This post is about two issues. One is about the relationship between the Louisiana Department of Corrections and parish sheriffs that has resulted in state prisoners being housed in parish jails which in turn means revenue for the sheriffs. It’s a relationship that has whetted the appetite of sheriffs for more power and encouraged them to develop paramilitary operations with the help of state and federal money.
When a convicted rapist being held in the Union Parish jail was allowed into the cell of a 17-year-old girl thought to be high on meth last month and raped her twice, it raised several questions, including:
- How was it that the girl was being held in the proximity of a convicted aggravated rapist?
- Who was the Union Parish Detention Center (UPDC) staff member who admitted Demarcus Shavez Peyton, 28, of Homer, into the cell?
- Who is responsible for operations of the detention center?
While Peyton has since been sentenced to life imprisonment on a separate aggravated rape charge, no answers have been provided to the first two questions but the answer to that last question turned out to be something of a surprise. http://www.knoe.com/home/headlines/Inmate-raped-inside-Union-Parish-Detention-Center-377640971.html
It has been widely reported by the media, including LouisianaVoice, that local sheriffs have come to rely on contracts with the Louisiana Department of Corrections (DOC) to house state prisoners at the going rate of about $25 per prisoner per day. That’s hardly enough to house, feed, educate, and train inmates in a trade as DOC officials like to have us believe they are doing. The harsh reality is that prisoners are simply warehoused. Period. There are no classes, no job training, no counseling. http://mondediplo.com/2013/12/11usprison
A fourth question might be: To what end are sheriffs seeking bigger detention centers to house more prisoners? The answer to that is power. The sheriff is already the most powerful person in any given parish and if he can build detention centers to bring in additional state money to shore up that power, so much the better.
One dirty little secret is that if one sheriff has an abundance of prisoners and the sheriff next door has empty beds, the first sheriff will ship a few to his fellow sheriff so that he can collect his $25 per day payments. Prisoners are moved all around from parish to parish that way. Those beds must be filled.
Instead of classes and counseling, some prisoners are funneled into work-for-profit programs whereby local jails farm out inmates to private firms for menial jobs—another source of income for the sheriffs.
The policy of paying for warehousing prisoners is so lucrative that companies like Corrections Corporation of America of Nashville, the GEO Group of Boca Raton, Florida, and the LaSalle Corrections of Ruston reap millions in profits simply by keeping beds filled.
Union Parish is the exception.
Oh, the Union Parish Detention Center takes full advantage of the glut of state prisoners (Louisiana has the highest prison rate in the U.S. which in turn has the highest rate of incarceration in the world). Of the 277 population of the UPDC, 165 are DOC prisoners.
If that population is maintained at the current rate of pay, that means about $1.5 million per year additional to the Union Parish Police Jury. In other parishes, that money would go to the sheriff.
The UPDC, however, is not run by Sheriff Dusty Gates, so his department does not receive the state funds. The UPDC is unique in that it is not overseen directly by the Union Parish Sheriff, but the police jury. Jail personnel, from top administrators all the way down to the guards, are police jury employees. Not one is a deputy sheriff. That means administrative staff and guards alike do not necessarily have law enforcement experience. One recent UPDC warden, who has since resigned, had no experience in law enforcement.
The facility is run by a commission made up of District Attorney John Belton, Gates, Union Parish municipal chiefs of police, and the police jury with the police jury having actual management responsibilities. https://louisianavoice.com/2016/05/10/how-did-convicted-rapist-gain-access-to-isolation-cell-in-the-union-parish-detention-center-to-rape-teenage-girl-twice/
The Lincoln Parish Detention Center next door was once run in the same manner but operations were soon turned over to LaSalle. When problems were encountered with LaSalle’s management, Sheriff Mike Stone took over operations.
In the entire state, only the UPDC is operated by a commission with no direct management from the sheriff.
DOC has since removed six other female inmates being held at UPDC. http://www.thenewsstar.com/story/news/crime/2016/05/19/doc-pulls-female-inmates-union-parish-detention-center/84626290/
Besides Peyton, also arrested was inmate Darandall Eugene Boyette, 27, of Marion. Boyette, originally incarcerated on home invasion and robbery charges, was also booked for simple escape because he did not have permission to leave his cell. He told officials that he entered the victim’s isolation cell when he found the door was unlocked. Upon entering, he said he witnessed Peyton and the victim having sex. He told authorities it was initially his intention to also have sex with her but that he “had a bad feeling,” and left the cell.
Detention center video confirmed that Peyton entered the cell followed by Boyette who then left the cell.
All of which raises the fifth and sixth questions: Why was Boyette allowed to wander about the jail unattended? He was charged with simple escape; so how was he able to exit his cell in the first place if it was locked as it should have been?
Perhaps, with this latest fiasco, the time has come for the state to take a long, hard look at the practice of shipping inmates off to local jails to fatten the bank accounts of parish prisons and sheriffs’ offices. https://louisianavoice.com/2010/12/13/state-inmate-housing-a-financial-boon-to-local-sheriffs/
The contracts with DOC are helping sheriffs’ offices to beef up their arsenals with expensive and seemingly unnecessary weaponry such as high-powered rifles and Humvees and military equipment previous used in Iraq and Afghanistan. The East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff’s Office, for example recently purchased 558 assault rifles from the Pentagon at discount prices. In that case, the purchases were made with grant money from Congress.
With some of the equipment being more appropriate for war zones, one might understandably feel these purchases in the name of law and order are the moral equivalent of sandblasting a Lays Ruffles potato chip to remove the salt.
http://www.wafb.com/story/26313340/investigators-are-police-departments-becoming-militarized
Granted, the trend toward purchasing military ordnance may seem far removed from housing state prisoners for a shade under $25 per day, but the influx of easy money has created a hunger for more and bigger firepower by the sheriffs, each hell bent on building a better and more powerful arsenal than the guy in the next parish.
