Federal Prisoner Convicted of Attempted Murder for Slashing Deputy Marshal’s Throat Sentenced to 20-Year Maximum

HOUSTON—Jose Garcia Jr., 31, of Mercedes, Texas, has been sentenced to the statutory maximum punishment of 20 years' imprisonment for the attempted murder of a deputy U.S. marshal (DUSM), United States Attorney José Angel Moreno announced today. Garcia, a federal prisoner in custody, used a razor to slash at the throat of DUSM at the federal courthouse in McAllen, Texas, on May 22, 2009. In June 2009, Garcia was indicted for attempted murder of a federal agent in the Houston division.

Garcia pleaded guilty to the attack on a DUSM in December 2009. At a hearing late this afternoon, United States District Judge Ewing Werlein sentenced Garcia to 20 years in federal prison to be followed by a three-year term of supervised release. The 20-year sentence is to be served consecutive to his 50-year state prison sentence.

According to the factual basis in support of the guilty plea, Garcia was in a holding cell in the federal courthouse awaiting a hearing before United States District Judge Randy Crane in McAllen for the possible revocation of the term of supervised release imposed as part of a 2000 federal robbery conviction prompted by Garcia’s recent state conviction for murder and 50-year sentence. While being lead into Judge Crane’s courtroom from a holding cell through a door being held by a DUSM, Garcia walked through the door into the courtroom and lunged at the DUSM slashing his throat with a razor blade. As the DUSM and other deputy marshals attempted to subdue Garcia, Garcia continued to slash at the DUSM’s throat several more times. Eventually, Garcia was subdued. Bleeding profusely from the injury to his neck, the DUSM was transported to the hospital and received nine stitches to close the wound.

FBI agents arrived at the scene and recovered the razor blade used by Garcia. FBI agents then interviewed Garcia, who told them he felt a “vibe” when he saw the DUSM earlier in the day. Before going in the courtroom, Garcia said he found a razor blade on the floor by the urinal in the holding cell located on the first floor of the federal courthouse building. Garcia admitted he hid the razor blade in his upper lip then later moved it to his hand where he had it when the cell door opened. As he walked closer to the DUSM, Garcia admitted he wanted to “get him right there,” and was trying to kill the DUSM when he attacked him. Garcia told FBI agents he felt “relaxed” after the attack.

Garcia, who has been in federal custody, will remain in custody to serve this sentence.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark McIntyre. Assistant U.S. Attorney Glenn Cook represented the government at today’s hearing.

A new report shows that the amount federal agencies paid in relocation incentives -- to compensate employees asked to move from one area to another -- nearly doubled from 2007 to 2008.

The Office of Personnel Management report shows than the rise in relocation bonuses, often to law enforcement officers and supervisors, made up a sizable portion of the 37 percent overall increase in the amount paid out for what are known as "3Rs" incentives for relocation, retention and recruitment.

Such increases have led OPM to ask agencies to review their use of the incentives. The total number of bonuses handed out increased by 7,027 between 2007 and 2008, to 39,511. The dollar amount spent on them went up by more than $77 million, to nearly $285 million. Citing recent labor market conditions, OPM Director John Berry asked agencies to make sure incentives were justified.

All three categories of incentives saw increases from 2007 to 2008. On a percentage basis, relocation incentives went up the most - nearly 86 percent, or about $20 million. Retention bonuses remained the most popular type of incentive, with a $28.9 million increase from 2007 to 2008.

According to the report, the Defense Department awarded the most incentives, handing out more than 19,000 bonuses totaling more than $135 million. The Veterans Affairs Department was second, with more than 9,000 incentives totaling almost $54 million. Other departments near the top of the list included Justice, Health and Human Services, and Commerce.

According to the report, 34 percent of all retention incentives were paid to employees in the health care field, including nurses, medical officers and pharmacists. For recruitment incentives, the most common occupation was patent examiner, which represented 11 percent of all such incentives.

Relocation incentives went to a mix of criminal investigators, contract officers, administrators and engineers.

Two of the agencies that manage federal benefits handed out some of the largest incentives. According to the report, OPM itself handed out five incentives averaging $23,600, including one relocation incentive of $70,000. The Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board gave out two awards, totaling $54,500 -- including a $38,650 retention incentive to its executive director. Both made the top five list for largest average incentive payments.

Is There Skepticism About Merit System Principles?

'A growing skepticism'

Federal workers who want to advance might want to look at a report issued last week by the Merit Systems Protection Board.

"Fair and Equitable Treatment: Progress Made and Challenges Remaining" contains valuable information on diversity in the federal workplace and alarming findings on fairness. But it is the section on advancement that workers might find most useful.

Through interviews and surveys, the MSPB came up with a list of 10 "career accelerators." These are workplace situations that help employees move up the promotional ladder. The two top items relate directly to personal contacts.

"A supportive supervisor to encourage my development and advancement" and "senior person/mentor (other than my supervisor) looking out for my interests" each were identified as having a positive impact by 85 percent of those surveyed.

"Clearly, one should not underestimate the power of personal connections in the workplace," the report says. "Given their nearly absolute control over the developmental opportunities employees receive, supervisors play crucial roles in determining the fate of their employees."

This, of course, allows for bias and favoritism. The report says fears about unfair and inequitable treatment are on the rise, even as perceptions of ethnic and racial discrimination have declined.

"Suspicions regarding traditional/blatant forms of discrimination have been supplanted by a growing skepticism about managers making their decisions in accord with the merit principles," the MSPB found in responses to its Career Advancement Survey.

The flip side of having encouraging supervisors and mentors is the feeling that "who you know," which carries a negative connotation, is what counts when it comes to promotions. Far more respondents, 72 percent, picked that as a reason for advancement, than did those who cited competence (40 percent) or hard work (36 percent).

Disturbingly, "over 70 percent of employees believed that some supervisors practiced favoritism," according to the report. And those views cross racial and ethnic lines. My mail indicates that's a prime factor undermining confidence in federal pay-for-performance systems.

