Kay Ivey mandates no more food funds in sheriff’s pockets
After several reports this year of Alabama sheriff’s stealing and pocketing hundreds of thousands of dollars meant for inmates food rations, Governor Kay Ivey has said, “no more.” On Tuesday, Ivey issued a memo to the state comptroller rescinding the Yellowhammer State’s policy of “paying prisoner food service allowances directly to sheriffs in their personal capacities.” Funds must now instead go straight to government accounts. “For decades, sheriffs have made extra money – sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars – under a Depression-era system by feeding prisoners for only pennies per meal,” the Associated Press reported. The previous guidelines allowed sheriffs to use $1.75 a day to feed each prisoner, then pocket anything that was left over. This practice led to Monroe County Sheriff Tom Tate to pocket $110,458 over the course of three years; and Etowah County Sheriff Todd Entrekin to collect $672,392 in 2015 and 2016. Ivey’s legal team used 2011 ruling made by former Attorney General Luther Strange to back-up the new mandate. “Based on the facts presented, neither the sheriff nor the county may use the surplus for any purpose other than future expenses in feeding prisoners,” Strange had said. The problematic precedent was previously set in 2008 when then-Attorney General Troy King ruled “the sheriff may retain any surplus from the food service allowance as personal income,” in a letter to Etowah County Commission Attorney James Turnbach. Alabama has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world with 946 people imprisoned per 100,000 people in the state in prison or jail. The state’s prison system has also faced some legal trouble. In 2014, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and the Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program filed a lawsuit against the Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) to end the poor conditions in the state prison system, including the understaffing of both correctional and mental health workers.
Gadsden sheriff loses election amid jail program criticism
An Alabama sheriff who was criticized for making money from the county jail’s food program has been defeated in a primary election. In Alabama, it’s possible for sheriffs to personally profit from jail meals. In many cases, the less a sheriff spends on feeding inmates, the more he or she can make. Before Tuesday’s Republican primary election for sheriff, Etowah County Sheriff Todd Entrekin released tax forms showing he made a profit of $672,392 from the jail kitchen in 2015 and 2016. Entrekin had made the documents public during a news conference where he denied allegations that prisoners were malnourished. Rainbow City Police Chief Jonathon Horton, who won the primary, tells Al.com that Entrekin called him and conceded the race after early returns showed Horton with a large lead. Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
GOP censures candidate for ‘not a Republican’ comment
A challenger will remain on the Republican primary ballot for sheriff in a northeast Alabama county. The Gadsden Times reports that the Etowah County Republican Executive Committee declined to remove Rainbow City Police Chief Jonathon Horton from the ballot. He’s challenging incumbent Sheriff Todd Entrekin in Tuesday’s primary. No Democrat has qualified. Horton was censured for a video made at a campaign event in which he said he was “not a Republican.” The committee is requiring Horton to remove the video and retract the comments. The committee also considered divorce filings between 1991 and 1997 that include allegations that Horton physically abused his wife. Horton says Entrekin paid a company to post the documents on a website. Entrekin says he paid the company, but not for “anything negative.” Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
Enjoying leftovers: Sheriffs feed inmates, keep extra cash
In Alabama, the less sheriffs spend on feeding inmates, the more money they get to put in their pockets. For decades, sheriffs have made extra money – sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars – under a Depression-era system by feeding prisoners for only pennies per meal. Critics say the meals can be unhealthy, and a lawsuit against dozens of sheriffs combined with media reports about the practice threaten to end the one-of-a-kind system. Legislators this year approved potential changes that would prevent sheriffs in two counties from keeping the excess money — including one where a former sheriff was jailed after feeding prisoners corndogs while pocketing more than $200,000 — and wider change is possible. “I think everyone agrees that something needs to be done,” said Sonny Brasfield, executive director of the Association of County Commissions of Alabama. Republican Sen. Arthur Orr said he is working on a bill to abolish the practice. “This law is from the 1930s. Times change. It’s time we move on into the 21st century,” said Orr. Back when chain gangs were common in the late 1920s, Alabama passed a law that gave sheriffs $1.75 a day from the state to feed each prisoner, and sheriffs got to pocket anything that was left over. Jails in most of Alabama’s 67 counties remain on the system generations later. Sheriffs also get small payments from the state per jail. Some also receive payments from cities and the federal government for holding prisoners, further boosting income. Add up all the money and a dash of frugality, like purchasing low-cost grub and accepting donated food, and sheriffs can wind up with large profits from jailhouse kitchens. Attorney Aaron Littman, who helped sue earlier this year trying to find out how much sheriffs are making off jail food, said lawyers regularly hear complaints about poor living conditions and lousy food in jails. “It’s no way to run government,” said Littman, of the Atlanta-based Southern Center for Human Rights. Alabama is the only state with such a setup, he said. Littman questions the legality of sheriffs pocketing the money. The Southern Center, which advocates for change in the criminal justice system, sued with the nonprofit Alabama Appleseed for Law and Justice in January to make 49 sheriffs release information that would show how much they are making off jail food. Sheriffs have refused, arguing in court that the numbers are personal and private. Some of the amounts have been revealed. Monroe County Sheriff Tom Tate collected “excess” jail feeding funds of $110,458 over three years ending in 2016 — a tidy amount for a south Alabama county with only 22,000 residents and a median family income estimated at $42,335 annually by the Census Bureau, according to an accounting turned over to a plaintiff’s lawyer. In mid-sized Etowah County, where the jail holds 900 people on average, Sheriff Todd Entrekin recently released tax forms showing he made a profit of $672,392 from the jail kitchen in 2015 and 2016. Entrekin made the documents public during a news conference where he denied malnourishing prisoners and denied news reports linking food profits and a beach condominium he and his wife purchased for $740,000 last year. “Nobody here is underfed. Nobody here is mistreated. I will say it’s not the Ritz, so you won’t be treated like a king. You will be treated like someone who has broken the law, which means you won’t get your choice about what or when you eat,” Entrekin told reporters. Last year, a federal judge held Morgan County Sheriff Ana Franklin in contempt and fined her $1,000 because she took $160,000 from a jail food account. She used to make a personal car loan that later failed, court documents showed. The judge ruled Franklin’s actions violated an agreement reached by former Morgan County Sheriff Greg Bartlett, who was briefly held in his own jail in 2009 after a federal judge held him in contempt for feeding skimpy meals to boost his profit, which Bartlett said was $212,000 over three years. Bartlett went in with another sheriff to purchase a truckload of corndogs for $1,000 and fed them to prisoners for weeks, evidence showed. Franklin argued she wasn’t bound by Bartlett’s agreement, but a court disagreed. Sheriffs in Morgan and neighboring Cullman County in coming years would be required to spend any excess food money on police needs under proposed constitutional amendments approved this year by lawmakers, but voters still must OK the measures. It’s unclear how much is at stake since they, like most other sheriffs, haven’t publicly released detailed information about their operations. Sheriffs’ responses to the suit seeking financial information have been coordinated in part by the Alabama Sheriff’s Association, where longtime executive director Bobby Timmons did not return a message seeking comment. Republished with the permission of the Associated Press.
