Ruston-based LaSalle Corrections is throwing in the towel at a trouble-plagued it has been operating for a decade in Texas.
When its current contract to run Bowie County’s Bi-State Jail in Texarkana, the facility will be turned back over to Sheriff James Prince, according to a STORY by Associated Press.
It was not immediately clear as to whose decision it was for LaSalle to pull out of running the jail that sits on the Texas-Arkansas line, but the facility has been beset by numerous lawsuits and has been the target of criticism from Texas regulators for the lax manner in which it has been run.
LaSalle took over operation of the facility in 2010 and since that time has become embroiled in a number of lawsuits involving at least two wrongful death claims and negligent injury.
Along the way, LaSalle or its employees have been found guilty of falsifying records, failure to complete training courses, lying about those courses, negligence, beating prisoners, denying medications, avoiding reporting in-custody deaths by releasing prisoners to hospitals or families prior to their deaths, and, in the case of its Georgia facility, filthy conditions and the performance of unwanted HYSTERECTOMIES on female detainees and exposing Louisiana employees and prisoners to coronavirus.
LaSalle operates nine facilities in Louisiana under contracts with local authorities. Those jails and their occupancy capacities are:
- Catahoula Correctional Center in Harrisonburg (835 beds);
- Jackson Parish Correctional Center in Jonesboro (1252);
- LaSalle Correctional Center in Olla (755);
- Madison Parish Correctional Center in Tallulah (334);
- Madison Parish Detention Center in Tallulah (264);
- Madison Parish LTCW (Louisiana Transitional Center for Women) in Tallulah (535);
- River Correctional Center in Ferriday (602);
- Southern Correctional Center in Tallulah (564);
- Winn Correctional Center in Winnfield (1576).
LaSalle’s legal problems haven’t been limited to Texas, however. Just last month, the company was PENALIZED more than $125,000 by the U.S. Department of Labor for failure to pay fringe benefits for 122 contract employees at its Olla facility.
LaSalle is run by the McConnell family in Ruston, headed by father William McConnell and son Clay.
The elder McConnell presides over myriad limited liability corporate entities, including WMC Enterprises, Medical Supplies, LaSalle Corrections West, LaSalle Corrections, LaSalle Corrections VI, LaSalle Correctional Center, Catahoula Correctional Center, Red River Center, Bayou Correctional, River Correctional Center, Richwood Correctional Center, Jackson Correctional Center, Lincoln Correctional Center, McConnell Southeast Holdings, McConnell Southeast Corrections, and LaSalle Management.
Clay McConnell is also involved in a number of corporate ventures. A Methodist minister, he was a director and vice president of the now-inactive Rush Ministries in Bossier City.
He also was president of Polytech Ammunition Co. of Ruston, which holds a patent to a lead-free, composite polymer-based bullet and cartridge case, and is the registered agent for Correct Aviation, LLC, also of Ruston.
Louisiana Voice 
In his book, “Monopolized” David Dayen devotes one of his chapters to prisons being run by private companies. Here is one paragraph:
“Private companies had already wedged their way into the criminal justice system, winning contracts for lower-security facilities. The Reagan administration invited them to manage prisons as well, in a 1988 report from the President’s Commission on Privatization. Contracting out prison management ‘could lead to improved, more efficient operation,’ the report said, and conservative organs like the Heritage Foundation echoed the sentiment, asserting that private companies could run prisons for as low as $25 per inmate per day, as opposed to $40 when run by government. Within a decade, private prisons were a billion-dollar business, with operations in twenty-seven states.”
He goes on to describe the history and the problems and the multitude of ways they run the entire prison system from video visitations to health care to food. By 1997 two companies managed 75 percent of all private prisons in America.
The entire book about monopolized power in America is worth reading, but be warned, it will make you queasy to learn all the industries controlling our lives and the price we pay.
My son got stabbed in the back of his head, hit in the jaw and they took over $700 worth of merchandise at the Catahoula Correctional Center. We called those people down so many times and nothing was done. When I found out the office was in Ruston I called them many times and left messages and no return calls