Showing what you can do is an important way to be promoted. Being appointed an acting supervisor presents a "critical opportunity for employees who aspire to demonstrate that they can handle the responsibilities" of being the boss, the report says.

"Opportunity" seems to be the operative word here.

"Unfortunately, our survey results indicate that members of minority groups report that they have less opportunity to serve in an acting capacity than White employees," the MSPB found. "Further, these discrepancies do not appear to be diminishing."

The MSPB urged agencies to measure how their policies and practices help or hinder progress toward workplace fairness. The measurement should include a workplace analysis that covers, among other things, "possible barriers to a fully representative workforce." They also should "emphasize to supervisors their influence over -- and responsibility for -- the career development of the employees they supervise."

Among other recommendations, the MSPB advises employees to seek or create developmental opportunities and to develop productive relationships with supervisors or other mentors.

A view inside federal lockup

The nation's largest federal prison facility opened its doors to media for the first time ever.

COLEMAN - Encircling the perimeter of United States Penetentiary-1, one of two maximum-security prisons here, are coils of barbed wire, the last buffer of security separating the concrete structure from the rest of the sprawling Federal Correctional Complex of which it is part.

Here, an ordinary day for an inmate in general population might go as follows: breakfast at 6 a.m., early morning work call by 7:40 a.m., vocational training or continued work duty, leisure time in the recreation yard, and two more meals, before it's back to a bland 84-square-foot cell by the time lights go out at 10 p.m.

With an average confinement period of 10 years, inmates at Coleman Federal Correctional Complex, the nation's largest federal prison facility, must adapt to a certain way of living - work, education, recreation, thriftiness - that prison staff hopes will prepare them for the world to which they might eventually return.

"Our prison is very reflective of the community," Bill Bechtold, associate warden of U.S.P-2, said Wednesday during the first-ever media tour Coleman has conducted since opening in 1995.

Following a spate of recent bad publicity - staff smuggling in contraband, the conviction of a correctional officer for violating an inmate's civil rights and contributing to his death - Coleman employees hope to reinforce a positive message about the prison.

"Those people involved in those activities," Bechtold said, "are not representative of the many great people here."

With a staff of about 1,300, Coleman is one of the largest, if not largest, employers in Sumter County.

It's actively seeking to hire additional correctional officers, especially medical personnel, to help supervise the 7,120 inmates it currently houses across four different facilities: a low-security institution; a medium-security institution with adjacent satellite female work camp; and the two high-security penitentiaries, known as U.S.P-1 and U.S.P-2.

With the exception of the female work camp, all inmates are male, and the vast majority of their offenses are drug-related.

During the guided tour of U.S.P-1, led by a handful of associate wardens and other staff, a scrubbed and smoothly functioning operation was on display: polished floors, immaculate hallways, a GED class in session, colorful artwork on easels in a recreation room.

Even the general population inmates released into an enclosed outdoor recreation yard, many sporting headphones, seemed to blend as naturally into the undisturbed calm as the beige on their prison jumpsuits to the rural landscape.

Although both U.S.P-1 and U.S.P-2 have a segregated housing unit reserved for the most violent, maximum-security offenders and for those who require protective custody, such areas were not opened to the media Wednesday.

Subject to metal detection screening, media also were advised not to participate in spontaneous interviews with inmates or correctional staff they happened to come across. No photography was allowed.

At Coleman, each inmate is given a job assignment, in which they can earn money to use at the prison commissary, for instance, to purchase things like snacks, aspirin, or personal hygiene items, though these items are marked up 30 percent.

Depending on the pay grade, such jobs will net anywhere between 12 cents to 40 cents an hour.

Coleman also offers an industries-oriented work program - building office furniture, for instance - that nets higher salaries of 23 cents to $1.15 an hour.

Prison employees place a high emphasis on inmate productivity, especially since it employs no outside contractors to perform maintenance work.

"We like to keep them busy because they stay out of trouble," said Steve Mora, associate warden at U.S.P-1.

Phil Geistfeld, who oversees educational services at Coleman, added that the prison is "keeping these guys busy with something legitimate."

He noted that 42 percent of inmates are enrolled in at least one educational or recreational program, such as an art or musical activity, and that 228 inmates obtained their GEDs in 2009, while 447 completed some sort of vocational training.

This is a complex that serves 2,900 meals a day, and where 5,000 pieces of incoming mail are pre-screened daily. If anything is slight, it's the average daily number of visitors that inmates receive, with Father's Day and Christmas being the busiest.

There are no plans to build an additional institution on the 1,600-acre complex, although the inmate count has already reached official capacity, according to Bechtold. Still, he said none of the facilities are so full as to be "packed to the gills."

If there is any one challenge over the next year that officials say they hope to overcome, it's increasing staffing levels to sustain a high inmate population.

"They (the federal Bureau of Prisons) are locking up more and more inmates but they're not hiring staff to equal it," said Jose Rojas, the new president of the local chapter of the American Council of Prison Locals. "Of course that makes for a volatile cocktail."

Rojas, whose also teaches inmates at the Coleman prison, said additional precautionary measures have been instituted over the last year.

He, too, rebuffed the notion that the Sumter County complex is any more rife with staff misconduct than anywhere else in the nation.

"That's prison. Every now and again, there's cracks," he said. "You'll always get folks that slide through the cracks. Hopefully those who do, get caught."

As Coleman seeks to burnish its image as a facility intent on better preparing its inmates for life on the outside, all the while embracing a newfound philosophy of greater transparency, it knows how it wants to do it.

As one of its staffers put it Wednesday, "Here at Coleman, we take the attitude that we want to be good neighbors."

Despite the often exemplary care given at most Veterans Affairs Department medical facilities, sometimes the best care for a wounded warrior comes from a loved one. A provision tucked away in the fiscal 2010 Defense Authorization Act will make it easier for federal employees and other workers to take time off to care for family members injured while on active duty.

The measure -- summarized in a Dec. 29, 2009, memorandum from Office of Personnel Management Director John Berry to agency heads -- allows federal employees to take up to 26 weeks of unpaid leave annually through the 1993 Family and Medical Leave Act to care for an injured veteran. To qualify, a veteran must be undergoing medical treatment or therapy for the injury, and he or she must have served in the military within five years of the treatment.

