New APAI Facebook Page

The Executive Committee of the APAI voted last week to make our APAI facebook page public!  You can now find our page at www.facebook.com/apaintl.

Check it out and let APAI know you are there!

National Parole Resource Center Announces Training Opportunity

The National Parole Resource Center (NPRC) announces a new training opportunity to be offered immediately prior to the APAI Annual Training Conference. To learn more visit the APAI website at http://www.apaintl.org/conference/ or NPRC webite at http://nationalparoleresourcecenter.org/

Sheriff slams prison overhaul

Gov. Deval Patrick wants to build two to three assisted-living centers with bars for golden-ager inmates to serve their time in comfort, as part of an ambitious overhaul of the state’s prison system due to be released today, the Herald has learned.

The 400-page Corrections Master Plan obtained by the Herald, though years in the making, was only shown to sheriffs for the first time yesterday by the Division of Capital Asset Management and the Executive Office of Public Safety. It drew immediate criticism.  Read more...

Mo. Supreme Court chief calls for sentencing fixes

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri's chief justice urged lawmakers Wednesday to make changes to the state's probation and parole systems to potentially save the state millions of dollars.

Chief Justice Richard Teitelman urged lawmakers in his annual State of the Judiciary address to pass measures to reduce the number of people in prison for probation and parole violations.

"I support your efforts to help make sentencing practices more cost-effective, helping Missouri to become ... both tough and smart on crime," Teitelman said, addressing a joint session of the state House and Senate.  Read more...

Lawmakers consider site for elderly offenders

Iowa may have to establish a special nursing home for elderly sex offenders and other criminals, according to a handful of local lawmakers.

''These individuals should not be turned loose,'' state Rep. Helen Miller, D-Fort Dodge, said Saturday morning. ''We will have to have a facility where these individuals will be contained.''

Miller and other legislators addressed the issue during an Eggs and Issues forum in Fort Dodge held months after a registered sex offender living at the Pomeroy Care Center in Pomeroy reportedly sexually assaulted another resident of the facility.  Read more...

Pardon restrictions mulled - Ex-governor: Proposals take away incentive for inmates to change

Leslie Carlton Smith wants to coach his 6-year-old son's soccer team, chaperone him at Boy Scouts events and take him hunting.

But until former Gov. Haley Barbour pardoned Smith, 46, last week, the Biloxi man could not be the dad he wanted to be because of a felony conviction from his teens.

"It's hard to tell a 6-year-old why I can't do some of things his friend's dads can," Smith said Monday. "It's a little embarrassing for me."  Read more...

Brown case highlights reluctance to parole longtime offenders

Eroy Brown, whose acquittal on murder charges involving the deaths of a prison warden and a farm manager in the 1980s shook the Lone Star corrections system to its roots, is coming up for parole again.

Brown is serving 90 years as a habitual criminal for robbing a Waco convenience store of $12 and some candy bars. The graying, almost 60-year-old is serving time in a South Carolina prison because a federal judge thought his safety could not be guaranteed in a Texas lockup. If he's granted parole, he would be sent to a pre-release program in California. Read more...