March 1, 2002
When death came, Tim Jackson was strapped face down on a bed in a cell by himself. The mattress was hard and vinyl and bare. He lay pinioned for two full days in the old Fayette County Detention Center -- his bony wrists and ankles locked into leather bindings, his body held firmly in place by a long piece of white fabric sometimes called a ''safety net.'' Resembling a blanket with straps, it was lashed tightly to the sides of the bed. For his own good, they said. A large, raw wound grew on the back of his neck, where he strained against the ''net'' that held him down. In plain terms, Dr. Gregory J. Davis said, Jackson resisted and resisted until he burned himself up inside. ''This guy was dying, and they apparently did not know it,'' he said. Jackson also was ''emaciated,'' according to Davis ' autopsy report. With only 109 pounds on his 5-foot, 4-inch frame, his body had begun feeding on its muscle, Davis said. He also was seriously dehydrated. And, not incidentally, Timothy Wayne Jackson, age 29, also was a paranoid schizophrenic. A paranoid schizophrenic who had been in the jail for more than a month. A paranoid schizophrenic who, during that month, had received no psychiatric medication. A paranoid schizophrenic who, during that month, had not been seen by a psychiatrist until just hours before his death. ''This shouldn't be occurring in jails, because this is a person who didn't know right from wrong,'' said Raymond J. Sabbatine, who was the director of the Fayette County jail at the time Jackson died. ''He shouldn't be there in the first place.'' Two Kentucky psychiatrists who reviewed Jackson 's medical records said it appeared that he had been in a serious mental and physical decline for three days, and needed hospitalization. In addition, Davis , the medical examiner, said the question of why Jackson was not sent to a hospital for evaluation of his physical needs remains a major, unanswered issue. And in fact, Dr. Teresa Oropilla-Kiefer, the psychiatrist who actually saw Jackson about nine hours before his death, wrote in his medical records that he would ''do best'' in a hospital, and she said in recent interviews that she thought he needed to be in a hospital. But he wasn't sent to one. The reasons are complicated and have much to do with the fact that there are two health-care contractors at the Lexington jail -- one providing only mental health care and one general medical care. A CMS nurse concluded that Jackson exhibited potential mental problems and referred him to Bluegrass , the medical records show. A Bluegrass social worker concluded that Jackson ''appears stable'' and recommended that he be placed in the jail's ''general population,'' the records show. On at least seven occasions over the previous nine months, doctors at both the jail and community clinics had prescribed psychiatric medications for Jackson , including Prolixin, an antipsychotic drug, his records show. Yet now, viewed as stable, Jackson received no medications. In the jail at the time -- which has since been replaced by a new jail away from downtown -- inmates in four-point restraints were placed in the infirmary, where the CMS staff was stationed. The jail's policy requires that an inmate in such restraints be constantly observed by a jail officer, checked every two hours for any harmful effects of the restraints, and released for 15 minutes every four hours. That means Jackson was not seen by a mental-health worker until 12 hours after being put into four-point restraints. By contrast, in a hospital, federal rules require that any patient put into restraint be assessed within an hour by a doctor, and that restraint be discontinued when the patient becomes calm, according to Butler , one of the Louisville psychiatrists who reviewed Jackson 's records at the newspaper's request. But because this was a Monday, there was no psychiatrist there. At the time, Oropilla-Kiefer, the Bluegrass staff psychiatrist, ordinarily was at the jail only on Tuesdays and Thursdays. So again Jackson would wait for a mental-health professional -- this time for 24 hours. Jackson 's deterioration also was reflected in a lengthy note entered that day by Judy Rhodus, a licensed clinical social worker and coordinator of the Bluegrass mental-health service at the jail. CMS was asked to begin monitoring Jackson 's food and liquid intake, according to a note Rhodus entered in the medical record at 10:40 a.m. Tuesday. Oropilla-Kiefer, the psychiatrist, also wrote orders in Jackson 's chart to resume two of his usual psychiatric medications -- including an injection of the antipsychotic drug Prolixin ''stat,'' meaning at once. Rhodus also wrote of special efforts by Bluegrass -- which were unsuccessful -- to locate the injectable Prolixin that Oropilla-Kiefer wanted Jackson to have. Rhodus wrote: ''Repeated efforts made by ( Bluegrass ) . . . to obtain Prolixin via community mental health system.'' The note indicated that neither the pharmacy at Eastern State Hospital nor a Bluegrass clinic had any amount of the drug that it could spare. In addition, Maria Wilson, a nurse for CMS, made a notation at 1:45 p.m. July 11 saying that, after speaking with Oropilla-Kiefer about Jackson 's ''deteriorating orientation of unknown etiology,'' she called a CMS physician and obtained an order to draw blood from him, a first step toward assessing his physical condition. However, results of the blood work would not be available for at least a day -- and, as it turned out, Jackson did not have a day to wait. Wilson 's entry was the last in Jackson 's medical chart until after the discovery at 8:18 p.m. -- 6 1/2 hours later -- that he was no longer breathing. The critical question -- why Jackson was not sent to a hospital, even though the psychiatrist, Oropilla-Kiefer, believed he needed to be in one -- has no simple answer. One source of information about Jackson 's actual condition would be the records of the vital-sign checks done by nurses every shift. But CMS spokesman Ken Fields in St. Louis said that the company could not locate any records of such checks for any of the 48 hours Jackson was in the infirmary. Fields, who works for a public-relations firm representing CMS, said he did not know why the records could not be found. CMS referred reporters to Fields. Wilson, a registered nurse and a supervisor on the CMS staff at the time, said she is sure the record existed on July 11, 2000 , because she read it. Wilson said Jackson 's blood pressure, pulse, respiration and possibly his temperature readings were on the record, and she thinks they were ''all within normal limits.'' In the series of decisions about Jackson 's care, one critical moment occurred around 1 p.m. on July 11, in a conversation between Oropilla-Kiefer and Wilson . Oropilla-Kiefer had just written in Jackson 's chart that he would ''do best'' in a hospital, and that she would ''recommend this to staff'' -- meaning, she said, CMS staff. ''My intention was that they (CMS) need to manage it,'' Oropilla-Kiefer said. ''We couldn't get medications, and again, he wasn't responding the way I wanted him to.'' Bluegrass officials also said, in a series of three interviews with the newspaper, that under its contract with the jail, Bluegrass is only a consultant on mental health. As a result, '' Bluegrass employees do not have the authority at the jail to hospitalize,'' Michael R. Moloney, attorney for the agency, said. That authority, Bluegrass officials said, rests entirely with CMS, which contracts to provide medical care, including emergency services. However, two registered nurses who were on the CMS staff at the time -- including Shirley Lutfi, who was then the top CMS official at the jail -- disagreed. Wilson , for example, said: ''They ( Bluegrass ) could have sent him to the hospital. They did not need us to do that.'' Lutfi, who was administrator of jail's medical department then and who now lives in Maryland , described the working arrangement between CMS and Bluegrass in similar terms. (The Courier-Journal)  

