PINE BLUFF - The Arkansas Department of Correction reached a historic-high inmate population Thursday as changes made this summer to the state’s parole system continue to cram county jails with inmates awaiting beds to open up in the already crowded state prisons.
As of Thursday, 2,123 state inmates were being housed in county jails, a number that has spiked since July and pushed the overall number of people in the custody of the state prison system to 16,867.
“That’s a record,” Arkansas Department of Correction Director Ray Hobbs told members of the state Board of Corrections, referring to both numbers.
The number of inmates - which eclipsed the previous high recorded on Nov. 24, 2010 - is taxing prisons that are already well over capacity.
In the latest count, the state prisons were at 106.4 percent capacity for men and 107.2 percent capacity for women. Overall, 14,343 inmates were being housed in the state prisons, 876 inmates above the 13,467 capacity.
Correction Department spokesman Shea Wilson said that prison staff members are “double-bunking” inmates and trying to find as many open beds as possible to house them, but inmates are still piling up in county jails because there’s no space.
“We’re busting at the seams. We’re finding bed space wherever we can,” she said.
The influx of state inmates has largely been fueled by changes made this summer in the state parole system that came after the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette chronicled eight-time parole absconder Darrell Dennis’ arrest in the May 10 killing of 18-year-old Forrest Abrams.
The new policies mandate that any parolee awaiting a revocation hearing remain locked up until the hearing; that any parolee who fails to report to his parole officer two or more times be jailed and a revocation hearing sought; and that any parolee charged with a felony - or a violent or sex-related misdemeanor - must remain in custody until a revocation hearing can be held.
The policies went into effect midsummer and since then Corrections Board members have said they expected an increase in parole revocations to fuel rapid prison growth.
On Thursday, Parole Board Chairman John Felts confirmed those expectations as he told board members that in only the past three months more paroles have been revoked than were for all of the previous fiscal year.
Between July and September, 514 people had their parole revoked, according to the Arkansas Department of Community Correction, which oversees the state’s parolees and probationers.
That was 81 more than the 433 parolees who were revoked in fiscal year 2013, which ran from July 2012 to June.
In total, more than 1,300 parolees have been sent back to prison in those three months, the majority being parolees who waived having a revocation hearing.
Community Correction Department Director Sheila Sharp said that the spike in parolees being sent back to prison has contributed to the county jail backlog but she expects that increase to level off in coming months.
“I think what we’ve just seen is a correction in the system,” she said, noting that new inmates have also added to the prison system’s rolls and not just parolees.
The county backup doesn’t include the 401 inmates who are assigned to work release or are being held in out-of-state facilities.
During Thursday’s meeting, the board attempted to alleviate some of the prison overcrowding, invoking the Emergency Powers Act to allow early release of about 180 inmates who were within 90 days of their parole eligibility dates and another 92 inmates who were within a year of parole eligibility.
The Board of Corrections has routinely invoked the act for 90-day early release when state prisons exceed 98 percent capacity as they did last month. They also have invoked the act for 1-year early release when the county backup list exceeds 500 inmates.
In September, though, the board excluded any inmates scheduled for release to Pulaski and Lonoke counties. At the time, board Chairman Benny Magness said he had concerns that the parole office serving the two counties wasn’t yet “stabilized.”
The office, which was understaffed and overwhelmed by a large caseload, was charged with supervising Dennis and other parolees who were later found to have had numerous problems with their supervision that were discovered only after they were arrested in violent crimes.
On Thursday, Magness again spoke in favor of excluding inmates who were set for release in those two counties but ultimately the board decided against making the designation a second time after several officials said they didn’t know if it would make much difference.
“The clock is still going to keep ticking, and they’re still going to go home anyway,” said Dina Tyler, the Community Correction Department’s deputy director for communications.
Also Thursday, the Board of Correction unanimously approved using up to $4 million to begin renovating the former 459-bed Diagnostic Unit in Pine Bluff that closed in January 2012 and caused the transfer of inmates to other prisons, including the expanded Ouachita River Unit in Malvern.
The money from the state prison construction trust fund will fund one of three phases of remodeling needed to reopen the facility, which will house more than 500 beds upon completion.
Construction of the first phase is scheduled to start in August 2014 and take about a year to complete, correction officials said.
Board member Bobby Glover said the renovated facility is needed, but neither it nor other prison construction projects will be ready soon enough to keep pace with the prison population’s growth.
“We’re going to have to start putting legislators on notice,” Glover said, “because we’re getting to a critical point.”
Front Section, Pages 1 on 10/25/2013