The Oklahoma Department of Corrections announced Tuesday that the state legislature’s inaction may force them to release certain inmates early in order to ease prison overcrowding.
Prison leaders said the program would heavily scrutinize inmates before releasing them early into community supervision programs, The Oklahoman reported Wednesday. The announcement comes after the legislature failed to pass expansive criminal justice reforms this spring.
“What we have not done in recent history is open the backdoor to any great degree,” Director of Population Laura Pittman told the paper. “What we’re looking at is opening the backdoor with highly selected inmates.”
Pittman estimates that 750-1,050 of Oklahoma’s 26,000 inmates will be eligible for the program, which requires participants to be within 18 months of release and excludes any inmate convicted of a violent or sexual crime.
Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin tried to push justice reforms this spring that would have helped empty the state’s prisons, but only one of the 10 bills in her package made it through the legislature. (RELATED: Oklahoma Gov. Pushing Against Women’s Incarceration Rate)
The bills, now defunct until next session, would have limited the punishments that could be added to a non-violent crime due to prior convictions, expanded treatment and supervision programs outside of prison, lowered sentences for low-value property crimes and made it easier for ex-convicts to get jobs once out of prison.
Prison officials warned the system was at a breaking point at the end of June, claiming that the state needed to either spend $1.9 billion on three new facilities or start releasing inmates early.
“I’m not trying to throw the Legislature under the bus, but somebody has got to make a move here … or there’s going to be a serious event,” Director Joe Allbaugh told reporters. “We’re just trying to be proactive in thinking a different way.”
Officials were quick to clarify that the early-release program was not a permanent fix, and legislative action was still necessary.
“The reality is if we could solve this problem, we would have done it a long time ago. This is definitely not going to solve the problem,” Corrections Board Member Adam Luck said.
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