Kentucky Department of Corrections
October 30, 2004 Courier-Journal
Kentucky has not fined the company that operates two prisons in the state for repeated contract violations, including the use of inmate labor, according to records obtained by The Courier-Journal. Lawmakers responsible for overseeing state prisons, including those run by Corrections Corp. of America, or CCA, said they were unaware of the violations and the lack of fines, conceding that they have not thoroughly reviewed inspection reports. "In the past we may not have scrutinized it as closely as we maybe ought to have," said Rep. Jesse Crenshaw, D-Lexington, chairman of the House corrections budget subcommittee. "But we're going to pay closer scrutiny as the state moves toward more privatization." State evaluations of the minimum-security Marion Adjustment Center in St. Mary show that since 1999, CCA has: Improperly used inmate labor to renovate facilities. Searched inmates' belongings without their presence. Mishandled inmate discipline and grievances. Also at Marion, the state found CCA violated the same contract provisions in consecutive years. And the Lee Adjustment Center in Beattyville, where inmates rioted last month, had ongoing trouble calculating prisoner sentences. A prisoner released in 2000 should have been transferred to an out-of-state agency, and a prisoner was set free 18 days early in 2002, records show. Critics say the fact that Kentucky corrections officials found problems at the private prisons but never sought financial penalties is not a surprise. "Contracting for private prisons is a political choice for states more than anything else. There's a lot of rhetoric about saving money, but by and large it's a political choice," said Judy Greene, director of Justice Strategies, a New York-based nonprofit criminal justice research group. "That same environment may result in corrections managers that realize vigorous fines may upset the apple cart and in turn will affect their own budgets." Kentucky's contract with CCA allows it to levy $5,000 fines for each violation. Under the contract, state prison officials would recommend a fine to the Finance and Administration Cabinet, which would set the fine amount after a state hearing officer reviews the matter. The department has never penalized CCA for a violation "due to the limited nature of each deficiency and the good-faith effort in implementing corrective action," according to the evaluations. But other states have imposed penalties on private prison operators. In North Carolina, the state withheld thousands of dollars from CCA for not establishing a jobs program at two medium-security prisons. "They failed to provide the services they promised in the contract," said Danny Thompson, director of auxiliary services for the North Carolina Division of Prisons. After three years, North Carolina and CCA dissolved the contract, Thompson said. In Texas, the Department of Criminal Justice deducted $890,739 of the $184.2 million it paid to private facility operators last year, department spokesman Mike Viesca said. In 2000, the Marion prison failed to process inmate grievances in accordance with state policy — grievances not settled informally must be resolved within 10 days of a hearing. Despite the violation, the state found the same problem in 2001 and 2003 but didn't issue fines. "This was not something that happened on a recurring basis," Lamb said. Between 2000 and 2002, Marion also improperly used inmate labor at the prison, the records show, including at least once after the state directly forbid it from doing so.

February 25, 2004
Corrections Commissioner John Rees said private businesses could run food services at state prisons as early as this year.  The move could save enough money at Kentucky's 12 adult institutions to raise the salaries of guards, which ranks 49th in the country, Rees said.  Rees, a former vice president of Corrections Corporation of America, No bids for food services would be sought unless it is concluded a private company can do the job as well, but cheaper, Rees said.  "It's going to cost $10 million to $11 million to bring them up to the average salary of other states," Rees told the Lexington Herald-Leader in an interview.  The proposal drew the ire of prison workers and House Democrats.  "What kind of employees do you think you're going to get for close to minimum wage and no benefits?" asked Esther Jones, a foodservice worker at the Eastern Kentucky Correctional Complex in West Liberty.  A corporation trying to maximize its profit in prison kitchens might cut back on the nutrition and caloric content of inmate meals, said Rep. Robin Webb, D-Grayson, a member of the House budget subcommittee for the justice system.  Kentucky pays about $3.30 a day for each inmate's meals, including the cost of personnel and supplies, Rees said. The department might not decide on privatization until after July 1, which is when the next state budget begins, he said.  

Kentucky Legislature
March 29, 2008 Herald-Leader
A key lawmaker says plans to build a new $129 million Eastern State Hospital in Lexington are still alive despite an e-mail warning to the contrary sent Thursday by the National Alliance on Mental Illness of Lexington. In a lengthy e-mail to Gov. Steve Beshear and many legislators, NAMI accused Rep. Jimmie Lee -- who engineered the complex deal that involves several land swaps -- of calling the group this week and angrily threatening to kill the new mental health hospital over the question of who would run it. NAMI wants the non-profit Bluegrass Regional Mental Health-Mental Retardation Board, which runs the hospital, to be guaranteed the management contract at the new facility. The Senate budget bill includes such language. Lee wants the contract to be open to competition. The House budget bill reflects that. "WE should not have to choose between a new hospital and the care we trust!!! ... PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE ... help us and don't let this absolutely righteous project be ruined," NAMI Executive Director Kelly Gunning wrote in her e-mail. "We have basically been threatened with 'no hospital.'" That's untrue, Lee said Friday. "I have every intention of building a new Eastern State Hospital, because it's important to the residents of the old facility and to their families," said Lee, who oversees House budget planning for health and welfare. However, Lee acknowledged meeting with a for-profit company, The GEO Group of Boca Raton, Fla., interested in running the hospital. Several companies are watching the Eastern State plan with an eye on bidding for the management contract if the legislature allows. "We would be very excited to submit a proposal," said Jorge Dominicis, president of GEO Care, a GEO subsidiary that runs four civil psychiatric facilities for the state of Florida. Overall, the company specializes in private prison and jail management. While Bluegrass may be doing a fine job now, Dominicis asked, "why wouldn't you want to find out what other people could offer you, what they could achieve for you?" GEO's political action committee gave $1,000 last year to elect Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear and $10,000 in 2005 to U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Somerset. Lee, D-Elizabethtown, said he's uncomfortable writing into state law a guarantee that anyone must get a state contract without competition. "I have nothing against Bluegrass," Lee said. "I think Bluegrass has done a marvelous job. I hope they do a marvelous job in the new hospital. But I am not prepared to mandate that by statute." However, this isn't a deal-breaker, Lee said. By the end of the ongoing House-Senate budget talks, he wants a new hospital, regardless of what compromises are reached, he said. On Friday, Gunning said she stood by the accuracy of her e-mail. If Lee now says he's willing to compromise, that's good, but that hasn't been his attitude recently, she said. Bluegrass Chief Executive Officer Joe Toy called NAMI's public criticism of Lee "unfortunate." But he said advocates are understandably worried that his non-profit might lose the new hospital to a for-profit company that puts revenue ahead of patient care. "Philosophically, I have a serious issue with privatizing safety-net care for individuals," Toy said. "If a person needs 10 or 15 more days in the hospital, but you're tight financially and you have to get them out right now, it's hard to see how you balance that. We're not making cars or widgets here; we're providing care for people who have no other options."

January 19, 2007 KY State Auditor
State Auditor Crit Luallen today released a performance audit of Kentucky’s method of privatizing government functions. The audit, the third and final in a series on state contracting, shows that Kentucky needs a process that will ensure stronger oversight and accountability of the Commonwealth’s privatization contracting. The audit found that Kentucky’s main privatization statute is ineffective. The statute requires contracts in which a private vendor provides services “similar to, and in lieu of, a service provided” by at least ten state employees to go through a more stringent procurement process. The statute requires a detailed cost – benefit analysis and an annual performance evaluation for larger contracts. However, the statute exempts fifteen different types of contracts. Because of the defined criteria and exemptions found in the statutes, every contract for privatizing state services is eligible to be excluded from the statutory oversight scheme. In fact, according to the Finance and Administration Cabinet, only one contract has been implemented under this privatization statute since it became effective in 1998. In addition to the general privatization law, another law applies to private prisons. That law requires private prisons show a 10% savings over state run facilities. The audit found that these savings determinations are inconsistent and need increased accountability and independent review. State Auditor Crit Luallen said, “In the past, I have been a proponent of privatization as a useful tool to deliver services and increase government efficiency. However, as we see an increased effort to privatize government services, Kentucky must demand that our contracting processes ensure adequate oversight and accountability. No better example exists of this need than the experience the state has had at Oakwood.”

October 25, 2005 Lexington Herald-Leader
First Lady Glenna Fletcher is having difficulty raising money to renovate the Governor's Mansion, one of her pet projects. The Governor's Mansion Preservation Foundation, a nonprofit group created in March, has canceled a fundraising event at the mansion Thursday because fewer than 80 of the 1,077 invitations drew an RSVP from people who planned to attend. The foundation's struggle is similar to that of Kentuckians for Justice, a legal defense fund organized by Republicans for members of Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration hit with legal bills because of the state hiring scandal. A few weeks ago, defense fund officials complained that donations were barely trickling in. And the scandal -- which has led to the indictment of 13 gubernatorial aides and advisers -- is probably the obstacle in both cases, because Ernie Fletcher is now perceived as damaged goods, said Donald Gross, a political scientist at the University of Kentucky. Special interests are willing to write checks at the request of politicians, but only if the politicians can be useful, Gross said. "You give money strategically. If there's a perception that (Fletcher) is seriously hurt, then you're just throwing your money away," Gross said. "And he just seems to be floundering up there." Other top donors include firms that have business relationships with the Fletcher administration. Donations of $10,000 each came from state contractors Corrections Corporation of America and HMB Professional Engineers, and from regulated utilities Cinergy and American Electric Power.

