Wednesday, August 21, 2013

Montana Legislature sets sights on Parole Board's possible role in prison overcrowding

Examining whether board may be too stringent on granting or revoking parole for felons within Montana correctional system

HELENA — Montana’s parole board, which decides the fate of hundreds of state prison inmates each year, will be getting a hard look from the Legislature on its possible role in overcrowding Montana’s prison cells.

Beginning next month, a legislative panel kicks off a yearlong study of the board, examining whether the board may be too stringent on granting or revoking parole for felons within the Montana correctional system.

“We’re keeping so many people in prison for so long, nonviolent offenders, at tremendous cost to the taxpayer,” said Sen. Terry Murphy, R-Caldwell, the author of the bill leading to the study. “It just came to some of us that we really need to find out why that is.”

The study will be conducted by the Law and Justice Interim Committee, which has heard hours of testimony from families criticizing the board, accusing it of denying parole for their loved ones for no good reason.

Mike McKee, a retired financial adviser from Hamilton and chairman of the parole board since 2009, said last week that much of that testimony was “misinformation and half-truths being presented as facts.”  Read more...