Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, May 4, 1995 TAG: 9505040102
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JAY REEVES ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: ELKMONT, ALA. LENGTH: Medium
Grumbling prisoners shackled together by clinking leg chains shuffled along a busy highway Wednesday, chopping weeds and picking up trash, as Alabama became the first state to bring back chain gangs.
Passing motorists blew horns and students on school buses shouted at the inmates. Several accidents nearly happened as drivers slowed to gawk.
The 12-hour workday started with shotgun-toting corrections officers standing watch while about 320 prisoners were made to kneel in the cold, dew-covered grass to have shiny steel chains clamped to their legs.
``It shows how Alabama is going back to slavery,'' said inmate Larry Clinton, serving 15 years for theft.
``Keep them hands outta them pockets and pick up those chains!'' one guard shouted over the roar of traffic along Interstate 65.
The day remained cool as the men shuffled along hacking at tall grass with 2-foot blades attached to wooden handles.
Each gang was made up of five inmates linked together by 8-foot lengths of chain. They worked in squads of about 40 men each, with an armed officer watching each squad.
White prison coats and billed caps were emblazoned with the words ``CHAIN GANG'' - a sight unseen in most states for decades.
Motorists who stopped at a Tennessee state welcome station a few miles north of the work site seemed largely unaware of what was going on along the highway.
``I thought it was a religious group or something out doing a good deed with all the white on,'' said one woman who wouldn't give her name.
Kim Davis of Birmingham said she had no problem with seeing chain gangs: ``They're not hurting me. They were just out there working.''
One chain gang member, James Sears, a convicted robber who violated parole by fighting with his girlfriend, called the experience degrading.
``You can't even chain five dogs up on the side of the road without the Humane Society doing something,'' Sears said.
``I hope and pray I don't never come back. I don't like the idea of being used as a political chess piece,'' said Dwayne Rowe, serving seven years for selling cocaine.
Gov. Fob James reinstituted chain gangs in an attempt to make prison life so unpleasant that no one will ever want to return.
Chain gangs were a common sight until public opinion was stirred by the 1932 movie ``I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang,'' about an innocent man brutalized on a Southern chain gang. No one is sure when the last chain gang was used in Alabama.
Donald Claxton, a spokesman for the governor, said the new shackles are lighter and more modern than the movie version. ``These aren't the ball-and-chain things,'' he said.
But some prisoners forced to wear leg chains during tests complained that being shackled was uncomfortable and demeaning. Clinton, the prisoner doing time for theft, worked on the trial chain gang for nearly a month and said he had sores and calluses on his legs.
Alabama and many other states already use minimum-security inmates, without shackles, to pick up litter and perform other duties.
Only medium-security inmates with at least two trips to prison are being forced to serve on chain gangs, based at Limestone Correctional Facility, said Prison Commissioner Ron Jones.
These repeat offenders are denied television, visitors and store privileges. They will work on the gangs for 30, 60 or 90 days, depending on behavior.
A bill is pending in the Legislature that would outlaw chain gangs, and critics say the program will only worsen Alabama's image as being backward and out of step with the rest of the nation. The American Civil Liberties Union has promised to sue.
However, Jones said officials from Oklahoma, South Carolina, New Jersey and Michigan all had contacted him wanting to send observers to Alabama.
by CNB