May 13, 2005 Courier-Journal
A former Kentucky governor and two men who sought the office were among major donors to the private fund created to pay for repairs to the Governor's Mansion. The list of 261 donors was released yesterday by first lady Glenna Fletcher's office. According to the office, the foundation has received pledges of $792,404 and actual donations of $534,904. Fletcher said she hoped to raise $5 million for repairs to the inside and outside of the mansion, which was completed in 1914. Among the contributors: Corrections Corporation of America, which operates private prisons under contract with the state, gave $10,000.

January 2, 2005 News Enquirer
For years, Northern Kentucky's county governments have been trying to be heard. They want more money from Frankfort to house state prisoners in county jails. They think it is strange that prisoners can wait, sometimes for years, for sentences in their jails - receiving time served against those sentences - and still, the state gives no compensation to the county. Now, county leaders are offering support to pass a bill in the state legislature to remedy the problem. The Kentucky Association of Counties, the judge-executives group, the Kentucky Association of Magistrates and Commissioners and the Kentucky Jailers Association have combined to support the bill. It asks for state money to pay for prisoners who have had to stay in county jails; a raise in the county jail per diem equal to that paid to private prisons by the state; an allotment from the state to cover jail expenses, and an increase in state medical payments. Since 1984, county jails have been paid $26.51 for every day a prisoner stays in the jail after that person is sentenced. Private prisons receive anywhere from $30.49 to $44.19 a day. "We want an increase here," said Kenton County jailer Terry Carl. "We want to be paid as much as the private jails."

September 16, 2004 Herald Leader
The riot Tuesday that scorched a private prison in Lee County didn't burn the state Corrections Department's desire to privatize its new prison in Elliott County, officials said yesterday. Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration still expects to solicit bids from companies interested in managing the 961-bed Little Sandy Correctional Complex, set to open in January, said corrections spokeswoman Lisa Lamb. And Nashville-based Corrections Corporation of America, which owns and operates the damaged Lee County prison, still expects to submit a bid. Rather than hurting CCA's chances during the bidding, the riot actually could be a plus, Lamb said. The Corrections Department -- led by John Rees, a former CCA vice president -- is impressed by the company's swift reaction to the violence, she said. "To say they're pleased with how CCA responded is a little odd when most of the responders were local and state police, who quickly took control of the situation," said House Majority Leader Rocky Adkins, D-Sandy Hook. Adkins and other lawmakers have urged the Republican administration to open the $92 million prison under state control. Nationally, critics of CCA and other prison companies say the firms suffer from higher employee turnover rates than public prisons because of chronic understaffing and lower wages. That results in an inexperienced work force, they maintain. Also, to maximize profits, prison companies often skimp on food, health care and educational programs, which can lead to inmate unrest, critics say.

March 10, 2004
Language aimed at keeping the new Little Sandy Correctional Complex state run remained in the House budget plan Tuesday as legislators there passed the nearly $15 billion spending bill on to the Senate.  Contracting out the facility's operation has never been an option, said Rep. Rocky Adkins, D-Sandy Hook, majority floor leader who fought the prison's privatization.  "Today, the House overwhelmingly showed their agreement," Adkins said late Tuesday afternoon, after the chamber's 64-36 vote.  The budget plan provides an additional $9.45 million over the biennium from within the state corrections budget to ensure the facility is fully-funded and state-run, Adkins said.  Its language requires "that no action be taken to privatize any service that is currently being performed at or for an entire adult correctional facility," his office said.  The budget now moves on to the Senate, but could be revised there.  "We are hopeful that the Senate will agree that the changes made by the House are in the best interests of the people we serve," Adkins said, vowing to continue the fight.  Elliott County leaders — as well as residents hoping for jobs at the 895-bed $90 million state prison being built on the outskirts of Sandy Hook — also remain watchful of the situation in Frankfort.  "It definitely should stay state run and it should be employees from the area who run it," said Julian Fyffe, Elliott County Chamber of Commerce president.  People will likely watch the privatization issue, and their legislators' actions, closely until the budget's fully passed by House, Senate and governor, Fyffe said.  The prison, expected to open in June, was billed as an economic booster for the job-poor area when construction began under Gov. Paul Patton's administration.  The call to privatize it, in other words contract its operation to an outside vendor, first came from within Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration earlier this winter.  Officials said they were eying all options to cut state costs in a time of budgetary crisis, and couldn't let the prison system drive the state's economy.  Adkins and other northeast Kentucky legislators fired back in January with criticism that future workers could lose out financially under privatization. It's bad public policy to turn the keys of a public construction project over to a private company, Adkins said.  The administration stressed employees would still be needed, and probably would be hired locally, whether run by a private company or by the state.  Elliott County Judge-Executive Charles Pennington said then that the county was eagerly awaiting an estimated 350 state jobs and a $17 million payroll.  Pennington was in Frankfort Tuesday, and could not be reached for comment.  The people still care a great deal about those jobs, as state jobs, Fyffe said.  "Elliott County should get the better part of the jobs," he said. "There's plenty of people around here who can do it."  Fyffe said he's retired, and not looking for a job now, but those who are looking worry that there might not be as many local jobs at a privately-run prison and some worry that the pay might not be as good.  "And I don't think they should go in there and tear up something somebody else started," he said. "They should try to build on it."  As it moved toward committee passage Friday, and onto the floor this week, the House budget bill did not escape the political quarreling.  House Democrats issued a summary of it Monday, claiming to have restored "time-tested education programs that were slashed by Gov. Fletcher in his budget proposal for the next two years."  Hours before Tuesday's vote, the Fletcher administration aimed fresh criticism at Democrats who drastically rewrote his budget bill. Spokesmen called the substitute budget irresponsible, mainly for the amount of construction debt it implied.  Fletcher said the budget he presented was focused on economic development. It earmarked money for university research facilities and for technical training centers.  The House committee decided to put more money into education and state government salaries.  State Budget Director Brad Cowgill called the committee's bill "a prescription for going back to the very same conditions that got us to where we are — a condition that says buy now, pay later."  The wrangling even drew in the new Elliott County prison as a sort of political playing card.  Gearing up for the House battle Tuesday, Minority Leader Jeff Hoover of Jamestown filed floor amendments calculated to put House Democratic leaders on the defensive.  One would take $2.5 million away from the prison in Adkins' home turf and apply it toward a business technical center at Eastern Kentucky University. The appropriations committee chairman, Rep. Harry Moberly of Richmond, works for the university.  (Daily independent)

