Northeast Ohio Correctional Center

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Emergency early release taken off table as Ohio considers options for prison overcrowding

As prisoners, advocates and journalists warned of deteriorating conditions in Ohio’s prisons over the past year, the inmate population slowly crept back up to around 30% over capacity.

During that time, prisoners in the buckeye state were fed spoiled, inedible meals by the food contractor Aramark, sometimes tainted with maggots. They also suffered abuse and abysmal conditions at private prisons operated by Corrections Corp. of America (CCA), bad enough to inspire a 14-hour peaceful protest. Have the events of this past year finally generated enough misery and public scrutiny to pressure Ohio officials to act?

Without the funding to add more beds to the prison system, Ohio Prison Director Gary Mohr was initially considering reducing the inmate population through ’emergency early release.’ According to the law, Mohr could declare an overcrowding emergency, recommending some nonviolent prisoners who are nearing the end of their sentences for early release. This declaration must be approved by Ohio’s Correctional Institution Inspection Committee (CIIC), which includes members of the state legislature and oversees prisons in the state. If the CIIC disagrees with or ignores the declaration, it is sent to the Governor for a final decision.

Mohr had asked the state assembly to make some ‘changes‘ to the early release law, but declined to specify exactly what those changes would entail. The law is just shy of 20 years old and has never been used before. And it doesn’t seem like it’s going to be used any time soon, either: the Coshocton Tribune reports that Mohr is now saying early release is “not going to happen.”

It’s not hard to understand why that may be. Continue reading →

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Bureau of Prisons and CCA Remain Silent on Evaluation After Canceling Youngstown Prison Contract

The Federal Bureau of Prisons has finally told officials at Corrections Corp. of America why they cancelled their contract at the private prison in Youngstown, Ohio. According to Youngstown Mayor John McNally, “CCA has learned that a Florida based company scored higher on a list of criteria and was awarded the next contract.”

CCA and the BOP have not disclosed any details on the evaluation upon which that decision was reportedly made, angering people on both sides of the issue.

The ‘Florida based company’ Mayor McNally is referring to would be GEO Group, CCA’s main competitor and another legendary purveyor of violence and abuse at various private prisons around the country. And Mayor McNally really should have said ‘contracts,‘ because GEO Group actually inked two contracts with the BOP to take most of the prisoners leaving NEOCC — one of which entails re-opening a prison that had been vacant since 2010.

CCA is not lying when it says it won’t share the evaluation out of “competitive reasons and a ‘long-standing relationship’ with the government.” Those competitive reasons are that if the public finds out about the abysmal conditions CCA harbored at NEOCC for so many years on the taxpayer’s dime, they open themselves up to a backlash that could put an end to their ‘long-standing [and very lucrative] relationship’ with the government, and rightfully so.

But this kind of behavior is to be expected from a multi-billion dollar corporation like CCA. Their massive profits depend on an absence of transparency, even if it means alienating employees and supporters, who are, by the way, quite angry at the moment. The Vindicator, which has been a vociferous advocate for CCA over the past few months, reacted by writing in an OpEd, “We believe that most of the people of this region have no qualms about supporting the private prison operator, but they aren’t prepared to do so blindly.”

Of course, what is far more disconcerting is the federal government’s apparent decision to favor its contracts and relationships with private prison companies over transparency and its duty to serve the public. I can see absolutely no reason why the BOP would not make this information public, other than to cover-up their complicity in allowing federal prisoners to be incarcerated in conditions so horrific they cannot be known.

If prison privatization really is the great “cost-saving” and “efficiency” solution that free market capitalists love to tell us about, why not release the evaluation and let the public — the free market — decide whether such contracts and corporations are worth our money? What do the BOP and CCA have to hide?

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Federal Government Drops CCA Contract in Ohio, But Remains Committed to Private Prisons

The Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) has decided not to renew Correction Corporation of America’s (CCA) contract to hold around 1,400 low-level federal inmates at the North East Ohio Correctional Center (NEOCC) in Youngstown.

As the deadline for renewal approached, the for-profit prison contractor launched an aggressive PR and letter-writing campaign focused on “the value of CCA” in the community and the jobs that Youngstown could lose without the contract. Prisoners and advocates sought to instead  raise awareness about the facility’s ugly history of violence and mismanagement under CCA, and in August, 240 inmates staged a 14-hour peaceful protest against poor conditions, high commissary prices and abuse and mistreatment by prison guards.