The new law builds on a provision passed in the fiscal 2009 Defense Authorization Act, which granted leave to help care for injured active-duty soldiers, by allowing time off to care for veterans as well.

"That's pretty significant," said Carl Bosland, a Colorado attorney who specializes in family and medical leave issues. "There are a lot of vets out there."

The 2010 law also broadens the types of injuries that qualify for the leave to include existing injuries aggravated by active-duty service.

In addition, the policy measure allows family members to take time off when active-duty troops are deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan. This leave can used to spend more time with the soon-to-be deployed soldier and settle financial or family issues. Previously, this benefit was available only to families of reservists called to certain types of duty.

Leave taken under FMLA -- whether for military care, medical issues, or the birth of a child -- is unpaid. But employees who have saved up other types of paid leave can apply that to make up some of the lost wages.

The White House released a series of wide-ranging mandates Tuesday designed to make agencies more transparent and cooperative in the public's requests for information about the inner workings of government.

Among other things, federal agencies have until the end of January to post three "high-value" data sets on Data.gov, the online home of such government information.

The Open Government Plan delivers a victory to open-government groups that have long sought to transform how the government presents and shares information with the public.

The plan says that agencies must publish information online in a timely manner and present their data in a Web-friendly format that is available to download. Agencies with significant backlogs of Freedom of Information Act requests will have to reduce that number of requests by 10 percent each year.

Peter Orszag, director of the Office of Management and Budget, said he expects that federal agencies and departments will comply.

"Failure to follow through on this will generate displeasure from the White House and the president," he said in an interview. "I don't think we've had a problem with Cabinet secretaries embracing clear directives from the president."

Orszag's team spent months meeting with government officials and good-government groups after President Obama ordered on his first full day in office a review of the government's transparency and openness efforts.

"The results appear to be well worth the wait," said Gary D. Bass, executive director of OMB Watch, one of several groups that pushed for transparency reforms.

"The key will be how the public, the White House and federal agencies work together in implementing the directive," Bass said.

Ellen Miller, executive director and co-founder of the Sunlight Foundation in Washington, said that the new orders demonstrate "the seriousness of the administration's commitment to data transparency and citizen engagement. It is evidence that the administration recognizes that transparency is government's responsibility."

Orszag said that the Internet has made government transparency efforts much easier. Although an agency could require that people visit their offices to review public records, he said, that would be "much less transparent than posting something on a Web site."

"Ease of access is part of transparency," Orszag said.

President Obama ordered late Friday that all federal agencies close for the last half of the work day on Thursday, Dec. 24, to give employees a jump on the Christmas holiday.

In an executive order, Obama also noted that the heads of departments and agencies may determine that "certain offices and installations of their organizations, or parts thereof, must remain open and that certain employees must remain on duty for the full scheduled workday" on Christmas Eve.

Traditionally, presidents grant employees an extra day of vacation when Christmas falls on Tuesday or Thursday. This year it is on a Friday.

Last year, when Christmas fell on a Thursday, President Bush ordered executive branch agencies to close on the next day, Friday, Dec. 26, giving most federal employees a four-day weekend over the Christmas holiday.

The last time Christmas fell on a Friday, in 1998, President Clinton gave federal workers a half day off. At that time, a White House spokesman said the half day was something of a tradition in years when Christmas falls on a Friday.

In 2002, when Christmas fell on a Wednesday, Bush gave federal workers a half day of vacation on Tuesday.

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Press Secretary

_______________________________________________________________________________________

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

December 15, 2009

TODAY: Senior Administration Officials to Hold Background Briefing Call on Decision to Acquire Thomson Correctional Center;

Quinn, Durbin to be Briefed at the White House

WASHINGTON – Today, senior administration officials will hold a background briefing call with reporters to discuss the administration’s decision to acquire Thomson Correctional Center in Illinois to house federal inmates and a limited number of detainees from Guantanamo Bay , Cuba .

Today, the Secretaries of State, Homeland Security, and Defense, the Director of National Intelligence, and the Attorney General wrote to Illinois Governor Pat Quinn announcing the administration’s decision.  Today’s announcement marks an important step towards closing Guantanamo, which will protect our national security and help American troops by removing a deadly recruiting tool from the hands of al Qaeda. 

This afternoon, Governor Pat Quinn and Senator Dick Durbin will be briefed at the White House about the decision by General James Jones, National Security Advisor; William Lynn, Deputy Secretary of Defense; and Harley Lappin, the Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. 

The meeting will be closed press but there will be a stakeout immediately following the meeting.

Details about the background call and the stakeout are below.

BACKGROUND BRIEFING CALL WITH REPORTERS

WHO:              Senior Administration Officials

WHAT:            Background Briefing call on the Administration’s Decision to Acquire Thomson Prison

WHEN:            TODAY, 1:00 pm ET

Call in:             (800) 288-8976                               

Note:                This call is NOT embargoed.

STAKEOUT WITH GOVERNOR QUINN, SENATOR DURBIN, ADMINISTRATION OFFICIALS FOLLOWING WHITE HOUSE MEETING ON THOMSON

WHO:              Illinois Governor Pat Quinn

Senator Dick Durbin

General James Jones, National Security Advisor

William Lynn, Deputy Secretary of Defense

Harley Lappin, Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons

WHAT:            Stakeout following briefing on Thomson prison

WHEN:            TODAY, 3:15 pm ET

WHERE:          Stakeout location outside of West Wing

Note: Press needing access to the White House to cover the stakeout must send their vital information and RSVP to media_affairs@who.eop.gov by 1:30 pm ET today.

Rural Ill. prison to house some Gitmo detainees

Decision is key step to closing Cuba facility; town hopes for jobs boon

WASHINGTON - Taking an important step on the thorny path to closing the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the White House plans to announce Tuesday that the government will acquire an underutilized state prison in rural Illinois to be the new home for a limited number of terrorist suspects held at Guantanamo.

