By Matt Dixon
Naples Daily News
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — A Senate panel began its probe of the state’s troubled prison system Monday, a process prompted by a series of inmate deaths, including one who was “cooked like a chicken.”
The controversy, inflamed by a high-profile headlines documenting the turmoil, has spurred outrage from lawmakers, cost more than 30 correctional officers their jobs, and forced the resignation of Michael Crews, Gov. Rick Scott’s former prisons chief.
“We have a lot of work to do as a state to improve our correctional system,” said state Sen. Rob Bradley, R-Fleming Island, after a meeting of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee.
The committee got updates from top state law enforcement officials, and George Mallinckrodt, a psychotherapist who gave a blistering account of what he learned while working in state prison psychiatric wards.
“The Florida Department of Corrections is riddled with sadistic, amoral sociopaths and the people who enable, support and cover-up their crimes,” he told the committee.
Though there have been numerous recent inmate deaths, the incident that sparked much of the outrage was the death of Darren Rainey, who prison guards trapped in a scalding hot shower for hours. He sustained burns over 90 percent of his body.
Mallinckrodt says Rainey was taunted by guards who asked is “the water hot enough?” as Rainey burned alive.
The reforms come amid leadership changes at the Department of Corrections and Florida Department of Law Enforcement, which is often tasked with investigating prison deaths. New DOC Secretary Julie Jones’ first day on the job was Monday, and interim FDLE Commissioner Rick Swearingen has been on the job for just two weeks.
Swearingen told the committee that changes to the agreement FDLE has with the Department of Corrections has drastically increased the number of prison incidents FDLE is involved in.
The current five-year plan is a verbal agreement that was put in place in June under Crews, the former DOC chief, and former FDLE Commissioner Gerald Bailey. It required that all incidents, including those deemed “non-suspicious,” to be reported by the department to FDLE.
“This has resulted in a significant workload to the department,” Swearingen told the committee.
As a result, FDLE is asking lawmakers for $8.4 million to hire an additional 66 people to investigate inmate deaths and incidents that lead to life threatening injuries.
Under the current system, FDLE investigates incidents reported by the Department of Corrections, a process that has come under fire because of the Department of Correction’s recent high profile blunders.
“Isn’t one of the questions whether DOC is properly describing instances as suspicious or not suspicious, isn’t that one of the issues?” Bradley asked.
“That has been an issue in the past,” Swearingen said.
He said that as he and Jones, the new DOC chief, work to hammer out a more formal plan – not just a verbal agreement – he would have to “be assured that policies are in place that would guarantee oversight would occur.”