No state standards: Private jail scrutinized after woman's death

By MARIA SUDEKUM FISHER

The Associated Press

HOLDEN, Mo. -- For those who knew and cared about Angela Lockridge, this much was clear: She could be difficult. At 42, she was mentally retarded, epileptic and dependent on medication to treat her borderline personality disorder.

But nothing prepared her family and friends for the way Lockridge died: alone in a segregated cell in one of Missouri's private jails, which are run without state oversight or standards.

Operators of the Integrity Correctional Centers in rural Johnson County were told the cause of death was epilepsy, a neurological condition that causes seizures.

But Johnson County Sheriff Charles Heiss, who led the investigation into Lockridge's death and has found no evidence of criminal wrongdoing, nevertheless has been angered by the prison's "guarded" response to his probe and obstacles blocking his way to potential witnesses.

Heiss, an outspoken critic of private jails and prisons, blames those obstacles on the manner in which private jails are operated and at least in part on the lack of state standards and oversight.

"Am I surprised she died? No," Heiss said. "Am I upset and concerned about her death? Yes."

Bernie Zarda, president of ICC, defends his "Christian-owned and operated" prison. He says although there is no state or federal oversight of his facility, oversight of ICC rests with the cities and counties that send their inmates there. He also questioned the motives for the investigation.

"I am not really sure why there has been an ongoing investigation," Zarda said. "The sheriff is giving information that makes us look not so great. We run a very top-notch, first-class facility with some 20 jurisdictions in Kansas and Missouri, and we have never had a death before."

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Lockridge's death comes at a time when the number of private prisons and jails in the United States has grown significantly, as the country seeks alternative housing for its swelling inmate population.

Critics of private prisons include prisoner rights groups and corrections officer organizations, who complain about the lack of accountability and inadequate staffing. Prison companies say they provide a sound alternative to government-run operations and that they save taxpayer dollars.

But private prisons have a checkered past in Missouri. About a decade ago, the state had to bring back inmates who were videotaped being beaten at a private prison in Texas. Since then, the Missouri Department of Corrections has stopped sending its inmates to private prisons.

But that rule doesn't extend to cities and counties, which can use private jails for their inmates, most of whom have shorter stays than prison inmates. Jail inmates are often awaiting trial and haven't made bond, as was the case for Lockridge.

In Missouri and elsewhere in the country, it's difficult to track the number of private jails that are operating, at least in part because of the lack of state control. The federal Bureau of Labor Statistics tries to identify private prisons and jails, but the last time the BLS published a count of private jails nationwide was in 1999.

Then there were 47 private jails in the country; one in Missouri. Since the 1999 study, however, two private prisons in the state have gone up and then been taken over by counties. Another, Bridewell Detention Facility in Bethany, opened recently and houses about 200 inmates from Iowa, which does not allow private prisons in its borders.

Sharon Dolovich, a law professor at UCLA who has written extensively about private prisons, said while there are several concerns about private prisons just as there are about government-run prisons, a major problem in private facilities is staffing.

The median annual earnings for prison guards in 2004 was $33,750 at state prisons, $33,080 at local jails and $21,490 at private prisons, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

"The one meaningful difference is the dramatic under-investment in labor (in private prisons)," Dolovich said. "The way private prisons make their money is by spending less on their labor; they pay them less, they train them less and they give them fewer benefits.

"There are predictable effects of doing that."

She pointed to a study from the U.S. Department of Justice Bureau of Justice Assistance that compared inmate assaults in public prisons over a year with that of private facilities over the same period. The survey found 25.4 incidents for every 1,000 inmates in public prisons, compared with 35.1 incidents in private facilities.

"I would put what we know about the profit incentives together with what we know about the failures of monitoring and other forms of oversight," Dolovich said in an e-mail. "When we do that, it seems to me, we have both an explanation for the greater levels of violence in private prisons suggested by the older studies, and reason to continue to expect greater levels of violence in private prisons going forward."

But Paul Doucette, spokesman for the Association of Private Corrections and Treatment Organizations, says private facilities are a necessary alternative to overcrowding in the public prisons and have become more popular with the federal government, largely because of the influx of immigrants and refugees.

"Research would indicate a quality of operations in private prisons every bit as good or better than the government-run facilities," Doucette said. "There's no cutting of corners and diminishing of services."

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Lockridge was sent to ICC on July 27, a day after being arrested at her Independence home, where she was charged with misdemeanor assault because of a fight with her mother over whether Lockridge could have her checkbook.

That type of dispute was common for Lockridge, who was born with the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck -- leading to her mental retardation, said her brother, Edward Neer of Kansas City. Lockridge was unemployed and got by on disability payments.

"My mother didn't want her spending money she didn't have," said Neer, 39, of Kansas City. "Her problems made it difficult for her to have a relationship with anyone.

"Rage was a normal part of her illness," Neer said.

But Lockridge could also be engaging. She would just as soon tell someone they were pretty as say "hello," Neer said. Her family called her Angel.

"The tragedy of it is this," he said. "She assaulted my mother and then in a fit of rage wanting my mother out of her apartment, it was Angel who called 911."

Lockridge was confined to a segregated cell in a male dorm at ICC on Aug. 1 because she had been making herself throw up.

"She was sticking her finger down her throat, and they asked her to stop and help clean it up and some other things," Zarda said. She was found dead in the cell the next morning.

Neer had never known his sister to make herself vomit. If Lockridge was throwing up, he said, it was because she was sick. Neer also wondered if Lockridge had received any of her medications while incarcerated.

The prison did not respond to requests for Lockridge's medical records.

Most inmate death investigations involving county jails last about a week, Heiss said. This one took him more than a month to wrap up. He said ICC policies and procedures slowed him down. When he tried to interview inmates who were witnesses, ICC told him he needed the approval of the county or city that sent those inmates to ICC. Some jurisdictions complied immediately. Wyandotte County, Kan., did not respond to his calls.

"We should have been able to get to these inmates in a matter of days," Heiss said. "And some of the inmates I wouldn't even begin to know where they are now."

Heiss found other problems as well, including prison logs that showed Lockridge had not been checked on hourly as ordered after she was put in segregation.

Zarda called it a clerical error.

"We have an officer who failed to log her checks every time," Zarda said. "But she was checked every hour."