The mentality is fast becoming one of “Send me more prisoners so I can purchase more heavy artillery.”
Meanwhile, the evidence is indisputable that the method of operating the UPDC is untenable and must be changed. It’s inconceivable that a prison of any description should be bereft of law enforcement personnel—from administrators to guards. You simply cannot have untrained, uncertified, inexperienced people running a prison.
Louisiana Voice 
Thank you for your complete report
“Williams v. Edwards is a class action suit started in 1971 over prison conditions throughout the state. In 1981 all the prison and jail consent decrees and class action suits were consolidated and placed before federal district court judge Frank Polozola.
In 1996 counsel for the Williams plaintiffs filed a motion to dissolve all consent decrees over all state, parish (county) and city jail facilities housing Department of Corrections prisoners, except for the penitentiary at Angola and some juvenile prisons. The decrees would terminate on April 1, 1997. On September 26, 1996, judge Polozola entered an order approving dissolution of the decrees.”
The above is excerpted from:
https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/1999/apr/15/no-appeal-allowed-in-louisiana-consent-decree-dissolution/
Those of us old enough to have dealt with the late Judge Frank Polozola know that dissolution of this consent decree was the beginning of the end of prison reform/oversight in Louisiana. Judge Polozola rode herd over state and parish prisons for some 16 years. His tolerance level for the kinds of things that are going on now approached zero. To say he took constitutional treatment of prisoners seriously is to grossly understate his diligence.
At this point, it appears nobody who matters takes prisoner rights seriously enough to exercise real oversight. Many believe prisoners should have no, or very few rights. Something those people might consider is how they might feel if the victim in this case was their daughter – if they are capable of even thinking about it at all.
They just buy their child out of trouble via political payoffs or money so they don’t care.
McKeithen was the first-named defendant in Case No. 71-98. EWE hadn’t taken office when the suit was filed.
Yes, and after all this time the federal court’s concerns about state and parish jails seem to have narrowed to whether it is too hot on death row at Angola.
Great and accurate comments by Mr. Winham and Mr. Minton. The privatization of our government functions to swell profits to corporate America results in lunacy and greed, unless of course, you unite behind Trump and make America great and excessive profits. ron Thompson
Privatization only works because it always costs more when government does anything….Example – private corrections firms do not have to pay hospitalization or retirement on workers…about 40 percent savings. So what if someone makes money, it saves taxpayers dollars. Profit in and of itself is not evil. It is only “evil” when it is an “inside” job, like when Dept of Corrections is involved with contractor and contractor receives preferential treatmwent
Don’t forget that the profitability of housing these prisoners is why those same police organizations oppose any softening of drug related sentences. They have a vested interest in growing the prison population, not shrinking it.
“If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime”……..
What if they coerce people into bringing false charges against someone these people have a grudge against? For example Bill doesn’t like his neighbor so one day he calls the sheriff’s office but the sheriff tells Bill, “Now Bill, I can’t arrest him for being ugly and cussing you but if he does it tomorrow with a gun in his hand and threatens you well you call me back (wink, wink). Oh and wait until Friday so he can’t make bond until Monday, OK?” That’s basically what has just happen to me. It didn’t matter that Bill had lied to them and they documented these lies and I have no record with them. They chose to believe him. Hmmm. What happened to credibility or preponderance of evidence? Well those two things there don’t make them any cash which is what they about now not justice just cash, thank you.
Police organizations support enforcement of drug laws because those are the most prolific repeat offenders. Lock them up – crime goes down. It is established that about 10% of criminals commit 90%+ of all crimes – locking them up helps everyone.
If you think someone in government is making money housing people at $24 per day, you do not do math well. The State of La acknowledges the daily cost to house inmate is almost $40/per day. That might work in Union Parish because wages are lower, but jails are a tremendous financial burden on local government for most, especially in south Louisiana
Obviously this AG needs replacing and the system which is not working needs a good shakeup. This case needs to go to trial asap. Is he hoping the perp will die of old age before he takes care of this case?
To Mr. Thomas Well,
THANK YOU. You are giving a nearly perfect depiction of UPDC. I did about 4 years there. I was around these ppl and had direct access to them, as I was the “Law Librarian” there for a period of time in which this rape occurred. I have intimate knowledge of the jail, it’s staff, daily working procedures, Boyette’s armed robbery case, this rape case, etc. If you have any questions, I am sure I can answer them. I did see 3 questions in your editorial.
Who runs the jail’s daily operations? Answer: In decending order of importance; Warden Adams, Captain Jones, Lieutenant Douglas, then it goes to whichever shift Commander is on duty. There are 4 shifts, so 4 commanders.. However, on weekends and holidays there is no “administration” working, so the highest ranking officer is then the Shift Commander. And that’s when the rape occurred, while administration wasn’t at work. Second, Boyette and Peyton were “pre-trial” at the time, and it was visitation time during the weekend. (Which meant most, if not all, guards were in separate control rooms talking/eating/sleeping and short staffed due to officers being in the visitation building also.) I probably can remember the actual guard’s name that popped the iso cell door for them, if I think about it long enough. He actually said, “I just heard someone call the door number on the box, so I popped the door. I didn’t know it was inmates because I didn’t check the monitor to see.” The guy was a prick in general, but he probably wouldn’t have done it on purpose. The other inmates weren’t in their cell/dorm because they were coming back from visitation. (The guard from visit walks you to the main building of the jail and sends you in by calling on the radio to the main control room and there are 3 control rooms). Well, I feel like I’ve digressed.. so, any other questions and I’ll reply.