Maryland Correctional

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger wants to nearly double funding - up to $93.9 million - for "anti-recidivism" efforts in his state, including more drug treatment, counseling and housing assistance for inmates upon their release. Schwarzenegger, a Republican, understands that meeting the primary goal of a state corrections system - protecting the public - includes keeping the worst criminals behind bars and reducing the rate at which other inmates commit crimes once they return to society.

Maryland corrections officials announced yesterday a series of security improvements at the state's prisons while continuing to deny any major problems in the wake of two escapes this year.The measures include a higher fence with razor wire at the Maryland Correctional Institution at Jessup (MCIJ), where convicted murderer Gregory L. Lawrence and convicted armed robber Byron L. Smoot fled May 18 and were recaptured two days later.The state is also installing a more secure fence at the Maryland Correctional Training Center at Hagerstown, where convicted armed robber Raymond E. Dodd escaped July 12. He has not been recaptured.

In a move to improve security at Maryland correctional institutions, inmates serving life terms who have an escape history have been transferred to more secure facilities.As of July 28, said Commissioner of Correction William W. Sondervan, 52 of 73 inmates whose records were reviewed have been transferred to the Maryland House of Correction in Jessup, the Roxbury Correctional Institution at Hagerstown or the Western Correctional Institution in Cumberland.The action followed the recent escape of two inmates from the Maryland Correctional Institution at Jessup, Sondervan said.

After more than a decade under federal court supervision, four of Maryland's oldest prisons have been freed from consent decrees governing their populations and conditions, prompting concern from inmate advocates yesterday.The termination of the decrees is part of a national pattern after passage in Congress of the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995, which restricts the extent to which federal courts can intervene in the management of state prisons.The act provides for "immediate" termination of consent decrees considered to be overly broad.

The Rev. Kloman F. X. Riggie, pastor of St. Joseph Roman Catholic Church in Hagerstown and former Maryland state correctional chaplain, died Monday of a heart attack while preparing for Mass. He was 64.Father Riggie arrived in Hagerstown in 1966, when he became assistant pastor at St. Mary Roman Catholic Church. The next year, Cardinal Lawrence J. Shehan of Baltimore asked him to be the archdiocesan chaplain of the Maryland state correctional system. For 20 years, he served as a spiritual leader at the Maryland Correctional Training Center, the Roxbury Correctional Institution and the Maryland Correctional Institution.

A VOICE from behind bars is the MCI-H Weekly News, written and published by inmates at the Maryland Correctional Institution in Hagerstown. Its July 23 issue raises a question that surely goes against the lock-'em-up-and-throw-away-the-key passions of a crime-obsessed society.The question is whether convicts with so-called life sentences that actually allow parole after a set number of years of incarceration should be permitted outside prison to work in the Maryland Correctional Pre-Release System.

The telephones in an activity room of the Maryland House of Correction at Jessup were Robert William Sykes' lifeline to the outside world. Saturday night, one of them transmitted his last words to his family -- "Hold on."About half an hour later, the phone rang again at the family home in the 200 block of N. Payson St. in West Baltimore. Instead of Sykes, a prison official was on the line telling the family that the prisoner had bled to death, apparently at the hands of another inmate.Division of Correction spokeswoman Maxine Eldridge said Sykes, 24, died from a severe neck injury inflicted about 9:25 p.m. Saturday, apparently after a dispute with at least one other inmate in the H dormitory dayroom.

The candles burned brightly on the altar as the 15 Lutheran worshipers lowered their heads and prayed. After a unanimous amen, the men's heads straightened and they began to read the Bible and sing "Jesus, Remember Me.""The theme for this evening kind of picks up from last week when Jesus announced to the world that he was the bread of life," the Rev. Charles Robert Frederick told the men. "When God fills us with his spirit, we have new purpose for our lives."The Lutheran pastor's sermon and the chapel's decorations resembled many other churches.

Maj. Louis R. Stewart has been bitten, stabbed, thrown down stairs and threatened by inmates who wanted to hang him or take him hostage during his 24 years as a correctional officer in Maryland's prison system."

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court made it easier yesterday for state and local officials who run prisons, jails, mental hospitals and other public institutions to get out from under federal judges' orders imposing reforms on those facilities.For the first time, the court made clear that tight budgets at the state and local level may be used by officials to get some relaxation of court orders requiring costly changes in an institution's operation.The new decision, unanimous on the key legal point, may affect scores of outstanding orders by federal judges seeking to protect the constitutional rights of inmates, juveniles, patients and others at public facilities.

