Foley, American Civil Liberties Union attorney, predicts that OCCC will be beyond its capacity within six months.

The transfers are seen as short-term solutions to the state's prison overcrowding problem.

Lawmakers this year gave the governor authority to construct a new prison on the Big Island.

Land adjacent to the Kulani Correctional Facility is expected to be used for the 2,300-

bed prison which likely will take three years to build.

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Federal criticism of
Texas jail conditions
concerns state

The attorney general's office
awaits the prisons' response

By Gregg K. Kakesako
Star-Bulletin

The state attorney general's office is "extremely concerned" over U.S. Justice Department charges that the conditions at the southwest Texas jail housing 100 Hawaii inmates fail to provide adequate security and inmate protection.

Cynthia Quinn, special assistant to Attorney General Margery Bronster, said Justice Department officials have given the operators of the Dickens County Correctional Center until mid-August to respond to their investigation, which found that conditions in the facility violate the inmates' federal constitutional rights.

Quinn said "it would be premature to draw any final conclusions" until the private contractor responds to the report. Until April, the Dickens facility in Spur, Texas, about 93 miles east of Lubbock, was run by the Austin-based Bobby Ross Group.

Since then, the 585-bed facility has been run by Correction Services Corp.

State Public Safety Director Keith Kaneshiro declined to comment on the critical, 13-page Justice Department report, referring all questions to Bronster. Quinn said she knew of no plans to move Hawaii's inmates from Dickens.

The Justice Department said the facility's design is more similar to that of a jail than a prison, consisting mostly of dormitory-style housing.

On May 9, 1997, a fight between Hawaii and Montana inmates at Dickens resulted in the death of Montana inmate Neal Hagen.

Of the six Hawaii inmates involved in the fight, one is serving a 20-year sentence for aggravated robbery and kidnapping and another was sentenced to 60 years for escape and burglary. Four are serving life sentences for murder.

Five of these inmates were classified as minimum custody inmates and the Justice Department said it believes these inmates were not properly classified.

Five Hawaii inmates were transferred to Newton after the riot, but no one has been charged.

The report also states that guards are not properly trained, citing several examples where their response to prison yard disturbances was inadequate.

"For example, the staff has attempted to quell yard disturbances through the use of shotguns, without sufficient resort to lesser alternatives, such as the use of chemical agents, first."

The report also refers to an Aug. 28, 1997, incident where a guard, who was not range qualified, fired live rounds. Dickens Warden George Fry was fired after ordering guards to fire live rounds and rubber bullets over the heads of inmates.

Other problems cited include inadequate medical care and inadequate mental health care. The state has 540 male inmates at Newton and Dickens.