February 3, 2004
Members of a House budget subcommittee raised objections yesterday to plans by the Fletcher administration to contract for private management of a new $93.million state prison in Elliott County.  "If we take a brand new facility and we turn it over to a private company, we are basically giving a private company millions and millions and millions of dollars of free taxpayer money," said Rep. Jesse Crenshaw, D-Lexington and chairman of the Subcommittee on Justice and Judiciary.  But John Rees, the administration's Corrections commissioner and a former official of Corrections Corp. of America, a private prison firm, said putting operation of the prison out to bid was the best option - particularly with a lean state budget.  As a former warden of state-operated and privately operated prisons, Rees said privately run prisons save money in the long run. "I do believe competition works," he said.  And although prisons are expensive to build, Rees said, "The real cost of a prison is its operational cost over time."  Funding for the 961-inmate prison was approved under the Patton administration. But the budget that Gov. Ernie Fletcher proposed last week anticipates that the prison will be operated by a private contractor and have just 500 inmates. Rees said his department plans to take bids from private prison companies this spring.  Rep. Robin Webb, D-Grayson, said she was not sure private operation would save much money. She also raised questions about what the state gives up when it hands control of a prison to private vendors.  "From what I've seen, our experience with two private prisons we now have shows that it's not really more efficient," Webb said in an interview after the subcommittee meeting. "The pay and benefits for workers is lower. But the main point is that you lose accountability and flexibility when you enter into a contract over years. And there's a question of the financial health and viability of the company that wins the contract."  The state currently contracts with Corrections Corp. of America to operate two of its 14 prisons: the Lee Adjustment Center in Beattyville and the Marion Adjustment Center in St. Mary.  Webb, whose district is near the new prison, and Rees disagreed over the cost to operate the Elliott prison under a private contractor. Webb said it costs the state about $44 per day, per inmate at the Lee Adjustment Center.  But Rees said he was confident that his estimate of $35 per day at the Elliott prison under a private contractor was conservative. Rees said the estimate was based on costs at similar privately operated prisons in other states.  Webb also pressed Rees on his background with a major player in the private prison business.  Rees said he began with the Kentucky Department of Corrections in 1969 and stayed with the state through 1976, then worked for Oklahoma's prison system before returning to Kentucky in 1980 as warden of the Kentucky State Reformatory. In 1986 he left to begin a 13-year career with Corrections Corporation of America, where he retired in 1998 as vice president of business development. Since then he has done private consulting in the corrections field, he said.  He said he owned less than $10,000 of Corrections Corporation stock, which he sold late last year before taking the job as corrections commissioner.  Webb said later that she raised the issue of Rees' background "only because I believe in full disclosure and that's a matter which we needed to hear."  Rees told reporters after the meeting that he's not trying to help his former employer. He said he expects three to five competitive bids from prison companies.  "The process will be fully transparent," he said.  The subcommittee will continue its deliberations through the rest of this month before making recommendations to the full House budget committee.  (Courier-Journal)

Lee Adjustment Center
Beattyville, Kentucky
CCA
November 1, 2006 AP
A former supervisor at a private minimum security prison in eastern Kentucky was arrested Wednesday and charged with smuggling marijuana to inmates. Rodney Trowbridge, 47, turned himself in at the Beattyville Police Department early Wednesday morning. He was charged with four counts of first-degree promoting contraband stemming from incidents dating back to last November at the Lee Adjustment Center. Jeffrey Todd Tomblin, one of the inmates who allegedly received the shipments, was also charged. Tomblin was moved to the Green River Correctional Complex in May. "We have zero tolerance for this type of activity at the Lee Adjustment Center," said Warden Randy Stovall.

November 15, 2005 WCAX
Vermont's prisons are already full and now there's word they're about to be swamped. Corrections officials project Vermont's prison population will skyrocket at least 20% within five years, and that's sparking a debate over where to put all these convicts. But state lawmakers have rejected building new prisons in Vermont, so the Corrections Commissioner says the primary solution to overcrowding will be to send more inmates to do time in prisons located in Kentucky and Tennessee. State leaders will be looking at a number of options to out-of-state placement during the legislative session next year. However, the out-of-state placements have one additional factor that is very appealing to many: Corrections Corporation of America (CCA )-- a private, for-profit prison company -- charges Vermont $20,000 per inmate, per year to jail them in Kentucky and Tennessee. Meanwhile, the cost of jailing convicts in Vermont is $40,000 per year per inmate, 100% more. The difference is that CCA provides no counseling educational, or rehabilitation programs. The cost-per-inmate in Vermont includes many services and counseling, plus probation, parole, furlough, and other early release programs.

December 9, 2004 Beattyville Enterprise
On Sept. 14, inmates at the Lee Adjustment Center rioted. If there is another disturbance, it may not be the inmates.   It may be the employees. Problems at the prison seem to be increasing. Especially when it comes to attracting and keeping correctional officers. The Beattyville Enterprise has learned that the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) has brought employees from Minnesota to the Lee Center to fill positions it cannot fill with local hires. Part of the reason the company is having trouble keeping employees is the presence of the people from Minnesota . Kentucky correctional officers are paid $7.81 at the Lee Center . The Enterprise has learned that the Minnesota officers are being paid $14 an hour plus $60 a week for food.  Also, CCA is paying for their housing in a local motel. Another problem that some of the officers are having is 12-hour shifts.  They only get one 30-minute break and this is to eat.

November 30, 2004 Lexington Herald Leader
Shortly after a riot erupted at a Lee County private prison in September, the state's top corrections official praised Corrections Corporation of America for its quick response to restoring order at the facility. Now, though, Corrections Commissioner John D. Rees, a former CCA vice president, has recommended that the state fine his old employer $10,000 for failing to have a sufficient number of trained officers to respond to the disturbance. On the night the riot broke out, just seven such officers were available instead of the 20 that were needed. That was just one of numerous problems at the Lee Adjustment Center described in a state report released last week. These included the failure of containment fences, restricted recreation time, restricted access to the inmate canteen, the suspension of such programs as Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous, lack of educational programs, mass punishments for minor offenses, the state's failure to monitor the prison and the seemingly ever-present lack of communication (in this instance attributed to the "strict management style" of former Warden Randy Eckman). All things considered, a $10,000 fine seems a bit small, which may be why a CCA spokeswoman quickly said that the company would pay it. But what puzzles us even more than the amount of the recommended fine is that the riot itself and the report on the problems that caused it apparently have not dampened one bit the zeal within Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration for privatizing the operation of a $91 million prison the state just finished building. The contracting process for that 961-bed Elliott County facility is moving right along as if the Sept. 14 riot that cost a warden his job and resulted in indictments against 23 inmates had never occurred and the problems that led to the violence and destruction at the private prison never existed. Go figure.

November 24, 2004 Courier-Journal
The company that owns the Beattyville prison where inmates rioted Sept. 14 should be fined $10,000 for failing to have enough properly trained officers to respond to the uprising, state officials said in a letter released yesterday. A state report also released yesterday said the riot grew larger than most inmates had intended and "was created by a lack of communication up and down the chain of command and too many changes within a short period of time." It's the first time the state has sought to fine a private prison operator, including the Corrections Corporation of America, which owns and runs the 800-inmate Lee Adjustment Center. In a Nov. 22 letter, state Corrections Commissioner John D. Rees asked Finance Secretary Robbie Rudolph to fine CCA for failing to adequately organize, equip, train and maintain 20 response team members. Only seven were available that evening, the report said. The department did not release CCA's response to the Oct. 4 report. Chickering refused to provide it yesterday, saying CCA believes the response should come from Kentucky officials. She also said the company would not immediately comment on the state's findings. The report found 16 problems at the prison, including: CCA built fences to control prisoner movement after an influx of Vermont prisoners. But inmates could "peel up" the bottom of the fences and sneak under them. There were mass punishments, including removal of pool tables after inmates allegedly gambled at them. Some Vermont inmates should have been in maximum custody prisons. Staff members were not prepared for the many others who are sex offenders, have a history of behavior problems and are on psychotropic drugs. Several programs were suspended, including Parenting, Anger Management, Alcoholics and Narcotics Anonymous. The report confirms many of the concerns previously cited by inmates, prisoner advocates and Kentucky and Vermont prison officials.

November 23, 2004 Courier-Journal
The first visible sign of a recent riot at the Lee Adjustment Center was when inmates targeted the wooden guard tower, using large concrete ashtrays to break its legs. With a guard still inside, inmates began pulling the tower apart, using the wood to batter the maintenance building, where ladders, wire cutters and axes were stored, according to inmate interviews and an official account of the Sept. 14 riot. The six-page Sept. 27 report, obtained by The Courier-Journal under the state's open-records law, does not conclude what caused the riot or make recommendations, but it confirms much of what inmates said about the riot in interviews with the newspaper. The Corrections Corporation of America, which owns and runs the prison, and Kentucky and Vermont prison officials are investigating the riot. A Kentucky official said the findings are expected to be released this week. According to the report, prepared by a Lee shift supervisor, CCA guards quelled the 7:25 p.m. uprising in a little more than two hours. By then, inmates had burned the administration building, ripped out electrical wiring, raided the commissary and caused other damage to the 800-inmate prison. "The inmates literally had control of this place, the inner compound," Adam Corliss, an inmate imprisoned for murder, said in an interview. He said he ran to the window of his housing unit when he heard the commotion. "There was no staff visible anywhere, and that's what surprised me the most, and I'd say a lot of other residents here," said Corliss, 30, of Springfield, Vt. "CCA is in a business to maximize profit," said inmate Tim Wells, 25, of Louisville, who is serving time for robbery. "Inmates are learning about this, and they're furious." Meanwhile, inside the maintenance building, prisoners Matthew Bennett and James Davis said their goal was protecting their civilian supervisor, Kris Goldey. Bennett and Davis decided to protect Goldey and the prison's equipment stockpile by closing the door to the equipment room and arming themselves with lead pipes, they said. The report confirmed that Goldey was in the room. Twenty riot squad members were supposed to have been on call under state policy, Rees has said. But that night, Lee spokesman Ron King said, only nine were available immediately, with three on duty and six others showing up at various times.

