By Tom Eldred,
Delaware State News
DOVER — A prison task force established by Gov. Ruth Ann Minner to investigate the circumstances of a July 12 abduction and rape of a counselor at the Delaware Correctional Center is hiring a nationally recognized corrections expert to help with the probe.
The expert, George M. Camp, is a principal in the Connecticut-based Criminal Justice Institute, which has completed staffing and organizational analysis projects for various prison systems, including the city of Philadelphia.
"We were very attracted to Mr. Camp's qualifications,'' said Wilmington attorney Thomas P. McGonigle, vice chair of the task force.
"My understanding is that he's on board and will be starting right away.''
State budget director Jennifer W. Davis said Mr. Camp's $175-an-hour fee, including travel, would come from a $50,000 contingency fund within the state budget office that is earmarked for such expenditures, and that the five-member state budget commission is expected to approve the cost at a meeting today.
"We have a $50,000 contingency fund that is set aside every year for unintended issues, such as emergencies, task forces and that sort of thing,'' Mrs. Davis said Thursday. "I have asked the task force for a dollar figure of what they think the cost might be. The unofficial number I was getting was about $10,000."
Mrs. Davis said the budget commission must officially authorize the expenditure but that she does not expect any dissent.
"It's fairly routine,'' she said. "This is the type of thing the fund is used for.''
Gov. Minner ordered an independent review of the July 12 incident after she read the results of a two-and-a-half month internal investigation undertaken by the state Department of Correction.
Created by executive order, the task force is to present its findings to the governor by Jan. 31, 2005.
The DOC report, released Oct. 6 by Correction Commissioner Stanley W. Taylor, contained accounts of interviews with more than 30 correctional officers involved in the hostage taking incident. It did not indicate who was responsible or what should be done to prevent future incidents.
According to DOC, inmate Scott A. Miller, 45, a serial rapist sentenced to 699 years behind bars, abducted prison counselor Cassandra Arnold, barricaded a room, and kept negotiators at bay for nearly seven hours before he was shot and killed by a correctional officer.
Miller raped Ms. Arnold, 27, before he was killed. She has since filed a federal lawsuit against Gov. Minner, Mr. Taylor and other prison officials. The lawsuit claims that security lapses, inadequate prison staffing, poor supervision and overworked employees contributed directly to Ms. Arnold's ordeal.
Task force members, acknowledging they are not prison system experts and noting the short timeframe they have to complete their investigation, stressed the importance of bringing in a specialist when they met last week at DCC.
"He certainly has the credentials,'' the panel's chairman, Grover C. Brown, said of Mr. Camp.
Mr. Camp could not be reached at his office Thursday.
According to his online career resume, he is a former director of the Missouri Department of Corrections and assistant director of the New York City Department of Correction.
He was also first deputy commissioner for the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services and chairman of the New York State Commission on Correctional Standards and Goals.
A former associate warden for the Federal Bureau of Prisons, Mr. Camp has been with the Criminal Justice Institute in Middletown, Conn., since 1978.
The institute's Web site lists prison-related projects completed in various jurisdictions, as well as an ongoing study in a cooperative agreement with the National Institute of Corrections to analyze the social and organizational cultures of prisons.
As part of their investigation process in the coming weeks, the seven-member task force organized at their last meeting into three groups.
Members Tony Allen, Guy Sapp and Mr. McGonigle will review prison resources.
Brian D. Shirey, Mr. Allen and Rebecca Scott Kidner are to look at prison polices, while Mr. McGonigle, Vincent A. Bifferato Sr., Mr. Sapp and Mr. Brown concentrate on staff performance, before and after the July 12 incident.
The next public meeting of the task force is set for 12:30 p.m. on Nov. 19, in the 12th floor conference room at the New Castle County Courthouse in Wilmington.
Post comments on this issue at newsblog.info/0407. Senior writer Tom Eldred can be reached at 741-8212 or at teldred@newszap.com.
Reprinted with permission from newszap.com www.newszap.com
