Dying, disabled, aged are eligible under cost-saving plan
By Mark Johnson
The News & Observer
RALEIGH, N.C. — Nine days before Christmas, state prison officials released Jeffery Cooke from McCain Correctional Hospital and sent him home to Currituck County to die.
Cooke, a 41-year-old repeat drunken driver suffering from liver disease, was the first inmate released under a new state program that grants early parole to terminally ill, disabled and geriatric prisoners who qualify.
North Carolina is among a majority of states that release inmates with high medical costs, but who officials believe pose no threat outside prison.
A 2007 study showed that North Carolina spent $34 million on health care for inmates age 50 and older out of a $1.2 billion budget that year. That was a 35 percent increase over the previous year. The early parole, however, may only shift the expense of medical care from one state agency to another.
“If you take them out of the prison system and put them into the public health system, they’re still being paid for by the taxpayers,” said Sen. Andrew Brock, a Mocksville Republican and one of 13 legislators who voted last spring against legislation creating the early release program.
Dick Adams, who heads the N.C. Crime Victims Compensation Commission, said families of victims with whom he has spoken object to the program. The state should enforce the penalties it imposes, said Adams, who lives in Bath and whose son was murdered in 1982.
“We should retain some measure of certainty [about punishment],” Adams said, “if we’re going to maintain certainty about public safety.”
Cooke, who declined an interview request, was serving a one-year sentence after his fifth conviction for driving while impaired since 1994. He was scheduled to go home at the end of January.
Officials and family members are finishing medical treatment plans for three other inmates scheduled to be released under the program, and at least three or four other inmates have been identified for possible release, according to Mary Lu Rogers, chief of auxiliary services for the Department of Correction.
More than half the states have started early release programs with similar guidelines, with some of the more recent startups prompted by the recession and subsequent shrinking of state budgets. South Carolina provides a medical furlough to terminally ill inmates who qualify. Alabama launched its new procedure last year.
“It’s one of the policy options states are looking at to save money,” said Alison Lawrence, a policy specialist with the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Between 2005 and 2007, North Carolina’s prison population grew by 5 percent to 38,400. During that time, the share of inmates who were age 50 or older grew by 21 percent, according to a state report. Older inmates have a higher rate of chronic and debilitating disease.
Costs compared
The state spent an average of $1,284 on health care for inmates under age 50 during the 2006-2007 fiscal year, according to the report. For inmates age 50 and older, the average cost was $5,425.
Rogers said that some inmates’ families maintain health insurance on the prisoner and use it to provide treatment after their release. But she said such situations are not common.
Legislators who opposed the program argue that the prisoners likely end up on Medicaid, the state health insurance program for the disabled, elderly and poor.
Sen. Tony Rand, a Fayetteville Democrat and chief sponsor of the legislation allowing the early release, agreed that it moves health care costs in many cases from the state Department of Correction to Medicaid, which is funded partly by federal money.
“We’re shifting it from the state to the federal government,” said Rand, the Senate majority leader. “We have to pay 100 percent when they’re in custody.”
Sen. Debbie Clary, a Cherryville Republican who voted against early release when she was in the state House last year, said she was also troubled that the program, in some instances, may release convicted criminals into adult care homes used by the rest of the population.
“Do you want your grandmother in the same room beside a convicted felon?” Clary asked.
Frank Parrish, the district attorney whose office prosecuted Cooke, said he was not consulted by the Department of Correction about Cooke. But he said he wouldn’t have objected to releasing Cooke, who is bedridden.
“You’re balancing public safety against equity and humanity,” Parrish said, “and in Mr. Cooke’s case, it came down on the right side.”
WHO IS ELIGIBLE
Inmates eligible for an early taste of freedom must fall into one of three categories:
- Terminally ill: Inmates who were diagnosed after they were admitted to prison or their condition deteriorated.
“It’s so serious that they’re unlikely to pose a serious safety risk and likely to result in death within six months,” said Mary Lu Rogers with the state Department of Correction.
- Permanently and totally disabled: Inmates who have an irreversible physical or mental incapacitation, diagnosed after their admission to prison or progressed since sentencing.
- Geriatric: Inmates who are 65 or older and have a chronic infirmity, illness or disease related to aging that has progressed to the point that he or she is no longer a public safety risk.
Inmates convicted of more serious offenses, such as murder and rape, and inmates required to register as sex offenders are not eligible for early release.
Rand says early release saves money.
Copyright 2009 The News and Observer