The inmate claims officers at the Maryland Correctional Institute at Hagerstown tortured him physically and mentally, and then denied him the medication he needed to lower his high blood pressure. "I am writing because I am going through racial cruel and unusual punishment," Michael Vaughn wrote in a letter postmarked July 2. "Since I've been on J-1 [a disciplinary segregation section of the prison] I've been called [racial and other epithets]. I've been choked unconscious with handcuffs on, I've had my meals took for five days, I've had a plastic shield in front of my cell which blocks air from coming in my cell."

Talk about a Catch-22 situation. Mentors in the Friend of a Friend program at the Maryland Correctional Training Center take on the responsibility of talking to other inmates in an effort to defuse violent situations and encourage peaceful resolutions to conflicts. Inevitably, this will involve talking to an inmate who's a gang member. But, Dominique Stevenson says, at least one FOF mentor has told her that talking to gang members has gotten him "tagged" by prison officials as a gang member himself.

A Hagerstown prison was locked down after minor fights in two locations yesterday, a Division of Corrections spokeswoman said. Maj. Priscilla Doggett, the spokeswoman, said she was not aware of any injuries caused by the fights at the Maryland Correctional Training Center, a medium-security prison that houses 2,000 inmates. No one was taken to the hospital for treatment, she said. She declined to comment about whether tensions between gangs were a factor in yesterday's fight. The incident was under investigation, Doggett said.

Yesterday's melee at the Metropolitan Transition Center in East Baltimore brought back memories of its notorious, violence-soaked past, when it was known simply as the Maryland Pen. The knife fight in the outdoor yard that left at least 18 inmates seriously injured, three with life-threatening wounds, was probably one of the worst, in terms of numbers, in the old stone prison's 196-year history, said Wallace Shugg, author of A Monument to Good Intentions: The...

Gov. Martin O'Malley's commitment to increased safety in Maryland prisons makes for good politics. It won't be good public policy, however, until Mr. O'Malley invests more in inmate and rehabilitation training programs. Mr. O'Malley announced last week that he was funding 155 new correctional officers at about $6.7 million, a decision that addresses complaints of correctional officers who say the prisons were understaffed during the Ehrlich administration. It also appeals to Western Maryland lawmakers who care deeply about jobs in their area.

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger wants to nearly double funding - up to $93.9 million - for "anti-recidivism" efforts in his state, including more drug treatment, counseling and housing assistance for inmates upon their release. Schwarzenegger, a Republican, understands that meeting the primary goal of a state corrections system - protecting the public - includes keeping the worst criminals behind bars and reducing the rate at which other inmates commit crimes once they return to society.

Maryland lost about $3.5 million during the past four years because state prison administrators didn't charge the federal government enough to cover the cost of housing federal prisoners, according to a legislative audit released yesterday. The daily reimbursement rate of $132 has remained unchanged since 1999 even though the cost to house federal inmates at the Maryland Correctional Adjustment Center in Baltimore has risen to $162, auditors wrote. The audit suggested that state corrections officials renegotiate the federal contract each year to fully recover such costs.

The commissioner of the Maryland Division of Correction retired yesterday amid continuing turmoil over the state's troubled prisons and the slayings of two correctional officers by inmates this year. Frank C. Sizer Jr., 62, delivered his resignation in the form of a two weeks' notice yesterday afternoon to Public Safety and Correctional Services Secretary Mary Ann Saar, said Jacqueline Lampell, her spokeswoman. "He simply told the secretary he was retiring," Lampell said. "I can't comment on her response.

Inmate assaults on Maryland correctional officers rose sharply from 2003 to 2005 -- a time when staff positions were being eliminated, overtime budgets were cut and vacancies went unfilled, a legislative panel was told yesterday. A report summarizing how prison staffing levels affect safety was prepared by nonpartisan legislative analysts, who presented their findings to a joint hearing of Senate and House subcommittees in Annapolis yesterday. The legislators met in emergency session to discuss a wave of recent prison violence, including the fatal stabbing of a correctional officer at the House of Correction in Jessup last month.

The parents of a prison inmate allegedly strangled by a fellow inmate as they were being transported on a bus filed suit against the state and corrections officials in Baltimore Circuit Court yesterday, blaming their negligence as well as inadequate security measures for the death of their son. The suit seeks $51 million in damages and more than $7,000 in funeral expenses. But Melissa Rodriguez, the mother of 20-year-old Philip E. Parker Jr., who died as he was being taken from a court hearing in Hagerstown to the prison he was assigned to in Baltimore, said her suit is about more than money: It's about answers.