MONTGOMERY State officials asked for
more time Tuesday to draft a plan to defuse what a federal judge in
December called the "ticking time bomb" of Tutwiler Prison for Women.
Lawyers for Gov. Bob Riley, Attorney General Bill Pryor and the state
Department of Corrections asked U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson to
give the state until Feb. 21 instead of a previously set Friday deadline
to file a plan to eliminate unconstitutional conditions at Tutwiler.
"The governor has already designated a task force to investigate such
remedies and alternatives, and to recommend how such alternatives could
be utilized most effectively to ameliorate the concerns identified by
the court," state lawyers told Thompson.
Thompson ruled on Dec. 2 that Tutwiler, built in 1942 to house 365
inmates but now containing more than 1,000, is dangerously crowded and
understaffed. He first gave the state until Dec. 30, then until Friday
to file a plan to solve Tutwiler's problems.
Nabers heads group:
David Azbell, Riley's press secretary, said the governor's prison
task force, headed by state Finance Director Drayton Nabers, includes
Finance Department staffers Bill Newton, Carolyn Middleton and Laurie
Avant; the Legislative Fiscal Office's Joyce Bigbee and Sharon Bivens;
and Rosa Davis of the attorney general's office.
Azbell said the panel will look at potential sources of funding as
well as management steps to operate state prisons more effectively and
efficiently. "They are looking at corrections from top to bottom," said
Azbell.
Thompson last week rejected a plan drawn up during the administration
of former Gov. Don Siegelman that lawyers for inmates said "effectively
does nothing" to solve problems at Tutwiler.
The plan called on Thompson to order Alabama counties not to bring
more inmates to Tutwiler for five months to give prison officials time
to ask the Legislature for emergency money to make improvements.
Thompson said last week he lacks the authority to order any inmates
released or refused admission to prison and that lack of money doesn't
give the state any excuse to violate the constitution.
At a Jan. 21 hearing, lawyers for the state told Thompson that money
is not available to make immediate changes at Tutwiler, but Thompson
said from the bench, "If you have to get more money, you just have to
get more money ... Lack of funds is not a defense." Lisa Kung of the
Atlanta-based Southern Center for Human Rights, representing state
convicts, said Tuesday that she won't object to the state's request for
more time, but she underscored Thompson's finding that Tutwiler is in
"an emergency situation" and "a ticking time bomb."
