Texas prison officials blame influx of cellphones on poor staffing, surveillance
By EMILY RAMSHAW / The Dallas Morning News
[email protected]
AUSTIN
– Poor surveillance, inadequate staffing and underpaid, easily corrupted corrections guards have allowed Texas prison inmates to easily obtain phones and other contraband, criminal justice officials acknowledged Tuesday, the day after three cellphones were recovered from death row.
One of these phones logged 2,800 calls over the last month and was used by a convicted murderer to make threatening
calls to state Sen. John Whitmire, who said at an emergency hearing Tuesday that he was “disgusted” with top prison officials.
“We’re talking about life and death, about a death-row inmate calling me and talking about my daughters,” said Mr. Whitmire, D-Houston. “It is more secure at the Harris County Courthouse, in Houston traffic court, than it is” on death row.
Everybody’s got a cellphone. Why should the inmates be left out?
Prisonworld 2008-2011
