Published: April 20th, 2008 12:55 AM
Last Modified: April 20th, 2008 12:55 AM
A bill in the Arizona state Legislature that would have stopped Alaska and other states from sending certain inmates to Arizona prisons is dead. "We'll still be able to take your prisoners, and they'll be returned to you when their time is up," said state Sen. Robert Blendu, who proposed the bill along with Gov. Janet Napolitano.
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As written, the bill would have barred Alaska and other states from sending inmates convicted of sex crimes and the most serious classes of felonies, such as murder, to private prisons in Arizona. Blendu said that won't happen.
"I didn't move it forward," he said.
He said that initially, he had concerns about Arizona becoming a kind of sex-offender capital, but now believes the state, its partners and prisons can make sure that doesn't happen without changing the law.
Alaska houses about 850 of its inmates in private prisons in Arizona at a cost of roughly $23 million a year, Alaska Department of Corrections Commissioner Joe Schmidt said in February.
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