In the end, the BOP decided to let their contract expire on May 31st of this year. CCA spokespeople told reporters they were not briefed on the government’s reasoning. They are seeking meetings with federal officials and are planning to mount an appeal in the coming days.

What is clear, however, is that the BOP has not lost confidence in for-profit incarceration. Most if not all of its prisoners at NEOCC will be transferred to two separate private facilities operated by GEO Group: the Moshannon Valley Correctional Center in Phillipsburg, PA (which, like NEOCC, holds immigrant prisoners) and the Great Plains Correctional Facility in Hinton, Oklahoma (which was vacant and is now being reactivated thanks, at least in-part, to this contract).

CCA will continue to hold some 580 prisoners for the US Marshals Service at NEOCC.

The federal government appears to be warming up to the idea of improving prison conditions, but it does not appear ready to give up on the private prison experiment. This would require a confrontation with the for-profit incarceration industry that they’ve now helped become deeply rooted in communities across the country. Continue reading →

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Peaceful Inmate Protest Highlights Dysfunction and Disservice of CCA’s Ohio Private Immigrant Prison

There is rightful anger at Correction Corp. of America’s failures in response to a 14-hour, 250-inmate protest at their for-profit Northeast Ohio Correctional Center in Ohio. But any critique that does not discuss the actual protest and its context is missing the point.

Inmates appear to have reached a breaking point in their tolerance for poor living conditions at NEOCC, and given CCA’s alarming track record at the facility, we should be paying close attention:

CCA first operated a for-profit prison in Ohio when it opened NEOCC in 1997. In its first 14 months of operation, the facility experienced 13 stabbings, two murders, and six escapes. The city of Youngstown eventually filed a lawsuit against CCA on behalf of the prisoners. Even after those tragedies, CCA still operates the prison today.

These inmates knew they would be risking severe punishment and retaliation for their decision to disobey orders to return to their cells. They knew this action could provoke violence from militarized guards, or a possible stint in solitary. They knew they could lose access to their families and communities through a punitive reduction in visiting hours and phone calls.

Still, in light of these potential consequences, between 250 and 400 of them decided it was still worth doing for 14 whole hours. Even as guards began preparing chemical munitions and setting up command posts to confront a peaceful demonstration, the prisoners refused to back down.

CCA should have been completely transparent about the protest from the beginning, but instead attempted to keep the situation under wraps. After all, it doesn’t make CCA look good for there to be allegations of mistreatment and mismanagement, nor when inmates are disobeying commands in order to protest about them. Continue reading →

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State Rep. Hagan Tours Ohio Private Immigrant Prison After Nearly 250 Inmates Protest Conditions and Treatment

Ohio State Rep. Bob Hagan continues to push Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) for answers about its handling of a recent incident at the for-profit Northeast Ohio Correctional Center (NEOCC) in which 248 prisoners waged a 14-hour nonviolent protest against their treatment and conditions.

After he was denied entry in the hours after the August 12th protest, Hagan was invited back to the prison last Friday for a tour. He was also given the opportunity to evaluate security camera footage and speak with some of the prisoners involved.

WKBN.com reports that Rep. Hagan was told there are three main issues concerning inmates: health care, food quality and commissary prices. Continue reading →

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Peaceful Inmate Protest Met with ‘Show of Force’ at Private Immigrant Prison in Ohio

The Youngstown Vindicator has more details on the August 12th inmate protest at the Northeast Ohio Correctional Center — a for-profit immigrant prison operated by Corrections Corporation of America.

CCA had originally claimed it was a minor incident involving a few prisoners complaining about food and living conditions. But according to the Vindicator, which based their story off an incident report provided by CCA, this was a 14-hour peaceful protest by mostly Dominican prisoners about many more grievances. Around 250 prisoners refused to return to their cells.

The demonstration ended after militarized corrections officials began threatening violence, at which point the protesters relented, volunteering to return to their cells and speak privately with the warden at a later time. Continue reading →

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CCA Rep. to Meet with Youngstown Mayor McNally over Prison Demonstration

A representative from CCA will meet with Mayor McNally on Friday to discuss the protest and “the prison’s obligation to the city when there is trouble at the facility.” There has been very little information available on the details of the protest, how the facility handled it and what exactly the ‘resolution’ entailed. WKBN has more: