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11-28-2003, 07:32 AM
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Published November 28, 2003
State, inmates settle $7.5M, 15-year suit
Prison officials approve reforms after mediation
Provisions of pact
Some privileges won by Michigan prison inmates after a long-running lawsuit:
Most prisoners may keep some street clothes, including winter coats and gloves.
Committees will review placement of new prisoners, inmate classification and how long prisoners can remain in isolation.
Prison libraries will include materials regarding divorce, custody and other family law issues. Inmates will be allowed longer phone calls to their attorneys. They also will be allowed reasonable amounts of paperwork and copies of documents needed for court appeals.
Corrections officers will listen more closely to prisoner grievances regarding such concerns as medical care and visitor lists.
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By Gary Heinlein
Special to the State Journal
State prison inmates can keep their own winter mittens and buy coats for themselves. They're also promised a clean pair of underpants each day, and two pairs of thermal underwear apiece.
These are among details of a settlement ending a class-action lawsuit against the Michigan Department of Corrections that consumed 15 years and cost taxpayers $7.5 million - one of the nation's longest, costliest prison reform cases.
The lawsuit, launched in 1988 by a handful of inmates, also touched on levels of personal freedom, double-bunking and other aspects of life behind bars. Much was at stake: State corrections officials portrayed it as a battle to keep courts and prisoners from taking control of the prison system.
Lawyers for the prisoners predict the settlement will make things better for their clients in numerous ways. No cost estimates were available, but corrections officials say the impact will be minimal.
"There really are no key changes," Corrections Department attorney Jeff Baumann said. "We've agreed to sit down and discuss some things, such as prisoner classification, to see if we come up with any new ideas."
Classification - a big issue for inmates - is the method corrections officials use to decide how dangerous each prisoner is, where they will be locked up and how much freedom they will have.
Inmates who behave themselves, even murderers, eventually can end up with relatively generous privileges - by prison standards. Prisoners who steal from others, or get in fights, can end up in tightly restricted cell blocks, even if their crimes weren't so serious.
Advocates claim many inmates are kept in high-security prisons long after they've earned the right to freer movement. Sandra Girard, head of the legal team representing prisoners, predicted 2,500 to 3,500 of them will be reclassified to lower security levels as a result of the settlement.
"I think we got a pretty good settlement," she said. "Quite a few things were won for prisoners."
The case at times bordered on the bizarre.
At one point the prisoners were allowed to have a public relations agent who issued news releases explaining their view of developments. That was to counter the spin being applied by representatives of former Gov. John Engler, who branded presiding Ingham County Circuit Judge James Giddings "a lunatic" and sought to have him removed from the case.
Initially, the Corrections Department had to pay the fees of the attorneys suing it, as well as the cost of hauling prisoners to and from court hearings. Those expenses later were shifted to the prisoner benefit fund, a pool of money raised from pop machines and other concessions that otherwise pays for such things as cable TV and books.
Giddings did his own test on a prison-issued coat and gloves by wearing them outside for a couple hours in frigid weather. He pronounced the garb inadequate for Michigan winters and ruled that prisoners could keep their civilian coats or buy new ones until the department comes up with better ones.
The judge held court hearings in a gymnasium when his courtroom proved too small for all of the prisoners wanting to testify.
The lawsuit, filed by inmates wanting to stop guards from seizing their street clothes and typewriters, developed a timeless quality. It swelled like a ball of string, taking in an array of issues central to the lives of 49,000 state inmates.
The Michigan Supreme Court told Giddings to end it by Dec. 1 this year. He appointed a retired judge to act as mediator and bring the two sides together. A settlement was reached earlier this month.
"It didn't have to go on this long," said Girard, head of the legal team representing prisoners. "We offered to negotiate a number of times before the court ordered us to go to mediation."
Contact Gary Heinlein of The Detroit News at 371-3660 or gheinlein@detnews.com.
Published November 28, 2003
State, inmates settle $7.5M, 15-year suit
Prison officials approve reforms after mediation
Provisions of pact
Some privileges won by Michigan prison inmates after a long-running lawsuit:
Most prisoners may keep some street clothes, including winter coats and gloves.
Committees will review placement of new prisoners, inmate classification and how long prisoners can remain in isolation.
Prison libraries will include materials regarding divorce, custody and other family law issues. Inmates will be allowed longer phone calls to their attorneys. They also will be allowed reasonable amounts of paperwork and copies of documents needed for court appeals.
Corrections officers will listen more closely to prisoner grievances regarding such concerns as medical care and visitor lists.
Advertisement
By Gary Heinlein
Special to the State Journal
State prison inmates can keep their own winter mittens and buy coats for themselves. They're also promised a clean pair of underpants each day, and two pairs of thermal underwear apiece.
These are among details of a settlement ending a class-action lawsuit against the Michigan Department of Corrections that consumed 15 years and cost taxpayers $7.5 million - one of the nation's longest, costliest prison reform cases.
The lawsuit, launched in 1988 by a handful of inmates, also touched on levels of personal freedom, double-bunking and other aspects of life behind bars. Much was at stake: State corrections officials portrayed it as a battle to keep courts and prisoners from taking control of the prison system.
Lawyers for the prisoners predict the settlement will make things better for their clients in numerous ways. No cost estimates were available, but corrections officials say the impact will be minimal.
"There really are no key changes," Corrections Department attorney Jeff Baumann said. "We've agreed to sit down and discuss some things, such as prisoner classification, to see if we come up with any new ideas."
Classification - a big issue for inmates - is the method corrections officials use to decide how dangerous each prisoner is, where they will be locked up and how much freedom they will have.
Inmates who behave themselves, even murderers, eventually can end up with relatively generous privileges - by prison standards. Prisoners who steal from others, or get in fights, can end up in tightly restricted cell blocks, even if their crimes weren't so serious.
Advocates claim many inmates are kept in high-security prisons long after they've earned the right to freer movement. Sandra Girard, head of the legal team representing prisoners, predicted 2,500 to 3,500 of them will be reclassified to lower security levels as a result of the settlement.
"I think we got a pretty good settlement," she said. "Quite a few things were won for prisoners."
The case at times bordered on the bizarre.
At one point the prisoners were allowed to have a public relations agent who issued news releases explaining their view of developments. That was to counter the spin being applied by representatives of former Gov. John Engler, who branded presiding Ingham County Circuit Judge James Giddings "a lunatic" and sought to have him removed from the case.
Initially, the Corrections Department had to pay the fees of the attorneys suing it, as well as the cost of hauling prisoners to and from court hearings. Those expenses later were shifted to the prisoner benefit fund, a pool of money raised from pop machines and other concessions that otherwise pays for such things as cable TV and books.
Giddings did his own test on a prison-issued coat and gloves by wearing them outside for a couple hours in frigid weather. He pronounced the garb inadequate for Michigan winters and ruled that prisoners could keep their civilian coats or buy new ones until the department comes up with better ones.
The judge held court hearings in a gymnasium when his courtroom proved too small for all of the prisoners wanting to testify.
The lawsuit, filed by inmates wanting to stop guards from seizing their street clothes and typewriters, developed a timeless quality. It swelled like a ball of string, taking in an array of issues central to the lives of 49,000 state inmates.
The Michigan Supreme Court told Giddings to end it by Dec. 1 this year. He appointed a retired judge to act as mediator and bring the two sides together. A settlement was reached earlier this month.
"It didn't have to go on this long," said Girard, head of the legal team representing prisoners. "We offered to negotiate a number of times before the court ordered us to go to mediation."
Contact Gary Heinlein of The Detroit News at 371-3660 or gheinlein@detnews.com.