Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 5, 1995 TAG: 9503060068
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
Twenty-two of the 150 inmates flown to Texas last month have signed a petition alleging they have ``received nothing but disrespect'' since arriving at the privately run Newton County Detention Center.
``To be blunt about the matter, the rights, laws and privileges which we went under and followed in the Virginia Department of Corrections seem to be totally obsolete here in Texas,'' inmate Darrick Hood, 25, wrote in the petition.
Among other things, the petition accuses officials at the jail of withholding sheets, pillows, washcloths and underclothes, as well as serving unsanitary food.
Virginia Department of Corrections spokesman Jim Jones said the department has investigated the jail and is ``convinced they are not being mistreated.''
BRG Inc. of Austin, Texas, runs the jail. Larry Young, BRG vice president, said the allegations are false.
``There's Texas inmates in there, along with Virginia inmates,'' Young said. ``Those claims are just unfounded. We just don't treat people like that. When they're processed, they're given all the proper care and everything they need. We're under very strict standards and guidelines of the state of Texas Jail Commission. The officers ask for respect from the inmates, and they give it - it's respect both ways.''
Hood's mother, Jacqueline Battle of Richmond, disagrees. She said her son told her that when they arrived in Newton County, ``They told him, `You're in Texas now; forget about the way things were in Virginia.'''
Another inmate in a telephone interview last week concurred that officers in Texas have repeatedly warned Virginia inmates that many rules and privileges they had in Virginia do not apply in Texas. Robert A. Wright Jr. also said he and the other inmates have been threatened with violence by corrections officers.
The inmates and their families, meanwhile, are trying to cope with the surprise decision to send the 150 to Texas, Battle said.
``My son said they told them they were going to Coffeewood [Correctional Center], somewhere near Fairfax, Virginia, so all of them were very upset when they arrived at the airport,'' she said.
by CNB