Administration officials as well as Illinois Sen. Richard Durbin and Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn will make an official announcement at the White House.

Officials from both the White House and Durbin's office confirmed that President Barack Obama had directed the government to acquire Thomson Correctional Center in Thomson, Ill., a sleepy town near the Mississippi River about 150 miles from Chicago. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid pre-empting Tuesday's announcement.

A Durbin aide said the facility would house federal inmates and no more than 100 detainees from Guantanamo Bay.

The facility in Thomson had emerged as a clear front-runner after Illinois officials, led by Durbin, enthusiastically embraced the idea of turning a near-dormant prison over to federal officials.

The White House has been coy about its selection process, but on Friday a draft memo leaked to a conservative Web site that seemed to indicate officials were homing in on Thomson.

The Thomson Correctional Center was one of several potential sites evaluated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons to potentially house detainees from the Navy-run prison at Guantanamo Bay. Officials with other prisons, including Marion, Ill., Hardin, Mont., and Florence, Colo., have said they would welcome the jobs that would be created by the new inmates.

Closing Guantanamo is a top priority for Obama, and he signed an executive order hours into his presidency directing that the process of closing the prison begin. Obama has said he wants terrorism suspects transferred to American soil so they can be tried for their suspected crimes.

The Thomson Correctional Center was built by Illinois in 2001 as a state prison with the potential to house maximum security inmates. Local officials hoped it would improve the local economy, providing jobs to a hard-hit community. State budget problems, however, have kept the 1,600-cell prison from ever fully opening. At present, it houses about 200 minimum-security inmates.

Obama has faced some resistance to the idea of housing terrorism suspects in the United States, but in Thomson many have welcomed the prospect as a potential economic engine. Thomson Village President Jerry Hebeler, was asleep when the word came that Thomson had been chosen.

"It's news to me, but then I'm always the last to know anything," Hebeler said Monday night of the news affecting his town of 450 residents. "It'll be good for the village and the surrounding area, especially with all the jobs that have been lost here."

But Hebeler said he wouldn't rejoice until "the ink is on the paper" because previous plans for increased use of the nearly empty prison have fallen through.

Some Illinois officials have not supported the idea. GOP Rep. Mark Kirk, who is seeking Obama's old Senate seat, said he believes moving Guantanamo detainees to Illinois will make the state a greater threat for terrorist attacks. Kirk has lobbied other officials to contact the White House in opposition to using the facility.

To be sure, Thomson will not solve all the administration's Guantanamo-related problems. There still will be dozens of detainees who are not relocated to Thomson, other legal issues and potential resistance from Congress.

Thomson is a symbolic step, however, a clear sign that the United States is working to find a new place to hold detainees from Guantanamo.

Federal employees making salaries of $100,000 or more jumped from 14% to 19% of civil servants during the recession's first 18 months — and that's before overtime pay and bonuses are counted.

Federal workers are enjoying an extraordinary boom time — in pay and hiring — during a recession that has cost 7.3 million jobs in the private sector.

The highest-paid federal employees are doing best of all on salary increases. Defense Department civilian employees earning $150,000 or more increased from 1,868 in December 2007 to 10,100 in June 2009, the most recent figure available.

When the recession started, the Transportation Department had only one person earning a salary of $170,000 or more. Eighteen months later, 1,690 employees had salaries above $170,000.

The trend to six-figure salaries is occurring throughout the federal government, in agencies big and small, high-tech and low-tech. The primary cause: substantial pay raises and new salary rules.

"There's no way to justify this to the American people. It's ridiculous," says Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, a first-term lawmaker who is on the House's federal workforce subcommittee.

Jessica Klement, government affairs director for the Federal Managers Association, says the federal workforce is highly paid because the government employs skilled people such as scientists, physicians and lawyers. She says federal employees make 26% less than private workers for comparable jobs.

USA TODAY analyzed the Office of Personnel Management's database that tracks salaries of more than 2 million federal workers. Excluded from OPM's data: the White House, Congress, the Postal Service, intelligence agencies and uniformed military personnel.

The growth in six-figure salaries has pushed the average federal worker's pay to $71,206, compared with $40,331 in the private sector.

Key reasons for the boom in six-figure salaries:

• Pay hikes. Then-president Bush recommended — and Congress approved — across-the-board raises of 3% in January 2008 and 3.9% in January 2009. President Obama has recommended 2% pay raises in January 2010, the smallest since 1975. Most federal workers also get longevity pay hikes — called steps — that average 1.5% per year.

•New pay system. Congress created a new National Security Pay Scale for the Defense Department to reward merit, in addition to the across-the-board increases. The merit raises, which started in January 2008, were larger than expected and rewarded high-ranking employees. In October, Congress voted to end the new pay scale by 2012.

• Paycaps eased. Many top civil servants are prohibited from making more than an agency's leader. But if Congress lifts the boss' salary, others get raises, too. When the Federal Aviation Administration chief's salary rose, nearly 1,700 employees' had their salaries lifted above $170,000, too.

Guantanamo Bay: depressed US towns battle to house detainees in 'Gitmo North'

Several blighted US towns are battling for the right to host Guantanamo Bay terror detainees in their own backyards in an unusual case of reverse "nimbyism".

The strategy of requesting the Islamic extremists accused of some of the world's worst atrocities, including the attacks of Sept 11 2001, as neighbours may seem perverse.

But local officials hope they will land a bonanza of jobs and investment by offering up their empty prisons as President Barack Obama tries to close the infamous prison camp, on a US naval base on Cuba nicknamed "Gitmo".

In the process, they have thrust themselves on to the frontline of a fierce national debate as Republicans accuse the Obama administration of endangering national security with plans to house and try terror suspects on US soil.

Amid the watermelon fields along the banks of the Mississippi River, the Illinois village of Thomson - down to about 450 residents after business and stores closed - has emerged as a strong contendor for "Gitmo North".

Federal officials last week visited an almost empty high-security 1,600-cell prison there that has rarely housed any inmates since it was completed for $128 million in 2001. The Bureau of Prisons and Department of Defence would upgrade it to the standards of a "supermax" - as the country's most secure federal jail is called - if it is chosen.

