State prison chief requests ‘safekeeping’ review

The head of Tennessee’s prison system told lawmakers Monday he’s asked for a review of the state Department of Correction’s policy on safekeeping, a program that allows jails to send Tennesseans not convicted of crimes to state prisons where they are kept in solitary confinement.

Department of Correction Commissioner Tony Parker told the Senate State and Local Government Corrections Subcommittee he asked the department’s chief general counsel to review the safekeeping policy “to try and find ways to be as less restrictive as we can.

“We have made significant efforts to lesson the burden of someone being in a restricted housing area,” Parker said.

Department Chief General Counsel Debbie Inglis said Monday evening she and several others in the legal department have reviewed the policy for more than one month. It is too early to say when she may have any recommendation on potential changes for the commissioner, she said.

The comments come after a February investigation into safekeeping by The Marshall Project and the USA Today Network-Tennessee. The inquiry found more than 320 people were declared safekeepers between 2011 and 2017, at times spending months in solitary confinement awaiting trial.

Many of the safekeepers have medical issues or a mental illness. Some are pregnant or juveniles, according to the investigation.

While Parker said “we have a significant interest in being as less punitive as we can” to safekeepers, he acknowledged many of the same rules that apply to safekeepers dictate housing of state inmates who are considered the worst of the worst.

Typically, solitary confinement means spending 23 hours a day in a cell and being shackled for any movement outside of the cell. Showers are available three days a week and recreation is available five times a week.

After the hearing, Corrections Subcommittee Chairman Ed Jackson said the legislature will continue to review safekeeping laws and policies.

“This is definitely something we are looking into to see what changes must be made. We must try to come up with a better way to house those who need safekeeping,” said Jackson, R-Jackson.

“The department does not have the appropriate facilities to house them, particularly as it applies to females. Our subcommittee will continue to look at the matter to find solutions.”

During the hearing Parker acknowledged his department at times houses juvenile safekeepers, which he said presents “another layer of issues.” Juveniles cannot legally be housed within sight or sound of adults, a requirement Parker said is “very hard to meet” within state prisons.

Without naming the safekeeper, Parker said a female juvenile was recently provided education opportunities during her time in state prison.

The February investigation found Teriyona Winton, now 16, spent months in 2017 in solitary confinement at the Tennessee Prison for Women.

Winton, awaiting trial on a murder charge in Shelby County, received two hours of instruction each day through the flap in her door. In early February, Winton was moved out of that prison to a Shelby County facility. However, a judge earlier this month ordered her back into state custody.

Gov. Bill Haslam, who said he recently learned of the program through published reports, said it “doesn’t make sense” to keep juveniles not convicted of a crime in solitary confinement at adult prisons.

Haslam said housing juveniles in solitary confinement because they are legally prohibited from living with adult inmates is “not an adequate answer.”

“We’re going to see what we can do to address that, because there’s got to be a better way,” Haslam said during an event in Washington, D.C.

“We’re going to see what we can do to address that, because there’s got to be a better way.”

— GOV. BILL HASLAM