October 22, 2008
Poor staffing and surveillance lead to influx of cell phones in Texas jails
Poor surveillance, inadequate staffing and underpaid, easily corrupted corrections guards have allowed Texas prison inmates to easily obtain phones and other contraband, criminal justice officials acknowledged Tuesday, the day after three cellphones were recovered from death row. The Dallas Morning News reports.
One of these phones logged 2,800 calls over the last month and was used by a convicted murderer to make threatening calls to state Sen. John Whitmire.
Texas' 156,000 inmates remained on lockdown Tuesday after Monday's revelation that a guard had accepted a bribe to get murderer Richard Tabler a cellphone.
Mr. Tabler and at least nine other death row inmates, most of them affiliated with violent gangs, made more than 2,800 calls over 30 days. The calls to Mr. Whitmire referenced the names of his daughters, their ages, and where they live in Houston.
Wardens from Texas' death row testified at the hearing that their surveillance cameras don't record footage, and that metal detectors often don't detect cellphones that are predominantly plastic. Only 22 of the state's 112 units have walk-through metal detectors.
Related:
-- Death Row inmate makes threatening call to Senator
-- Cell phone smuggling is a big problem in Texas prisons (April 2006)
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