Corrections And Rehabilitation

Scott Kernan, the second-ranking administrator of California's prison system, has been suspended for six weeks without pay as punishment for driving his state car under the influence of alcohol, officials said Friday. Kernan, who was arrested June 7 after being pulled over by California Highway Patrol officers near Sacramento, said in a statement that he will enter a guilty plea to the charge later this month, which will also result in his license being suspended. "I am deeply remorseful for my actions and arrest on June 7, and offer no excuse for my poor judgment," Kernan said.

California's prison population declined in 2009 for the third straight year as the number of state prisoners fell nationally for the first time in nearly four decades, according to a new survey from the Pew Center on the States. The overall decline was relatively small, 0.4% of roughly 1.4 million state inmates in the nation, but the study's authors said it is significant because it represents the first year-over-year drop since 1972. "After so many years on the rise, any size drop is notable," said Adam Gelb, director of the Pew Center's Public Safety Performance Project.

State corrections officials placed California's entire adult prison system on lockdown Thursday afternoon after two gang members attacked four officers inside a Tehachapi facility, a spokesman said. The prison guards -- two sergeants and two correctional officers -- were injured in the 1:10 p.m. assault in an office at the California Correctional Institution. They were taken to area hospitals. Three officers sustained cuts and puncture wounds during the attack by the inmates, members of the Surenos, a Southern California gang, and two weapons were recovered, said officials with the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Until 1996, members of the news media could conduct one-on-one interviews with inmates in California prisons, giving the public a deeper understanding of what went on behind the barbed wire. This did not please the administration of Republican Gov. Pete Wilson, which was disgusted by the way some inmates abused this privilege to promote themselves -- calling in to radio talk shows to complain about their treatment, or appearing on TV to plug their books or movie deals. So reporters were barred from holding in-person interviews.

Re "Is this paroled killer still a threat?" July 13 We are grateful for The Times' perceptive piece on the state Supreme Court case regarding the parole of Sandra Lawrence, which points to a striking irony in the current state government bureaucracy. California has a Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, but what does "rehabilitation" mean when the governor wants to deny parole to inmates who have taken every opportunity to demonstrate they have reformed? What else would Sandra Lawrence have had to do?

California is on the verge of a justice revolution. Realignment, as it is known, is a set of changes thrust upon the state by our collective inertia: Prisons had become so overcrowded as to violate the U.S. Constitution's prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment, and Californians demonstrated no will to pay more money for more prisons. As a result, the courts ordered the prisons to reduce their inmate population by 30,000 over the next two years. So Gov. Jerry Brown and the Democratic-controlled Legislature quickly and somewhat carelessly adopted realignment, which transfers responsibility for many felons who have completed their prison time, and many newly convicted felons, from the state to the counties.

Calling solitary confinement "torture," California prisoners and advocates are asking the United Nations to investigate the segregated housing of gang members at prisons throughout the state. "We have California treating several thousand prisoners in much the same way the U.S. government treats enemy combatants held in Guantanamo," said Peter Schey, an attorney representing hundreds of inmates. Schey, who announced the petition at a news conference in Los Angeles on Tuesday alongside prisoners' relatives, said solitary confinement was devastating to the physical and mental health of prisoners and was likely to increase their risk of committing more crimes upon release.

Charred cotton mattress stuffing is heaped on a scruffy lawn outside Joshua Hall dormitory at the California Institution for Men, the interior ankle-deep in ash and evidence of inmate-on-inmate brutality that has destroyed precious space in one of the state's most volatile prisons. In neighboring Otay Hall, dried blood stains a lower bunk mattress where a reclining inmate's chest would be, two deep gashes in the fabric suggesting a stab wound. Between the two dorms -- one destroyed by fire, the other smashed and debris-strewn -- stands an empty carton marked "White Kittey," testifying to the racial divides that run deep among the facility's 5,900 prisoners.

Rioting inmates in Chino recently torched a dormitory, ravaged five other dorms and destroyed 1,200 beds. Roughly 1,300 convicts participated and 175 were injured. The state caught a break. No guard was hurt. And no prisoner was killed. "It turned out better than we thought," says Matthew Cate, the state's prison boss as secretary of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. "Officers were able to retreat to a place of relative safety near the administration office.