November 20, 2004 Courier-Journal
Twenty-three inmates, including seven from Kentucky, were indicted by a grand jury yesterday on charges of taking part in a riot that extensively damaged a privately operated prison in Lee County. The inmates at the Lee Adjustment Center were charged with first-degree riot and being a persistent felony offender. Sixteen of the inmates who were indicted are from Vermont. During the Sept. 14 riot, inmates burned the administration building and severely damaged a housing unit by ripping out electrical wires and plumbing, officials said. The company has not said how much the damage cost to repair. The riot occurred after an influx of Vermont inmates at the Lee prison. Vermont Corrections Commissioner Steve Gold has said that Vermont inmates had complained about limited recreational time, smaller portions and less variety of food, and a disciplinary crackdown that wasn't adequately explained to staff or inmates. But the Kentucky and Vermont departments didn't have on-site monitors at the prison to listen to inmate grievances and to observe prison conditions. After the riot, CCA replaced the warden, Randy Eckman, and the company later fired him.

November 2, 2004 Times Argus
A Vermont inmate being housed in Kentucky received minor injuries when a fight broke out early Friday morning among 10 prisoners, including four from Vermont.  The prisoner, whose name was not released by Vermont officials or the company that runs the prison, was taken to an area hospital and had stitches put in his face and was returned to prison. An inmate from Kentucky was struck in the head with a fire extinguisher and had stitches put in his head at an area hospital and was released.

October 28, 2004 Times Argus
For the first time since last month's prison riot, Vermont inmates being housed in a private facility in Kentucky on Wednesday gave their home state lawmakers first-hand accounts of conditions that led to the uprising. "I find it very difficult to live in the dorm situation. Bathrooms are set up inhumanely with no privacy. I can't sleep, the floor shakes,'' said Dennis Chandler, one of four prisoners who addressed the Corrections Oversight Committee by telephone from the Lee Adjustment Center in Beattyville, Ky. "Different corrections officers have different rules. Officers make up the rules as they please,'' said Scott Amidon, another inmate. Corrections Commissioner Steven Gold and Sen. Richard Sears, D-Bennington, the committee chairman, said they will continue to work to improve conditions at the prison, including making sure that prison officials are more responsive and inmates have better education opportunities. The riot began around 7:15 p.m. on Sept. 14 when some of the inmates in the recreation yard tore down the guard tower and used the wood to break into the commissary. At Wednesday's hearing in Montpelier, inmate David Rivers said officials at the Kentucky prison frequently bring up false charges against inmates as a way of punishing prisoners they think are troublesome. The charges often result in the inmates being placed in solitary confinement for extended periods. "This was one of the many straws that broke the camel's back before the riot. Improvements are slow in coming,'' he said. He added that "… the education offered is poor and classes are sometimes turned over to the smartest inmate and the teachers do not teach.''

October 27, 2004 WKYT
A Lee County grand jury is expected to consider criminal charges today against 26 inmates accused of starting a riot at a private prison last month. The grand jury is to hear evidence on charges of arson, criminal mischief, inciting to riot, and assault. Of the 26 inmates facing charges, 15 are from Vermont and eleven are from Kentucky.

October 12, 2004 WCAX
A Kentucky grand jury will consider criminal charges against 15 Vermont inmates believed to have helped start a prison riot last month. Police say some of the charges will be misdemeanors and some will be felonies. The September 14th riot involved more than 100 inmates and resulted in extensive damage to the Lee Adjustment Center run by Corrections Corporation of America in Beattyville, Kentucky.

October 1, 2004 Times Argus
As many as 15 Vermont inmates could be indicted by a Kentucky grand jury later this month for crimes relating to their involvement in instigating a riot at their prison. Corrections Commissioner Steven Gold said employees of his department who are in Kentucky have worked to ensure that there is no retaliation against the Vermont inmates by CCA employees. Gold has said any Vermont prisoners convicted of instigating the riot would be moved to a more secure CCA facility in Arizona.

September 29, 2004 Courier Journal
Kentucky and Vermont did not have inspectors on site at the Lee Adjustment Center in the months before inmates rioted at the privately run prison. While it is not required by law, Kentucky Corrections Commissioner John D. Rees said the state wants an inspector to work at the prison to make sure the Corrections Corporation of America runs it properly. "For a month it wasn't addressed. Should it have been? Probably yes," said Rees, adding that an inspector has since been reassigned there. House Majority Leader Rocky Adkins, D-Sandy Hook, who is fighting a state plan to privatize a new Elliott County prison, said the Corrections Department didn't follow the law by not immediately replacing Glenn Hance. "That is a very, very serious oversight by the Corrections Department," Adkins said. Steve Gold, Vermont's corrections commissioner, said his state was sending inspectors to Lee every month. "We clearly have to pay closer attention on an ongoing basis and have someone there who is monitoring the contract and serving as an ombudsman, if you will, or caseworker, for the inmates," Gold said. "There just is no substitute for having a monitor on staff every day, walking around with a clipboard, noticing what's happening and what's not happening, listening to the staff, listening to the prisoners," said Judy Greene, who runs Justice Strategies, a New York-based nonprofit criminal justice research group. "With private contracts, the key is oversight and monitoring. You have to hold their feet to the fire," said Doug Sapp, the former Kentucky corrections commissioner who signed the original contract with CCA in 1999 and retired a year later.

September 25, 2004 Times Argus
At least one state employee will be assigned to the prison in Kentucky to ensure that Vermont's prisoners there are treated properly and to avoid a repeat of conditions that prompted last week's riot, Corrections Commissioner Steven Gold told lawmakers on Friday. "The people in Kentucky were not always responsive to the complaints raised by our inmates before the riot." He told lawmakers that prisoner complaints centered on smaller and lower-quality food portions, lack of access to recreational activities and inadequate visiting hours. Committee members also received a copy of a letter in which Vermont inmate Scott Bressette described conditions that drove the inmates to violence. "They ain't feeding us hardly anything. I'm starving so bad that my stomach's starting to eat away at my backbone," Bressette wrote to his fiancée Katherine Jenkins two days after the riot. He described the riot as "one of the most insane things I've ever witnessed in my entire life! Inmates chasing guards with 2X4s breaking everything in sight…It was so hostile that the S.W.A.T. team of guards came in, launching tear gas, armed with shotguns." Gold added that prison conditions before the riot were largely the result of policies implemented by the former warden of the facility, Randy Eckman, who was removed from the position last Saturday and had not yet been reassigned. Gold said Eckman often punished inmates excessively for minor infractions and did not communicate effectively with inmates and prison employees. Sen. James Leddy, D-Chittenden, said the riot shows what can happen when there is a "rogue warden whose actions are only known about after the riot."

September 25, 2004 WCAX
Vermont Corrections Department officials are continuing to work on a plan to build a second prison work camp to help ease prison overcrowding. Corrections Commissioner Steve Gold says Governor James Douglas is interested in hearing the options for adding a work camp. And Gold says his department is planning to conduct a full investigation into a September 14th riot at a private Kentucky prison that houses about 400 Vermonters. Gold says he wants to have an employee stationed at the Kentucky jail and that the jail's operator, Corrections Corporation of America, is willing to pay most of the cost.