The state's Democratic governor and senior senator have said that the moving the prisoners there could create more than 3,000 jobs in the area - including 900 at the prison itself. htat sounds highly attractive to many residents. "We're hurting here, hurting bad," said village president Jerry Hebeler.

But Republicans have raised the spectre of attempted rescues of inmates by fellow Islamisists and retaliatory attacks on the skyscrapers and airport of Chicago, 150 miles to the west, as well as disputing the benefits for local coffers.

Federal officials have also visited a prison about to close in the economically-striken Michigan city of Standish, where the jobless rate stands at 18 per cent. Michael Moran, the city manager, has little time for those opposed to re-locating Guantanamo detainees. "We already have unemployment figures of the level of the Great Depression and we are losing the jobs of 500 prison guards and yet we still get some people trying to stoke up fears," he told The Sunday Telegraph.

"I am a former corrections officer and a former military policeman and I am sure that there are no security fears. It's unfounded scaremongering."

In Big Horn County in Montana, officials in Hardin are proposing their pristine new detention centre - empty for two years - as an ideal site to locate the prisoners, arguing that their remote location in "cowboy country" is another plus. Unemployment here is above 10 per cent.

And another Illinois town, Marion, has also made a bid for the detainees. "Bring them on," said Mayor Robert Butler, hoping to reduce an unemployment rate just below 10 per cent.

Florence, home to the country's only current federal "supermax", has made a pitch too. But the prison would probably only have space for the "worst of the worst" - such as self-confessed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who is due to be put on trial in New York - as it already houses the likes of British "shoe bomber" Richard Reid, the Unabomber Theodore Kacynski, and other convicted Islamic terrorists.

Mr Obama admitted publicly last week that the deadline he set for closing Guantanamo Bay - Jan 22 2010, a year after he took office - will be missed. One of the prime problems has been overcoming opposition in Congress to moving detainees to the US mainland, so selecting an appropriate site is key to his strategy.

The camp is currently home to about 215 prisoners. If Mr Obama has his way, up to 100 could be transferred for detention and later trial in the US, while the remainder would be cleared for transfer overseas, so long as countries willing to accept them can be found.

As the debate rages, the residents of the competing towns are not the only interested parties - so are the detainees in Cuba, for they know one thing is certain if they are moved. Their conditions will be a lot less comfortable, and not just because of less clement climes of the main contendors for Gitmo North.

For while Guantanamo Bay may be the world's most notorious prison, life behind the barbed wire there has never been better.

During a recent visit, the DVD in the recreational room was loaded with Spiderman 3, ready for an afternoon viewing, while others detainees prepared to play football outside on a pitch built at their request Lunch was served with the usual daily choice of six menus, all Middle Eastern and following halal rules of preparation. Fresh supplies of dates, olive oil, honey and pita bread are also on offer.

Detainees spend at least two hours out in the Caribbean sun every day and have access to a library of 16,000 books, 1,600 magazines and 300 DVDs - Agatha Christie is surprisingly popular, although tomes on the Islamic faith are in most demand. In every cell there is an arrow pointing towards Mecca, a prayer rug and beads; there is one medical member of staff for every three detainees, After it was opened in Jan 2002 by then president George W Bush to receive suspected members of al-Qaeda and the Taliban, Guantanamo quickly bacame a symbol of detainee abuse and detention without charge and a stain on America's reputation.

Now, incredible though it may sound, camp officials say that hardcore detainees, who are certain they will never be free men, would rather stay in Guantanamo than spend a life sentence, or years waiting for execution, in the US.

"They know there will not receive the same privileges as here," Zak, an Arab American appointed in 2005 to liaise with the exclusively Muslim detainees, told The Sunday Telegraph. "Given the choice of being sentenced forever in Guantanamo or moved to supermax, it is 'No, can I stay in Gitmo?'. Here they can be outside, they can smell the sea."

By contrast, prisoners at the Florence "supermax" spend 22½ hours a day in a 9ft by 9ft cell. The only natural light comes from a 4in by 4ft window that only shows the sky, in order to prevent the prisoner from knowing his specific location within the complex. Exercise time is strictly limited.

It took years for the Pentagon to grasp what damage conditions at Guantanamo were doing to America's reputation. But Adm Thomas Copeman, the detention centre's commander, now confidently describes it as a "model detention facility".

Peter King, a Republican congressman who visited earlier this year and wants Mr Obama to keep the faciltiy open, said that "if there's any scandal at Guantanamo, it is that the detainees are treated too well". It is, he complained "a Club Med for terrorists".

Officials to inspect Ill jail for Gitmo inmates

THOMSON, Ill. — Federal officials are due to arrive in rural northwest Illinois to inspect a prison that could be bought by the federal government and used to house Guantanamo Bay detainees.

Closing Gitmo: Feds Eye State and Military Prisons for Detainees

Officials Expect Dozens Of 'Enemy Combatants' to Be Distributed Across Country

By DEVIN DWYER and JASON RYAN

Nov. 16, 2009—

As the Obama administration's January deadline to close the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay looms, officials are developing plans for the more than 200 detainees still held there, including their possible distribution to civilian and military prisons across the country.

Attorney General Eric Holder Friday said the United States would bring five Gitmo detainees, including four alleged 9/11 conspirators, to New York City to stand trial in federal court. Holder also said that five suspects would be tried before revamped military commissions.

Roughly 40 to 50 more prisoners from the U.S. Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba will be transferred to the United States , prosecuted in federal court or before a military tribunal, officials say. And at least 100 detainees have been approved for transfer to other countries.

The United States is actively negotiating additional transfer arrangements in pursuit of its self-imposed deadline, administration officials said.

That leaves 70 to 80 men considered too dangerous for release but whom the administration neither plans to charge in federal or military courts nor transfer to foreign countries.

The hope is that all but 10 to 30 of the unresolved cases will eventually be brought for prosecution or transferred abroad, officials said. A number of Yemeni and Afghan detainees are expected to remain indefinitely in "enemy combatant" status.

