By Virginia Young
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Call it the $1 million state bonanza, courtesy of escaped prisoners and halfway house walkaways.
Over about 15 years, thousands of Missouri inmates and parolees who left the state’s custody without authority also left behind money in prison system bank accounts.
Now, the Missouri Department of Corrections is using the money to upgrade computers for staff members who run the inmate canteen, or store.
Not so fast, says Auditor Susan Montee. She contends the department has no legal right to the money.
In an audit released Monday, Montee said that after child support and other court-ordered obligations for the inmates were paid, the remaining funds should go to the state’s unclaimed property division.
That means the money could end up in the former inmates’ hands - if they returned to claim it. A spokesman for state Treasurer Clint Zweifel, who runs the unclaimed property division, said the office was reviewing the audit.
A detailed breakdown on the escapees’ money was unavailable. But most of it likely came from parolees who disappeared from community release centers, not inmates breaking out of prison.
The Department of Corrections said Monday that since 1993, there have been 12,397 offenders who absconded from community release centers and 168 prisoners who escaped from custody.
Of those offenders, eight escapees and 192 parolees have not yet been apprehended, according to the department’s offender management database. The department cautioned that the count is not necessarily complete. For example, inmates may have been arrested and served the remaining sentence in another state.
Department spokeswoman Jacqueline Lapine said Director George Lombardi was unavailable for comment on the audit.
In its response included with the audit, the Department of Corrections said it controls the money because of a law that says the department can set policy for the amount and type of personal property an offender can possess.
The department cited court cases from 1989 and 1996, which found that an inmate’s escape resulted in abandonment of personal property and upheld the department’s authority over inmate property.
Tony Rothert, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri, said he had not received a direct complaint about the seized funds. But he said he knew of inmates who worried that their money would be taken without due process.
“If it was actually people who were breaking out of prison and were never heard from again, that would be one thing,” Rothert said. “Based on the large number of prisoners whose money is being taken, it appears there’s some lesser criteria.”
The dispute over what to do with escapees’ money is not a new one. Former state auditor and now U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill questioned the department’s handling of the funds in an audit in 2002. At that point, the agency was holding the money but not spending it.
That changed in 2007 and 2008, when the department transferred $500,000 of the money to the inmate canteen fund and spent at least $167,000 on computer equipment for staffers who run the inmate store.
The canteen sells products such as soda, cigarettes, snack foods and televisions to inmates. Profits go toward recreational, religious or educational services.
Montee noted that state law says abandoned property should be turned over to the state treasurer’s office. She said the department lacks “clear statutory authority” for spending escapees’ money and should consult the treasurer or seek legislation allowing the department to keep the funds.
Allison Bruns, a spokeswoman for Montee, said the auditor wasn’t taking sides on the best use of the money.
“It’s an accounting policy,” Bruns said. “With corrections as well as any agency, if it’s unclaimed property, it should go into the unclaimed property division.”
The audit, which covered three years ending June 30, 2008, also examined the $40 million the state pays each year to counties and the city of St. Louis for incarcerating and transporting prisoners.
Montee said “significant billing errors” had resulted in overpayments.
For example, in sampling 18 payments totaling $5.7 million made to St. Louis County, Montee found 43 mistakes totaling at least $44,118 in double billings.
She recommended the department periodically compare bills with jail records and compare current billings with previous ones. Developing an electronic billing system would improve the monitoring ability, she said.
In response, the department said it had recouped the double payments from St. Louis County and was working to eliminate duplicate bills. But the department said it was “unreasonable and unwise” to develop an electronic billing system that would suit all 113 counties and the city of St. Louis.
In other areas, Montee recommended that the department:
- Stop using $2 million a year to subsidize canteen operations, which are supposed to be self-supporting.
- Review the 970 cell phones issued by the department to be sure they use cost-effective plans.
- Cap lodging costs for extradition expenses at the maximums set for federal employees in various cities.
Copyright 2009 St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Inc.