September 23, 2004 Snitch
As a lawyer for the Alliance for Prison Justice in Vermont, Barry Kade is quite interested in last week's fracas at the Lee Adjustment Center, a privately run prison in Beattyville, Ky. About nine inmates could face criminal charges for instigating the Sept. 14 "disturbance," according to a statement from the Corrections Corp. of America, which runs Lee. Kade has a different opinion of what transpired. "Let's call it an uprising," he said, "not a disturbance." Kade is assisting another Vermont lawyer, Thomas Costello, in a lawsuit against the Marion Adjustment Center, a minimum-security facility in St. Mary, Ky. The suit alleges that a security guard sexually assaulted inmates during a strip search. And while he hasn't decided whether he'll sue CCA, Kade indicated that the thought has crossed his mind, based on complaints he's received from Vermont prisoners about poor treatment. CCA has come under fire from prisoner rights groups in past years for unfair treatment of inmates, inadequate training of its guards and for mixing inmates who require different levels of supervision. When asked to describe CCA's response to inmate concerns, Kade said, "I haven't seen any response other than stonewalling."

September 24, 2004 WCAX
Vermont Corrections Commissioner Steve Gold says he recommended that the warden at a private Kentucky prison be removed from his job. Former warden Randy Eckman, who has not been blamed for the incident, has been transferred to another job. He says inmates were angry over policies instituted by the prison warden.

September 21, 2004 Lexington Herald Leader
Folks at the state Corrections Department subscribe to a strange logic about what constitutes good performance by a private prison company. After inmates rioted last week at Corrections Corporation of America's Lee Adjustment Center in Beattyville, department officials suggested that the incident might be a plus for CCA when Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration gets around to choosing a company to run a new prison. It seems CCA's swift response to the riot impressed department officials. We're not surprised that the department would adopt a positive view of CCA response to the riot, during which several buildings burned. After all, the agency now is run by John Rees, a former CCA vice president, who might be more inclined than most to cut his former company some slack. But even when you take those friendly ties into consideration, the notion that a riot can somehow become a plus for CCA is absurd. By even suggesting such an idea, cabinet officials sent a message to CCA and other private prison operators: "Get a few inmates to start a riot, quash it quickly and decisively, and we'll give you another prison to run." That logic is outlandish even by Fletcher administration standards. Rather than earning CCA some kind of bonus points, last week's riot, viewed in the context of the company's recent history in Kentucky and elsewhere, should give the administration and the General Assembly reason to question the wisdom of privatizing prison operations. In July, prisoners rioted at CCA facilities in Colorado and Mississippi. That same month, a female prisoner died of a skull fracture after a confrontation with a guard at a CCA prison in Nashville. Here in Kentucky, CCA's record includes a 2001 riot at its Otter Creek Correctional Center in Floyd County. And some of the approximately 400 Vermont prisoners now housed at the Beattyville facility were moved there from CCA's Marion Adjustment Center after an incident in which a guard was fired for improper sexual contact with two inmates from Vermont. A performance record of that nature doesn't justify the positive spin the Corrections Department tried to put on last week's riot. On the contrary, it begs for an investigation into why CCA facilities seem particularly prone to riots and other negative incidents involving guards and inmates.

September 21, 2004 Rutland Herald
The warden of a private Kentucky prison that was the scene of a riot last week was replaced Monday, the latest fallout from an uprising in which nearly two dozen Vermont inmates took part. According to Vermont Corrections Commissioner Steven Gold, the number of inmates involved in last Tuesday's riot could be 23, about six times more than originally thought. He said that "a much larger group has been identified" by the jail's operator, Corrections Corp. of America, which last week said only four Vermont inmates were involved in the riot. Randy Stovall, who until last week was warden at one of the company's other prisons, took over for Randy Eckman, who had been warden at Lee for about a year, according to CCA spokeswoman Louise Chickering. Eckman's management style apparently contributed to unrest among some of the 400 Vermont inmates who are housed in the rural prison in eastern Kentucky, according to Matthew Valerio, the Vermont defender general. "The apparent cause of the riot was a somewhat arbitrary and restrictive change in the rules and privileges at the facility," Valerio said Monday. "These included changes in and reductions in use of the commissary, changes in food quality and increased punishment for minor infractions. That really ratcheted up the tension at the facility." "As of right now, these people have been in a lockdown state for almost a week, haven't had a hot meal in about a week, and, if that doesn't get resolved very quickly, we will ask that changes be made."

September  21, 2004 WCAX
The prison in Kentucky where a riot involving Vermont inmates took place has a new warden. Corrections Corporation of America says it has replaced the warden who was in charge during the uprising. Randy Stovall will take over as top official at the prison immediately. Prison officials say the riot followed a dramatic increase in inmates and cutbacks in privileges such as free time outdoors.

September 17, 2004 AP
A doubling of the population with prisoners from 1,000 miles away, cuts in privileges and reduced time to visit with friends and family are some of the reasons observers cite for a riot at the privately run Lee Adjustment Center this week. Barry Kade, a Vermont lawyer and a member of the Alliance for Prison Justice, an advocacy group that works to improve conditions for Vermont inmates, said he has received an increasing number of complaints from Vermont inmates sent to Kentucky this year to relieve prison crowding in Vermont. Of the nine inmates who officials said started the fires, five were from Kentucky and four from Vermont. "Usually when there's a prison riot it occurs after months or years of intolerable conditions," Kade said. Ray Flum, director of inmate classification for the Vermont Department of Corrections, said the state has been sending prisoners to publicly run prisons out of state for a number of years. But its contract with Corrections Corporation is its first with a private corporation. "Are we surprised that something like this happened and we're involved in it? Yes we are," Flum said. "In the six or seven years we've been doing business like this out of state it's the first time this has happened."  Corrections Corporation also experienced riots in July at prisons it runs in Colorado and Mississippi - both of which house out-of-state inmates. Chickering said the company doesn't believe adding prisoners from another state was the cause of the uprisings. "I think this latest uprising fits into this general pattern of unhappiness by prisoners who have been transported out of state," said Paul Wright, editor of Prison Legal News, a Vermont-based magazine about the prison industry. Vermont inmates at Beattyville complained to Kade that visits from friends and family - who must drive about 1,000 miles to Kentucky - were cut to two hours a week. Free time on the yard was cut and some inmates alleged they were mistreated through physical abuse or by being put into isolation without having committed any violation, he said.

September 17, 2004 Times Argus
Four Vermont inmates helped to instigate an uprising and set a fire that toppled a guard tower and caused extensive damage to a private prison in Kentucky, officials said Wednesday. Some of the 25 to 150 inmates in the recreation yard tore down the guard tower and used the wood to break into the commissary. Officials said they then threw food and tobacco to other prisoners and set fires that damaged one of the housing units and the building where the kitchen is located. Earlier this year, at the request of Vermont officials, CCA moved 195 Vermont prisoners from the Marion Adjustment Center in Kentucky to the Lee facility because inmates complained about inadequate about inadequate library, dining and recreational facilities. The Marion prison had also come under scrutiny when two Vermont inmates were returned to the state after accusing a guard there of sexually assaulting them. The guard has since been fired and no Vermont inmates remain in that facility.

September 16, 2004 AP
A privately operated prison in eastern Kentucky was under a security clamp and inmates were doubled up in cells, a day after prisoners torched three buildings during an uprising. The medium-security Lee Adjustment Center at Beattyville was on "lockdown" Wednesday following a disturbance that erupted as inmates milled around a recreation yard Tuesday night. Ken Kopczynski of Private Corrections Institute Inc., a group opposed to private prisons, said such prisons are understaffed and have high turnover, leading to inexperienced guards. "What that does is it leads to more abuse and more safety-related issues because they don't know what's going on," Kopczynski said. He said locking up people hundreds of miles from families - such as the Vermont inmates - "doesn't help the situation." Vermont inmates have been housed at the Kentucky prison since this year to help ease overcrowding in Vermont facilities.

