From Deseret News archives:
Stop placing all the blame on jails
inflammatory and inaccurate reporting, along with the finger-pointing of corrections officials concerning recent escapes from custody from county jails all need to be put into perspective.
The contractual type of arrangement between state corrections and county jails began several years prior to 1988 as has been stated in the recent news reports. Although it later evolved into an overcrowding relief valve for the state, its original purpose was to help the prison with special housing problems such as inmate segregation and protection issues. The early years of the state's need to farm out prisoners coincided with a period of time when many counties needed to construct new or renovate existing jails, resulting in extra bed space in county jails. Thus came about the increased use by the state.
The housing location of some state inmates may need to be evaluated, but the wholesale movement of inmates out of county jails based just on the crimes for which they are incarcerated makes no sense at all. Most jails are maximum security facilities by design and by the very nature of their purpose. I would like to remind everyone, most particularly those who have had so much negative to say on this issue, that there is not a single person in any prison facility in this state who wasn't first housed in a county jail.
Many are kept there for lengthy periods of time while the slow wheels of justice grind away. This means the baddest of the bad, those on 24-hour lockdown, were at one time safely housed in a county jail first. That's just the way the criminal justice system in Utah works.
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