Those prisoners, officials say, will likely be distributed to several prisons and military installations throughout the country with none of the facilities having to completely shoulder the load.

Among the leading state prisons being considered to house detainees is Illinois' Thomson Correctional Center, a maximum-security prison complex 150 miles south of Chicago .

Feds Eye State Prisons for Gitmo Detainees

The Thomson facility has been underutilized since opening in 2001 and state officials, including Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn and U.S. Sen. Richard "Dick" Durbin, both Democrats, see the chance to house Gitmo detainees there as an opportunity to create much-needed jobs, both at the prison and in the surrounding area.

Other communities, from the tiny town of Hardin , Mont. , to recession-struck Standish , Mich. , have also been attracted to the potential economic boost and have actively lobbied the government to bring the high-level prisoners there.

The Standish City Council recently passed a unanimous resolution expressing interest in having a federal prison at the Standish Max Correctional facility, which has faced closure because of budget cuts.

But critics in Standish and elsewhere across the country have expressed skepticism about the prospect of their communities becoming the Gitmo detainees' new hometowns.

"There are just too many things that could go wrong," said Tom Kerrins, chief of the Michigan correction officers union. "The problem I have is ... you almost are putting a bull's-eye on the whole entire area."

In Illinois , GOP Rep. Mark Kirk has warned in a public letter, "We should not invite Al Qaeda to make Illinois its No. 1 target."

But advocates for the adoption of Gitmo detainees in state prisons point to the federal maximum-security prison in Marion, Ill., which already houses 35 convicted terror suspects, as proof that such inmates can be held and at little danger to surrounding communities.

Federal officials have also been considering Colorado 's so-called supermax prison, south of Denver , for placement of some of the detainees.

The prison is already home to Oklahoma City bombing co-conspirator Terry Nichols, Atlanta Olympics bomber Eric Rudolph, 9/ 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui, 1993 World Trade Center bombing mastermind Ramzi Yousef and failed airline shoe bomber Richard Reid.

U.S. Military Prisons Among Those to Replace Gitmo

Aside from state correctional facilities, the Obama administration is considering a list of U.S. military bases that could house some of the detainees. Among the options are Camp Pendleton in California , Fort Leavenworth in Kansas and the U.S. Naval Consolidated Brig in Charleston , S.C.

Representatives from the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, U.S. Marshals Service and other agencies have conducted site visits at the brig in Charleston and consider the military complex a viable option, according to two administration officials.

Officials had also considered Fort Leavenworth in Kansas but have recently shied away from that option.

The congressional delegation from Kansas, led by Sens. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., and Pat Roberts, R-Kan., has fiercely opposed using the military compound north of Kansas City as home for detainees.

In August, the senators placed legislative holds on Justice Department and Pentagon political appointees who were awaiting Senate confirmation to force the administration to provide information about its plans and prevent Leavenworth from being one of the chosen locations.

A month later, the Kansas senators said they had released the holds on the nominees after discussions with senior administration officials.

"We believe that the administration has a good understanding of obstacles and concerns and is giving them proper consideration," the senators said in a joint statement. "In a good faith effort to continue moving this dialogue forward, we are releasing our holds on all Department of Defense and Department of Justice nominees. We are confident that because of this good faith dialogue, detainees will not be transferred to Fort Leavenworth ."

One major consideration that remains unresolved in the placement process is how state prisons and military installations will handle staffing of the facility or at courthouses where potential trials would take place, according to the Justice Department and federal law enforcement officials.

While there have been no specific funding requests made yet to the federal government, officials said, the cost of holding detainees on U.S. soil is likely to be a matter of concern for states, many already facing significant budget crises.

Illinois prison top contender to house Gitmo detainees, official says

Of the total number, 35 inmates are housed in federal prisons in Illinois, including Ali al-Marri, who pleaded guilty in federal court to conspiring to provide material support to al Qaeda. Al-Marri is serving eight years and four months at the federal penitentiary in Marion, Illinois.

This memorandum is being sent as a reminder to all TRULINCS institutions of the CorrLinks transition beginning Monday, October 5.  On Monday, we will mass email all inmate email contacts an invitation to join CorrLinks.  If the contact does not register prior to October 14, they will not be able to send email to or receive email from inmates.

We have had some inquiries regarding CorrLinks and based on these inquiries I want to clarify a few things:

-           The public does not need to register with a credit card.

-           The public can not add an inmate without the invitation's identification number; although the site will allow them to register in advance.

-           The public must go to www.corrlinks.com to read or send all future emails.

-           If the public receives an invitation and has problems registering, they should submit the issue via the Customer Support link at www.corrlinks.com. 

Please find attached a document you may wish to consider posting to remind inmates of the upcoming change.

Teenage inmates allegedly stab and handcuff officers in escape attempt

Vernon, Indiana, Oct 6 - (WHAS11) - Corrections officers in southern Indiana had some terrifying moments Tuesday when they were overpowered in an escape attempt and held hostage. Two of them were stabbed at the Jennings County jail by young inmates who'd learned to improvise.

Police say 3 teenage inmates took clothes hangers and sharpened the points.

They then stabbed a guard several times, overpowering and handcuffing him.

Two other guards rushed to help and the teens stabbed one of them and used pepper spray they'd gotten from a storage cabinet.

They handcuffed the officers, too.

State police and sheriff's deputies rushed to the scene.

With the guards held hostage, police shot the teens with stun guns ending their escape attempt.

One inmate, 17-year-old Ryan Renfroe, was in the jail on murder charges suspected of killing Greg and Maugerite Gough, a couple in their 60’s, in Jennings County then stealing and crashing their 1987 Camaro.  Police say after he was caught, he claimed voices told him to kill the couple.

Another inmate, 17-year-old James Smith had a bandage on his head as police moved him Tuesday. They say he tried to kill at least one of the guards and will be charged with attempted murder.

The others, Renfro and 19-year-old Roger Bushhorn will face kidnapping and assault charges.

They have now been sent to 3 separate jails.

The most seriously injured corrections officer was Walter Peace. He was flown to an Indianapolis hospital and at last report, he was in serious condition with a stab wound to his head.