September 16, 2004 Herald-Leader
It started when nine prisoners tried to tear down a wooden guard tower in the outside recreation yard of the Lee Adjustment Center, officials said yesterday. What followed Tuesday night was a three-hour riot in which inmates set fires and threw rocks before being subdued by special prison response teams armed with nightsticks, plastic handcuffs and pepper spray. By the time the smoke cleared and the sun rose yesterday, the medium-security private prison was left with a heavily damaged administration building and a housing unit where no one will be able to live for a while at least. But Barry Kade of the Vermont Alliance for Prison Justice said he had been receiving e-mails and phone calls for several weeks from prisoners complaining of mistreatment. Kade said he has been getting complaints about unprofessional conduct by guards, bullying, and inmates being put in isolation without being charged with an infraction. Steve Gold, commissioner of the Vermont Department of Corrections, said a team from his state will interview inmates about security and conditions at the prison. Gold, the Vermont corrections official, said his agency had concerns, including lack of space, when prisoners were held at CCA's Marion Adjustment Center in St. Mary's. He said there was also an incident there in which a prison officer was fired after alleged improper sexual contact with two Vermont inmates.

September 15, 2004 Herald-Leader
Inmates took partial control of a prison in Beattyville last night, starting fires and claiming that they had taken at least one hostage before state police regained control. "There was a period of time that a small group of guards was separated from other folks inside. Ultimately, it turned out it was not a hostage situation," Miller said. The Lee Adjustment Center is owned by Corrections Corporation of America. It is a minimum security prison with 800 inmates. About half from Kentucky and half from Vermont. Beattyville police Chief Steve Mays was at the prison while inmates still had partial control. "This was quite a sight when we got here," Mays said about midnight. "Smoke was rolling, people were yelling, prisoners were throwing big rocks over the fence. But it has quieted down now." Fires set to two housing units had been extinguished by 10:50 p.m., but the administration building was still smoldering, Lamb said. Mays said that the guard shack and the administration building were heavily damaged by the fire, and that the cafeteria was also damaged.

September 14, 2004 WKYT
Order is back after hundreds of inmates created a disturbance at an Eastern Kentucky prison. Officials say the prisoners started a number of fires that took hours to get under control.  About 8:00PM Tuesday, inmates got out of control and set the administration building on fire. Police responded by the dozens on ground and in the air to keep prisoners from escaping. After nearly four hours, the fire was put out and the inmates were contained in the facility's recreation yard.

August 4, 2004
A Vermont inmate sent out of state to serve his sentence was hospitalized with pneumonia three weeks ago without anyone from the state or the prison telling the inmate's family that he was sick, officials acknowledge. Francis Joseph, an inmate at the Lee Adjustment Center in Kentucky, was admitted to the hospital several weeks ago suffering from pneumonia.   Lillian Joseph, the inmate's ex-wife, said the hospital called her three weeks ago to tell her about Joseph's condition. The news was a shock because her family wasn't aware that he was sick.  Corrections Corp. Of America, a private company, runs the Lee Adjustment Center. According to a policy between the Vermont Corrections Department and CCA, the Josephs should have been notified by the prison about the illness.  (The Champlain Channel)

January 22, 2004
A 3-year-old Owsley County girl was in critical condition last night with a fractured skull, and her father and a woman who lives with him were arrested on charges of first-degree criminal abuse.  Michael J. Riley, 28, and Dorothy C. Birch, 25, of Boone-ville, were ordered held on $50,000 cash bonds each in Three Forks Regional Jail in Beattyville.  Alexis Riley, was described by neighbors yesterday as a "teeny, tiny" blond-haired child.  Alexis suffered cuts and bruises "over her entire body," a Kentucky State Police report said. She was listed in critical condition last night at the University of Kentucky Children's Hospital.  "She's fighting for her life," Betty Brandenburg, the child's grandmother, told WKYT-TV.  In Owsley County, where Alexis lived in her father's brick home in Chestnut Gap on Ky. 28, about 3 miles from Booneville, neighbors said they were shocked.  "Everyone is upset and just torn all to pieces," said Phyllis Johnson, who lives near Riley's home.  She said Riley received sole custody of Alexis more than a year ago when he was divorced from the child's mother. He had been living for about a year with Birch, a former nursing home employee who recently went to work for a physical therapist, Johnson said.  She said Riley recently began working at the Lee Adjustment Center, a private prison in Beattyville, and he had helped tend her husband's tobacco crop.  (Eastern Kentucky Buraeu)

June 8, 2001
Two former prison guards left disabled by injuries, then fired for being unable to meet all the job's demands, lost again Friday in the Kentucky Court of Appeals.  Ferman Heaton and Gary Evans sued Corrections Corporation of America, charging disability discrimination under the Kentucky Civil Rights Act and Kentucky Equal Opportunities Act.  The company has operated Lee Adjustment Center, a prison in Beattyville, on contract for the state since 1998.  Prior to that, the prison was owned by U.S. Corrections Corp.  When Corrections Corporation of America took over, a new job description for correctional officers listed strenuous activities, including breaking up fights and restraining inmates by force, as "essential functions."  It also said officers "must be able to work any post assignment on any shift."  Heaton and Evans conceded they could not perform the essential functions, and they were terminated.  They sued in Lee Circuit Court in August 1998, contending they should have been allowed to keep working at the gate, regardless of the job description.  Siding with company, Lee Circuit Judge William W. Trude Jr. said Heaton and Evans "cannot 'tack' their employment from USCC to that of CCA."  The appeals court agreed.  (AP)

Little Sandy Correctional Complex
Sandy Hook, Kentucky
CCA
March 12, 2005 Daily Independent
Flanked by a group of local legislators and public officials - many of whom had battled him for nearly a year - Gov. Ernie Fletcher on Thursday publicly addressed a group of citizens gathered at the Little Sandy Correctional Complex to discuss the future of the $92 million facility. The governor made the statement many had been expecting to hear: The prison will be state run. The state's top official, who had once directed the state seek bids from private contractors for possible operation of the 961-bed facility, said bidding has been closed. "Once it became pretty clear the state could operate as efficiently, I asked them to close down (bidding) and operate as a state facility," Fletcher told reporters following a press conference. A longtime advocate of keeping the facility state-operated, Rep. Rocky Adkins, D-Sandy Hook, praised the governor's decision. He said he understood Fletcher, who inherited a $300 million state deficit when he took office, faced a tough decision as the administration studied the most cost-effective measure for operating the prison.

February 3, 2005 Herald Leader
Kentucky's $92 million new prison, originally scheduled to open eight months ago, may sit empty in Elliott County for considerably longer, according to state officials.  But for just how long, why, who is at fault and what's being done about it are still mostly mysteries.  Officials in Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration yesterday said the 961-bed Little Sandy Correctional Complex cannot be occupied any time soon because of "serious construction defects." They refused to say more. There are no serious defects in the prison, and it's ready for use, said Tim Robbins, vice president of Ray Bell Construction Co. in Brentwood, Tenn. "I don't think the governor's office knows what it's talking about," Robbins said. Legislators who have toured the prison agreed. They theorize that Fletcher's agenda to privatize state government is the real reason for the delay. "This is a ruse," said Rep. Robin Webb, D-Grayson, who lives near the prison. Last year, the Finance Cabinet accepted bids from companies interested in managing the prison and using some of its beds to hold profitable out-of-state inmates. Democratic legislators have opposed that idea, arguing for the state's Corrections Department to run the facility instead. One of the bidders, Corrections Corp. of America, is a heavy donor to Republican politics, including Fletcher's gubernatorial campaign. Fletcher hired a former CCA executive as his prisons chief. "What we're hearing in the legislature is that Fletcher is stalling for time because all the bids came in way too high," Webb said. "They're stuck. Now they can't make the argument that privatization is cheaper." House Majority Leader Rocky Adkins, whose district includes the prison, expressed surprise yesterday about the administration's allegations. "If there is something seriously wrong with the place, I've never seen it or heard it," said Adkins, D-Sandy Hook.

