Salt Lake County Jail

Richard Gettler was first locked up in the Salt Lake County Jail in 1990.

Each time he was released, he would stay out just long enough to do something that put him right back in.

But during this stay, Gettler took the Life Skills class the jail offers, and he says he’s a changed man.

“I now understand the responsibility I have to society. I never understood that before,” he said through tears March 18 as he addressed the audience at the Life Skills class graduation. “I’ve never been successful at anything in my life. This is the first time I’ve been successful at something positive.”

The Life Skills class began in January 2007, and by then end of 2009, about 400 jail inmates had taken the 150-hour course, learning about topics such as anger management, personal finance and writing a résumé. Jail officials want to track one more year of data to see long-term effects, but in the first two years, they’ve seen a recidivism rate of about 64 percent, as opposed to the recidivism rate of inmates who don’t take the class at 70 to 74 percent.

“It’s not a huge difference, but it is fairly significant,” said Sgt. Jeremy Martinez, who oversees treatment and education in the Jail Programs Division. “Part of the goal is to prepare the prisoners for what reality is when they get out. It is promising to know we’re having an effect.”

What that effect is depends on the inmate.

Gettler hopes to apply the lessons he learned in parenting classes so he can interact better with his children and one day take his son fishing.

Others, such as Brandon Olson, hope they can apply the parenting lessons, too.

Olson, 28, has been in jail nine times. He hopes this class not only helps him keep himself out of jail for a 10th time, but it also made him realize that he needs to stop depending on others to take care of him and instead take care of his own family.

While it’s hard for many of the graduates to articulate specific situations in which they’ll apply their new skills, Olson said he learned how to disagree with someone without yelling at the person and turning it into a fight.

For Silvano Guadarrama, it’s been a journey of self-discovery.

The 18-year-old pleaded guilty to four charges of illegal discharge of a firearm, and spent four months in detention as a juvenile. When he turned 18, he moved over to the Salt Lake County Oxbow Jail, where he has been for the past six months and is now awaiting his early-June release date.

But it’s the past month that he says has been revolutionary.

“I’ve learned truth out of this class. I was living the typical gang lifestyle, and I didn’t really have any remorse, but now I realize there are victims, and some are innocent bystanders like my family,” Guadarrama said. “I’ve never had anyone push me to make myself better before. I know who I am now. I am in control of my own destiny.”

That attitude change is exactly what officers say they see in the inmates who take the class. While a lower recidivism rate is a bonus, the goal of the class is to ease the transition of re-entry into the outside world after being institutionalized. Both officers at the jail and people from the community — including personal accountants, health department workers and career-placement specialists — teach the course. They require homework and introspection that some find too difficult. The class is capped at 32 inmates, but this time only 23 finished.

Salt Lake County Sheriff Jim Winder, who handed out certificates of completion to the graduates and posed for photos with them, called the program a “huge deal.”

“This is where we’re trying to head in corrections. It’s not just about bringing inmates in and housing them,” Winder said. “I wish we could open this up to the entire jail because I know if we did, in two years we wouldn’t be facing overcrowding.”

Many of the students agreed with making the program more widespread.

Tomas Cortez, 33, who was sentenced to a year in jail for aggravated burglary, heard about the class from fellow inmates.

“I wish this program got a lot more recognition from the courts and that judges required us to take this class,” Cortez said. “Being sent to a place where the criminal mentality is the majority is counterproductive. In this class, we learned healthy life skills.”

Martinez congratulated the 23 inmates for persevering through the class, but also told them this was only the first step in making a permanent life change.

“I know it’s not going to be easy when you leave this place, but I’ve already seen big changes in you,” Martinez said. “When you do get out, I hope each of you has a five-minute goal, and then goals after that. Reality is reality, and it’s up to you.”

Written By: Sheena McFarland – Salt Lake Tribune

Popularity: 14%

SALT LAKE CITY — During debate about whether to sign a resolution on jail reimbursement with Weber, Davis and Utah counties, Salt Lake County Councilman Randy Horiuchi boiled the issue down to a single question.

“Are we willing to raise taxes on our residents to take care of state problems?” Horiuchi asked.

With that, the council voted unanimously to have a resolution prepared to approve next week. The resolution would join Salt Lake County with three neighbors in a management strategy for dealing with condition of probation prisoners, convicted prisoners who are court ordered to attend a probationary facility rather than prison.

The problem is one of funding. The state doesn’t view condition of probation prisoners as state prisoners and doesn’t budget for them. Counties don’t claim them, either, leaving no one to pick up the tab for the inmates.

The four-county effort would create two separate management plans — one governing county prisoners in county facilities and the other covering state prisoners in county facilities.

Salt Lake County Council Chairman Joe Hatch said the county has always eliminated beds when faced with budget deficits during his eight years on the council. Now, he said, it’s time to try something new.

“We have to have a slight shift in how we approach it to see if that has an effect on the state policy of correction,” Hatch said. “I don’t agree with Utah County on anything, and I’m willing to agree with them on this.”

According to Hatch, this year the state delivered only half of what it promised to help cover costs of housing condition of probation prisoners. That would leave a $900,000 funding gap on July 1 and an even bigger one next year, because the Legislature currently has budgeted no money for jail reimbursement.

“We’re simply housing state prisoners,” Hatch said, “and we’re being expected to go to our residents to collect the money. I think it’s really unfair for us to carry that burden as we have.”

The resolution would unite the four counties with 80 percent of the prisoners in question in lobbying the Legislature, as well as dealing with the budget shortfall uniformly.

If the state provides no funding for its share of the prisoners and still sends more than its quota of inmates, it could mean some prisoners go free to make room for others. Several council members, including Jenny Wilson and Steve DeBry, expressed concern about that idea.