The other officers, Shawn McDaniel and Vickie Day were treated and released from a local hospital.

Short-Staffed Federal Prisons Endanger Communities, Guards

The union that represents correctional officers at the U.S. Bureau of Prisons says federal prisons—including the famed Supermax facility—are not safe and major steps must be taken soon to protect prison employees and the communities near the prisons.

Testifying before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security yesterday, Bryan Lowery and Phil Glover told lawmakers that budget cuts and short staffing increasingly pose a danger to officers, inmates and the 115 communities and small towns which surround the facilities.

Lowery is president of AFGE’s Council of Prison Locals, and Glover is the council’s legislative coordinator.

Earlier this year, AFGE successfully fought for a $545 million increase in Bureau of Prisons funding. But the agency’s top management repeatedly has refused to follow the direction of Congress and is unilaterally saying that none of the funds provided for increased staffing will be used for that purpose.

Lowery testified:

The blatant disregard for the safety of our federal correctional officers by the Bureau of Prisons management is inexcusable. The safety of correctional officers, inmates and our communities is at risk.

The Council of Prison Locals is circulating an online petition urging U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to order Bureau of Prisons management to use the appropriated funds to hire more officers, fire Bush-era Bureau of Prisons Director Harley Lappin and hire 9,000 additional correctional officers. The council also has asked for a meeting with Holder to address the issues at the Bureau of Prisons.

Click here to sign the petition and send Holder the message.

Years of underfunding has created a serious understaffing situation in which correctional officers are outnumbered by inmates by 150-1 and correctional officers are unarmed inside the facilities. In a bureaucratic sleight of hand to cover over the shortstaffing, the Bureau of Prisons counts secretaries and administrative unit managers, among other nonguard correctional workers, in calculating its inmate-to-correctional staff ratio nationwide.

Some 206,000 inmates are confined in federal prisons today, up from 25,000 in 1980. By 2010, estimates project 215,000 inmates in these institutions.

The number of officers who staff federal prisons is failing to keep pace with the tremendous growth in the inmate population. Today, prison staffing is at an 86.6 percent level, compared with 95 percent staffing in the mid-1990s. The additional officers requested by the union would return staffing to 1997 levels.

The seriousness of the short staffing was underscored last month on the first anniversary of the murder of correctional officer Jose Rivera, who was stabbed to death in a federal prison in Atwater, Calif., while locking inmates into their cells. He was working alone because, the union says, that prison is severely understaffed.

In addition to fully funding and staffing the prisons, the union is seeking stab-resistant vests for correctional officers. Assaults on officers with homemade weapons have jumpred in recent years, said Lowery and Glover, who both are exposed to dangers in their jobs as correctional officers in federal lockups.

Panel: Prison Overcrowding Jeopardizes Guard and Inmate Safety

Some operations at 14 US prison factories closing

The government-owned company that employs federal prison inmates is closing some factory operations at 14 prisons and downsizing operations at four more amid multimillion-dollar losses, according to a copy of a memo provided by a prison union official.

ByCATHERINE TSAI

DENVER —

The government-owned company that employs federal prison inmates is closing some factory operations at 14 prisons and downsizing operations at four more amid multimillion-dollar losses, according to a copy of a memo provided by a prison union official.

Federal Prison Industries Inc., or UNICOR, has lost $20 million year to date and has lost money the last seven months, according to the memo Wednesday from Paul Laird of the Bureau of Prisons.

The Associated Press received a copy of the memo from Phil Glover, national legislative coordinator for the Council of Prison Locals, American Federation of Government Employees.

The memo didn't say how many staff jobs were affected. Bureau representatives didn't return after-hours phone messages.

Laird wrote that the company has excess production capacity, and cost-reduction initiatives weren't enough to bring profits.

The memo said the company started closing factories at eight prisons Tuesday in various states and will close operations at specialized units at six more prisons. Operations at four more prisons will be downsized.

The initiatives are expected to save nearly $16 million a year in operating costs, beginning in late 2010, Laird wrote in the memo.

"This was an extremely difficult decision because it affected a number of dedicated FPI staff. However it is critical that FPI not incur costs that we have insufficient business to support," he wrote.

Glover said Laird told union officials early this year that the company was projecting multimillion-dollar losses for the year.

Glover said the military hasn't been buying as much equipment from the company. At the Loretto federal prison in Pennsylvania where he is a correctional officer, the factory was running two shifts, five days a week, to keep up with orders for communications cable during the Iraq war, he said.

The workload is now down to four days a week, with one shift and almost 200 fewer inmates working, Glover said.

Glover estimated 100 non-inmate jobs could be affected by the factory downsizing, although workers could be offered other corrections jobs. The larger issue, though, is what will happen with inmates who lose jobs - a big safety issue for corrections officers, Glover said.

"Idle inmates are always a recipe for disaster," said Mike Schnobrich, a correctional officer and treasurer for an American Federation of Government Employees local union in Colorado. "One of the benefits of having UNICOR is it takes up inmates' time. They're being productive, they're busy working."

The company had 21,836 inmate employees and 109 factories at 76 locations as of Sept. 30, 2008. The program is aimed at preventing recidivism and teaching inmates job skills.

U.S. Marshals searching for prisoner who was allowed to take himself to halfway house

By Naples Daily News staff report

U.S. Marshals are searching for a prisoner from Fort Myers who recently walked away from an unescorted move to a halfway house in the city.

Kent George Sawyer, 43, was serving a 92-month sentence for a 2003 drug possession conviction. Held in a low-security prison at the federal Coleman complex in Orlando, Sawyer was granted a June 8 move to the halfway house, according to an affidavit filed in federal court.

He was permitted to travel unescorted to the home, the Salvation Army Residential Reentry Center on Edison Avenue.

Sawyer was to take a taxi from the prison to the Orlando bus station and catch an afternoon Greyhound bus to Fort Myers, arriving no later than 8:35 p.m. Sawyer would then take a taxi to the reentry center, arriving no later than 9:05 p.m., according to the affidavit.

When he didn't show up, the Bureau of Prisons notified marshals that Sawyer had escaped.

The U.S. Marshals Service filed a criminal complaint against Sawyer on Wednesday. In the affidavit, Deputy U.S. Marshal Paul Smith stated that Sawyer still hadn't been found.

The Bureau of Prisons grants furloughs to prisoners who meet "strict requirements," according to its Web site. Reasons for the unescorted trips include family emergencies and efforts to aid the prisoner's eventual release.

Sawyer showed no disciplinary problems in prison, according to court documents.

His sentence, originally for 110 months, was reduced last year to match newly lowered federal crack cocaine sentencing guidelines.

Three Democratic lawmakers have asked President Obama to restore a labor-management partnership council established by President Clinton and abolished by President Bush.

"Union leaders with whom we have spoken agree that the labor-management partnership recognized the importance of employees and their employee representatives to smooth collegial decision-making in the government," wrote Reps. Edolphus Towns, D-N.Y., and Stephen Lynch, D-Mass., and Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, D-D.C., in a June 2 letter to the president. "The council served the essential purpose of maintaining communication between the heads of executive agencies and the president to better serve the public."

Clinton created the governmentwide National Partnership Council in a 1993 executive order, and directed agencies to establish their own groups. But Bush shut down the partnerships with a 2001 executive order. In 2007, Rep. Danny Davis, D-Ill., and Sen. Daniel Akaka, D-Hawaii, introduced legislation that would have written the councils into law; the bill did not make it out of committee in either chamber of Congress.

Reviving the labor-management partnerships has been a priority for federal unions, though there has been some disagreement about the form the partnerships should take. John Gage, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, has said he would prefer a version of partnership that did not require employee and management representatives to be trained in negotiation tactics that focus on reaching compromises and consensus. Other unions have praised the Clinton-era partnerships for fostering greater collaboration between labor and management, and a number have submitted drafts of a potential executive order.

"Partnership, collaboration, cooperation -- it does not matter what it is called," said Colleen Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union. "The idea is that a mechanism be established by which employees' voices can be heard in a nonadversarial forum where everyone retains their rights and where the objective is raising and talking through ideas that address ways to reach common goals."

Even absent an executive order, the Obama administration has shown some interest in restoring partnership. Lisa Jackson, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, voluntarily restarted EPA's partnership council. And Office of Personnel Management Director John Berry said during his confirmation hearing that he wanted to increase labor-management collaboration within OPM to set a strong example for the rest of government.

Schock says closing Guantanamo poses risks to U.S.

The Guantanamo Bay detention center, with the largest known al-Qaida cell in the world being held there, is an invaluable asset to U.S. military and intelligence operations, said U.S. Rep. Aaron Schock.

Closing it would strip the U.S. military of key information in fighting terrorism and pose a threat to national security, said Schock, R-Peoria, who toured the facility in Cuba on Monday with five other members of Congress.

"Individuals who will remain there are the most hardened criminals who pose the greatest danger and threat to the U.S., and there is no safer or more appropriate place to keep them than Guantanamo Bay," Schock said. ". . . A place that has a stellar reputation of treatment, of security with no escapes and still allows us to gather assets for our intelligence community.

"When (military officials) are describing who the individuals are, what they have done and what they can do, the plots that they've discovered, the information they've been able to provide our government, you are very glad that they are there and not here."

On the tour with Schock were three other Republicans and two Democrats, including U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Evanston. During the five- to six-hour tour, the group saw all six detainee camps - three now are vacant - which include minimum to maximum security facilities and house upward of 250 prisoners, mostly captured in Afghanistan after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Schock said.

President Barack Obama has vowed to shutter the prison by early 2010. The Senate recently voted to keep the prison open and forbid the transfer of detainees to the United States after a similar move in the House.

At its height, the facility housed about 500 prisoners. The least harmful have been processed and sent back to their home countries, and those who remain are the most dangerous and still operate under the al-Qaida hierarchy of power, Schock said he was told.

The Peoria congressman was surprised to learn torture techniques never have been used at Guantanamo Bay. He said prisoners have access to a library, computers, television, newspapers and receive three meals daily.

Military officials "never invoked involuntary interrogation. They (gather information) by building relationships with individuals," Schock said.

Allowing those prisoners to infiltrate U.S. prisons poses safety concerns not only to the communities in which they reside, but the prisoners and others who could be subject to their "hatred and ideology," Schock said.

U.S. Sen Dick Durbin, D-Springfield, has called Guantanamo a "recruiting tool for terrorists around the world" and said it should be closed. U.S. prisons are capable for handling the transfers, he continued.

"The reality is that we are already holding some of the world's most dangerous terrorists in federal prisons, including the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombings, the Shoebomber, the Unabomber and many others," Durbin said in May.

"The Bureau of Prisons is currently holding 347 convicted terrorists. Clearly, our prison guards know how to hold terrorists."

Some Democrats oppose closing the facility, saying bringing detainees from Cuba to the U.S. could pose security threats.

U.S. Rep. Phil Hare, D-Rock Island, also does not support closing Guantanamo Bay.

"It has become a moral black eye for our nation and a detriment to our national security," said Hare spokesman Tim Schlittner.

"However, (Hare) believes the president should submit a detailed plan regarding how and where detainees will be housed before proceeding with its closure."

Schock said a more logical approach is more transparency into Guantanamo.

"It's very easy to be critical of a facility you've never seen, of a process you know very little about," Schock said.

"There is no price that can be put on keeping America safe. And there is no better place for them to be other than Guantanamo Bay."

Marking guard's slaying, activist seek changes at federal prisons

Michael Doyle | McClatchy Newspapers

last updated: June 11, 2009 07:30:45 PM

Worker at U.S. Penitentiary Atwater predicted trouble day before deadly attack

By CORINNE REILLY

A manager at U.S. Penitentiary Atwater predicted that someone would be killed if the two inmates accused of murdering correctional officer Jose Rivera were allowed to live near each other, according to a newly released FBI report. Even so, the inmates were placed in the same housing unit, the report says.

AFGE Takes on the Bureau of Prisons