Prometheus 6

At $45 a day, South Carolina spends less per inmate than any other state.

State ACLU calls for independent investigation into prisons system
By Yvonne Wenger
The Post and Courier
Wednesday, August 27, 2008

COLUMBIA — The seriousness and number of complaints lobbed by prison workers and inmates against the S.C. Department of Corrections prompted the state's American Civil Liberties Union office on Tuesday to call for more independent investigation.

The request comes after the state Legislative Audit Council dropped plans for a survey of working conditions in the agency. Prisons Director Jon Ozmint had criticized the survey as being an effort to blame administrators for the agency's woes.

"With the population exploding and the corrections budget ever smaller, prison conditions within the state's Department of Corrections have deteriorated dramatically in recent years," said Graham Boyd, interim executive director of the ACLU South Carolina Office. "There has been no accountability to the taxpayers who fund the system, the employees who work in the prisons or the individuals who are incarcerated in them."

Boyd said the state Corrections Department should invite the National Institute of Corrections, an agency within the U.S. Department of Justice, into the prisons to investigate operations.

A number of lawsuits involving the S.C. Department of Corrections linger, as do allegations of mismanagement, inmate abuse and a hostile work environment, Boyd said. Prisoner complaints brought to the ACLU in recent years include inadequate medical and mental health care, involuntary drugging and physical restraint of inmates with mental illness, sexual assault, overcrowding and harsh disciplinary measures without due process, he said.