Jail

If the Carroll County commissioners don't follow the recommendation of newly hired jail warden Mason W. Waters to junk their plan for a modular addition to the jail in Westminster, they will be making a big mistake. Mr. Waters has suggested that instead of constructing a modular addition, a staff training room at the facility should be converted into a 24-bed dormitory for work-release inmates.The commissioners have to recognize they have two problems that need to be addressed -- short-term and long-term overcrowding.

Two inmates in a medium-security building at the Baltimore City Detention Center attempted an escape by removing a ceiling tile in a shower room and crawling through the rafters.But Tony Brown, 27, and David Gollahan, 31, apparently didn't realize that there was no where to crawl to, said Barbara Cooper, a jail spokeswoman.Above 7:40 p.m. Friday, correctional officers saw the opening through which the inmates crawled, and shortly afterward, captured them.Ms. Cooper said Mr. Brown, who is serving a sentence for assault and driving while intoxicated, and Mr. Gollahan, seving a sentence for traffic convictions, were placed in segregation.

Enough is enough. The time has come for Anne Arundel County's Traveling Jail Circus to find a place to pitch its tents for good.While the existing county jail gets more outdated and overcrowded by the day, the traveling circus has spent nearly two years hopping from place to place -- packing up and moving when each community and its elected representatives start screaming. First Glen Burnie. Then Pasadena. South County. Crownsville. Millersville (the choice of a county executive-appointed site selection committee)

The death of a young woman confined to the Harford County Detention Center this week recalls public attention to a penal facility that is already enwrapped in political controversy.There is no immediate suggestion that proper procedures were not carefully followed by jail personnel. Niecey D. Aldridge, 24, of Aberdeen died early Sunday after a series of severe asthma attacks since her incarceration three weeks ago, even as her lawyer asked for her medical release.An ongoing investigation ought to sort out the details in the sudden death.

Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend had some advice yesterday for inmate David Warner at the Baltimore City Detention Center."You're not going to come back here, right?" she asked, sounding like a friendly assistant principal dealing with an unruly youngster."It's my first time, and it will be my last time," answered Mr. Warner, 27, before turning back to the soap opera sex scene unfolding on the television in one of the jail's day rooms.Mrs. Townsend, 44, was officially at the detention center to publicize the state's progress in bringing the jail's inmate population within a federally imposed cap.But the visit also provided a glimpse at her upbeat style as she made valiant, if sometimes awkward stabs at small talk.

Today, the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee begins mulling over the proposal to allocate $1.25 million in design funds for a badly needed jail in Anne Arundel County. The prognosis is not good, however.The Anne Arundel County Council voted 5-2 against the site Monday night. The county's Senate delegation is evenly split on the issue. This is partly because County Executive Robert R. Neall didn't brief residents and local politicos on his jail plans.We hope that this legislative hearing shifts the focus of debate back to where it should be -- on the need for a new lockup.

All the trappings of the modern jail were on show at the Howard County Detention Center yesterday -- the $2 million electronic control center; the 28-bed substance abuse facility; the clean, modern cells and lack of crowding.But state inspectors touring the Jessup facility as part of a routine audit were a day too late to witness a darker side of jail life: a struggle with an inmate that sent a 37-year-old correctional officer to the hospital, where he was later treated and released.That incident went unmentioned as jail officials touted the benefits of the facility's $12 million renovations completed last fall, including a modernized security system and expanded recreational facilities.

The duel moves north tonight.In what some have only half-jokingly called the second "battle between the north and the south," the County Council will hold a second public hearing on two resolutions: one would put a new jail in Glen Burnie; the other would put it in Crownsville.The resolution is important because a site must be agreed upon before the General Assembly will provide the customary 50 percent funding for jail projects. With the state legislative session more than half over, time is running out if funding is to be granted this year.

BALTIMORE'S JAIL should carry a warning: "Hazardous to your health." That's the contention of lawyers for inmates at the Baltimore City Detention Center in East Baltimore who recently sought help from the federal court to address issues of medical neglect and unsanitary conditions there. These problems aren't new; in fact, they are long-standing. A year ago, the U.S. Department of Justice issued a scathing report that concluded the state's operation of the facility was so poor in several areas that it had violated inmates' constitutional rights.

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Convicted killer Harold Benjamin Dean, the only person ever to escape from Maryland's Supermax prison, complained at a hearing yesterday that he was treated better there than in the Franklin County Jail in Columbus, where he is being held on $1 million bail.In a brief session in the county Common Pleas Court, Judge Paul Martin granted a county prosecutor's request to hold Dean for up to 60 more days -- the deadline for authorities to secure an extradition order from Maryland's governor.