Pubdate: Sat, 12 Apr 2003 Source: Montgomery Advertiser (AL) Copyright: 2003sThe Advertiser Co. Contact: http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1088 EXPANDED PAROLE DOCKET GOOD STEP The weekly special dockets instituted by the state Board of Pardons and Paroles are a useful step in working to ease the horrific overcrowding of Alabama's prisons. The weekly special dockets instituted by the state Board of Pardons and Paroles are a useful step in working to ease the horrific overcrowding of Alabama's prisons. The kinds of cases the board is considering in these special dockets underscore again the needlessly high number of people incarcerated in the state for crimes that don't necessarily warrant incarceration. The board got a $1 million emergency appropriation in February that allowed it to hire some additional parole officers to supervise persons paroled from the special dockets. Inmates convicted of Class A felonies involving violence or of domestic violence or drug trafficking are not eligible for the special dockets, nor are inmates with disciplinary charges within the past six months. That leaves primarily the nonviolent drug and property offenders, the very offenders for whom incarceration often is a costly and unproductive option for society to choose. Many of these inmates could be released from prisons into the supervision of the board without posing any appreciable physical threat to the citizenry. At the special docket hearings held this week, for example, 31 of the 34 inmates considered for parole were paroled. The special dockets are an important short-term measure. Their greatest value, however, may well lie in the questions they raise about why some of these people were in prison instead of serving sentences in more productive and less costly ways. - --- MAP posted-by: Beth