TALLAHASSEE
Over the past 18 years, a little more than 200 prisoners have been released from Florida’s massive prison system for medical reasons.
It’s a paltry number given the 100,000-plus inmate system and given that Florida’s prisoners are an aging group. As of June 2014, a fifth of the inmate population was defined as elderly – over the age of 50.
In the 2015 session, lawmakers will consider broadening that definition for conditional medical release to include “elderly and infirm inmates.” (Herald-Tribune archive)
In the 2015 session, lawmakers will consider broadening that definition for conditional medical release to include “elderly and infirm inmates.”
In the 2015 session, lawmakers will consider broadening that definition for conditional medical release to include “elderly and infirm inmates.”
In the 2015 session, lawmakers will consider broadening that definition for conditional medical release to include “elderly and infirm inmates.”
lawmakers will consider broadening that definition for conditional medical release to include “elderly and infirm inmates,”
More than 1,000 prisoners were over the age of 70, including two 92-year-old inmates, among the oldest in the nation.
Last year, 18 inmates applied to the newly named Commission on Offender Review – the former Parole Commission – and only eight were granted the conditional medical release.
The reason is Florida has a very narrow definition of what qualifies an inmate for medical release. The inmate must be either “terminally ill” or “permanently incapacitated.”
If they meet one of those definitions and the Offender Review Commission agrees, those prisoners can be released under supervision, including a provision that would send them back to prison if their condition improves.
In their 2015 session that begins Tuesday, lawmakers will consider broadening that definition for conditional medical release to include “elderly and infirm inmates,” defined as prisoners over the age of 70 who have not committed violent crimes and who have medical conditions that “renders the inmate infirm or physically impaired to the extent that the inmate does not constitute a danger to himself or herself or others.”
It would bring Florida in line with other states and the federal government which have set “geriatric” standards for the review of inmate sentences.
The bills (SB 2070 and HB 785) would also allow the families of inmates to pay for an independent medical exam to determine an infirmity and then submit the report to the Department of Corrections and the Offender Review Commission.
Reggie Garcia, a Tallahassee lawyer with 20 years of experience in handling clemency and parole cases, said broadening the definition for conditional medical releases is a good idea.
“There’s a humanitarian reason to do that and there is a cost savings reason to do that,” Garcia said.
Garcia has a new book – “How to Leave Prison Early” – that delves into the medical releases as well as other clemency and early-release issues in the Florida prison system.
“The reality is there are thousands of older inmates with chronic illnesses. While very serious, most of these illnesses evidently do not rise to the level of having a terminal illness or permanent incapacitation,” Garcia wrote.
Garcia and other authorities note that providing medical care for elderly prisoners is a costly enterprise. The National Institute of Corrections estimates that some $70,000 a year on average is spent on elderly prisoners, nearly three times the cost for a younger prisoner.
Seeking a medical release is among a variety of issues that Garcia explores in his “how to” book aimed at inmates and their families. He also outlines some 25 steps for clemency review, 17 steps for prisoners seeking parole (which was abolished in the 1990s) and seven steps for entering a work-release program.
Garcia said he wrote the book to demystify the complicated and complex early-release procedures that involve the Department of Corrections, the Offender Review Commission and the governor and Cabinet, who sit as the state Clemency Board.
“Families with inmates ... they simply do not understand the early-release options. The process is intimidating. The terminology is confusing,” Garcia said.
He said the book – available on Amazon – is particularly aimed at those who “cannot afford a lawyer.”
“This is literally my 20 years of experience,” he said.
WINNER OF THE WEEK: Ray Sansom. The former House speaker won a ruling from a Leon County circuit judge that the state must pay his legal fees _ which could amount to close to $1 million _ in case where the former House leader was accused of corrupt activities related to a $6 million appropriation for an airplane hangar in the state budget. The corruption case was dropped by state prosecutors.
LOSER OF THE WEEK: Financial disclosure advocates. A state appellate court threw out a lawsuit challenging a state law that allowed Gov. Rick Scott to use a blind trust to shield his personal assets rather than filing a detailed accounting of his finances. The suit contended the blind-trust law violated a 1976 constitutional amendment backed by Gov. Reubin Askew that required state officials to file full financial disclosures.
QUOTE OF WEEK: “I look forward to continuing to meet with more companies in Pennsylvania to highlight all of the great things we are doing in Florida,” Gov. Rick Scott said after his first “job poaching” trip to try to lure more out-of-state companies to Florida. Scott’s Pennsylvania trip yielded an announcement from Wawa Inc. that it would expand by another 50 stores in Florida over the next two years.