December 10, 2004 Herald Leader
Missing a step; Fletcher should have known law on prisons. One of these days, Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration may come to understand that there's more than one kind of waste in state government. The surface waste -- the kind Kentuckians have seen from most every recent governor, including Fletcher -- includes such things as paying cronies highly to do little or nothing, awarding no-bid contracts to political contributors, having a pastry chef on the Governor's Mansion staff or even installing hidden doors in the Capitol. But there's a less obvious kind of waste, too. It's the waste of resources involved when you don't look before you leap, and later find that you leaped the wrong way. Take the administration's plan for privatizing the $92 million prison the state just built in Elliott County, for instance. It turns out that all the time Fletcher's folks spent discussing this idea, all the effort they put into drafting a request for bids from private companies and all the hours spent evaluating those bids have been a complete waste of state money. Why? Because privatizing this particular prison would be illegal. Had administration officials bothered to check the law, they could have avoided all that waste because they would have found the same restrictions on the location of privatized prisons that Deputy Attorney General Pierce Whites found. What Whites found when his office was asked for an opinion on the subject was KRS 197.505, which governs privatization of prisons. One provision of that statute says, "Any adult correctional facility contracted for pursuant to this section shall be constructed only in a county with an established Kentucky State Police post or in a county in which at least two (2) state police officers reside as a result of a duty assignment or in a county with a full-time police department." Elliott County has none of the above. Therefore, state law prohibits privatization of the new prison located there. Whites also said KRS 197.505 allows for privatization of prisons only in cases where the contract builds its own facility. That part of his opinion may be open to a bit of debate, since it hinges on what lawmakers intended the word "establish" to mean. But the provision restricting the location of private prisons is abundantly clear. So, we assume Fletcher and his staff were ignorant of these restrictions because they didn't bother to check the law. We must assume that because the alternative is that they knew about the law and intentionally were going to violate it. Surely that can't be the case because Gov. Ernie "Waste, Fraud and Abuse" Fletcher would never want to get a reputation as a willful lawbreaker.

December 8, 2004 Courier-Journal
Gov. Ernie Fletcher would break Kentucky law by allowing a company to operate a $92million prison that the state is building in Elliott County, the attorney general said yesterday. A prison built with state money cannot be privatized, and private prisons are restricted to counties with a strong police presence, which Elliott County lacks, according to the opinion from Attorney General Greg Stumbo's office. The opinion, written by Deputy Attorney General Pierce Whites, was issued as state officials were reviewing bids from companies that want to operate the 961-bed prison. The administration had planned to issue a contract by the end of the month, but a Fletcher spokesman said they have not decided whether to honor the opinion but will continue to review bids. Senate President David Williams, R-Burkesville, said the state should privatize the prison and disregard the opinion. "It has no weight of law whatsoever," said Williams, an attorney. The opinion said state law prohibits the government from contracting with a company to run a prison if taxpayers paid for the facility. By law, the state can contract with companies to "establish, operate, and manage adult correctional facilities," the opinion says. Under the law, the state can contract with a private prison company only if the company has built the prison that would house Kentucky inmates, according to the opinion. Corrections Commissioner John D. Rees, a former executive at Corrections Corporation of America, did not return a call seeking comment.

December 7, 2004 AP
Kentucky law prohibits the state from privatizing a new prison in Elliott County, the attorney general's office said in an opinion Tuesday. State government may contract with private companies for the "establishment, operation and management" of adult prisons. But because taxpayers paid for the Elliott County prison's construction, a private company may not be paid to operate and manage it, according to the opinion. "The adult correctional facility in Elliott County, not having been established by private provider, may therefore not be operated by a private provider," Deputy Attorney General Pierce Whites wrote in the opinion. House Majority Leader Rocky Adkins, D-Sandy Hook, asked Attorney General Greg Stumbo for a decision on the matter in October. Stumbo, a Democrat, was Adkins' immediate predecessor as House majority leader. Elliott County is restricted from having a privately run prison because, among other things, it lacks some of the security outlined in state law, according to the opinion. The county does not have an established Kentucky State Police post, nor does it have a full-time police force. "The wisdom of this statutory directive is underscored by the recent riot at the privately run Lee Adjustment Center," White wrote. "To hand over the keys to a private, for-profit company is wrong," Adkins said. "It's bad public policy."

October 8, 2004 Courier Journal
A House Democratic leader says state law prohibits Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration from privatizing a new Elliott County prison built with taxpayer money. Majority Floor Leader Rocky Adkins, D-Sandy Hook, yesterday asked Attorney General Greg Stumbo for an opinion on whether the Department of Corrections can contract with a private company to operate and maintain the $92million, 961-bed prison. Adkins also criticized the department for soliciting bids to run the prison just three days after a riot at the privately run Lee Adjustment Center in Beattyville. In a recent interview, state Corrections Commissioner John Rees said bidding by private companies to run the Elliott County prison will continue despite the riot by more than 800 Kentucky and Vermont prisoners at the Lee prison last month. In asking for the opinion, Adkins said that he believes that the state cannot contract with a private company to run the Elliott County prison because state law requires all privately run prisons to be built by private companies. He said the Elliott County facility should be run by the state. Taxpayers will pay $8million in debt service annually on the project, Adkins said.

October 8, 2004 Herald Leader
House Floor Leader Rocky Adkins has asked the state attorney general's office whether state law allows the Fletcher administration to place the state's new $92 million Elliott County prison in private hands. Before leaving Frankfort yesterday to attend a raucous anti-privatization rally at the Little Sandy Correctional Complex near his home, Adkins said he thinks state law requires a private-prison operator to "establish" the facility as well as manage and operate it. The new prison was authorized by former Gov. Paul Patton, a Democrat, but when Gov. Ernie Fletcher, a Republican, took office this year, officials said it was not needed and said they would consider allowing a private company to operate it. Corrections officials moved ahead with that plan yesterday. While protesters with picket signs gathered outside the double coils of razor wire along Ky. 7, state corrections officials met inside with representatives of half a dozen private-prison companies. State Sen. Walter Blevins, D-Sandy Hook, one of several Democrat legislators who attended the rally, stood near a cardboard sign that said, "New Nest for Birdwhistle," a reference to former CHA Health chief Mark Birdwhistell who helped Fletcher draft a controversial insurance plan for state employees that gave two exclusive contracts to the company. Blevins noted that state corrections chief John Rees is a former vice president of Nashville-based Corrections Corporation of America, which owns all three private prisons in Kentucky and had four representatives at yesterday's "vendor's conference" in Elliott County. "He (Fletcher) has got an insider in corrections now, too," Blevins said. "Seems like all of his people are lobbyists for corporations that are trying to privatize state functions," Blevins said. Larry Bland, president of the Fraternal Order of Police lodge at the state prison in Eddyville, was not so sure. "Fletcher was elected to clear up this mess," he said, "but what he's done is make the mess worse. It's no longer the 'good-old-boy system,' it's the 'good-old-corporation system.'"

February 3, 2004
A nationwide prison management company is interested in operating the new Elliott County state prison, if Kentucky leaders opt for privatizing the 895-bed facility.  "We would certainly have a strong interest in partnering with the state should they make that decision," said Steve Owen, spokesman for Corrections Corp. of America of Nashville.  The company was not approached by the state, but has made its interest known as it does routinely in areas of the country where it has clients, Owen said.  Corrections Corp. operates 64 private prisons in 21 states. It owns and operates three in Kentucky, including the Otter Creek Correctional Center in Wheelwright.  The state owns the new Little Sandy Correctional Complex near Sandy Hook, and expects to finish its construction in June.  Plans of instead contracting out the prison to a private company to manage it stirred up recent debate when Lt. Gov. Steve Pence, also Kentucky's Justice Cabinet secretary, called it an option for Kentucky's cash-strapped budget.  Pence said the state's studying how much it would cost to let someone else handle operations, someone that could do it more effectively and efficiently.  In his budget address last week, Gov. Ernie Fletcher also mentioned the possibility of privatization — an option a cabinet leader later in the week, during an interview with The Independent's editorial board, called one of two he heard being considered in meetings: privatize it, or mothball it.  Opponents, including local judge-executives and legislators who see the new prison as an economic boost for a job-poor northeast Kentucky, dismiss the idea of privatization.  "It's not the right call, because the investment has already been made there by the state," said state Rep. Rocky Adkins, D-Sandy Hook, who serves as House Majority Leader.  And Adkins said he's not surprised a private company is watching the issue.  "As a for-profit company, I'm sure they're interested when $90 million of taxpayer money has already been invested to build the facility," he said, adding such compa