“I wish we could talk about this as a global correction punishment issue,” Hatch said, “but it isn’t. It’s unique funding issue.”

Written by: Abigail Shaha | The Deseret News

Popularity: 8%

Counties along the Wasatch Front are fed up with the state of Utah reimbursing them less and less money for the cost of housing state inmates in county jails.  Now, Salt Lake County is considering whether to join Davis, Weber and Utah Counties in capping the number of state inmates they’ll accept.  Sheriff Jim Winder says the county is only getting reimbursed about 25 percent of what it costs to house state prisoners.

“We average about 300 inmates a day that are of this type, and it costs us $80 a day to house those inmates, and we are reimbursed by the state, presently, at about $22 a day,” he told KCPW.

Winder fears with the state budget facing massive cuts, lawmakers might decide this session not to reimburse county jails a single penny for housing state prisoners.  He hopes lawmakers preserve or increase jail reimbursement to avoid having to release additional inmates.

County Council Chairman Joe Hatch is torn about the proposal to cap the number of inmates the county will accept from the state.  He doesn’t want to see violent criminals released, but he’s also frustrated by the legislature continuing to slash jail reimbursements.

“And that frustration has got to a point that I think we have to do anything, and maybe it’s to the point where desperate times deserve desperate actions, and this is very desperate action, I have to say, it is a very extreme desperate action to take,” said Hatch.

The council will debate the proposed inmate cap at its meeting this afternoon.

Written by: Jeff Robinson | KCPW News

Popularity: 9%

Shots fired when car runs over officer’s foot during alleged drug deal.

(Our personal opinion, is this officer needs a serious lesson on when to use his weapon.)

Before he died, Travis Paul Johnson told his mother he didn’t hold a grudge against the police officer who had shot him.

“He was a very good man,” Penny Johnson said of her son. “The only thing he cared about was forgiving the police officer.”

Johnson, 39, died Tuesday at Intermountain Medical Center. A West Valley City police officer shot him in a Burger King parking lot near 3500 South and Redwood Road on Jan. 27 during an alleged drug deal.

According to West Valley City Police, Johnson hit an officer with his Pontiac Grand Am as he tried to drive away from officers. At least three plainclothes officers were monitoring the alleged drug exchange between Johnson and a friend and people in a second car moments before the shooting, West Valley City police Capt. Tom McLachlan said.

Penny Johnson said Wednesday that her son used drugs, but she said she believed him before he died when he told her he wasn’t involved in a drug deal.

What she can’t come to grips with is why police had to shoot him.

“I don’t know why the policeman shot him” she said. “He didn’t hit him [with the car] on purpose. He just panicked.”

Johnson said her son had been a construction worker until May 2008 when he fell 50 feet off a roof and shattered both ankles and his back. She said he was scheduled to undergo surgery again soon and had been on the mend.

Johnson admits she doesn’t know “totally everything that happened” on Jan. 27.

She just wishes her son was still alive.

“He just got caught in a bad place and he was afraid,” Johnson said. “I don’t think he should have been shot. He was unarmed.”

McLachlan previously told The Salt Lake Tribune that at least one officer fired at Johnson because he thought the other officer’s life was in danger when the car ran over the officer’s foot.

After Johnson was shot, his car rolled forward into the Burger King wall where it stopped.

Police arrested four other men in connection with the incident. They remain incarcerated in the Salt Lake County jail.

The Salt Lake County Attorney’s Office is reviewing the case, but has not yet issued a ruling on whether the use of force was justified by police.

Johnson said she and her 10 other children are preparing to bury Travis on Saturday.

“My son was very loving, very good and had a very big heart,” she said.

Written by: Jason Bergreen and Melinda Rogers | The Salt Lake Tribune

Popularity: 8%

Council urges state to pay may or some inmates will be set free.

Felons could get a shorter stay in Salt Lake County’s jail if the Utah Legislature doesn’t pay more for state inmates.

The County Council has signed a resolution — and ordered an ordinance drafted — that could release state convicts early from jail if the Legislature doesn’t provide enough funding to house them. The less money, officials say, the less bed space for felons who are sentenced to the county lockup.

“There does come a time,” Councilman Randy Horiuchi said, “when you have to say, ‘Enough is enough.’”

The Utah Association of Counties has lobbied for similar measures in Davis, Utah and Weber counties, hoping to persuade lawmakers to put more cash into jail reimbursements.
While the state is supposed to split the cost of incarcerating felons in county jails, UAC Executive Director Brent Gardner said, actual funding has fallen far below that. The state set aside $6.5 million for jail reimbursements in this year’s budget, he says, but should be spending closer to $15 million.

UAC’s initiative now has the support of Utah’s most-populous county, where council members unanimously supported a resolution saying they will not continue to subsidize the state’s financial shortfalls.

“It is outrageous that the state, on a yearly basis, provides this unfunded mandate to county governments,” Mayor Peter Corroon said. That mandate affects public safety, “not only for the unincorporated county but for the cities we serve”

The resolution comes as yet another development in the long-running debate about how much the state should pay for inmates serving out their sentences in county jails.

The recession has only deepened the rift. Jails in Utah and Weber counties have reduced bed space because of budget woes.

Salt Lake County Councilman Joe Hatch characterized it as a “very difficult thing to do” to consider turning away felons because of inadequate state funding. But, he said, “we need the money.”

The question now is whether the state, also in a financial bind, will cough up the cash at a time when it is considering closing a prison pod of its own.

Written by: Jeremiah Stettler | The Salt Lake Tribune

Popularity: 7%