WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden signed a bill Thursday that strengthens oversight of the crisis-plagued federal Bureau of Prisons, after reporting by The Associated Press exposed systemic corruption, flaws and abuse in the federal prison system.
The Federal Prison Oversight Act, which was passed by the Senate on July 10 and the House of Representatives in May, establishes an independent ombudsman to hear and investigate complaints in the wake of sexual assaults and others criminal misconduct by staffchronic understaffing, escapes And notable deaths.
It also requires the Justice Department’s inspector general to conduct risk-based inspections of all 122 federal prison facilities, make recommendations to address deficiencies, and assign each facility a risk score. Higher-risk facilities would then be inspected more frequently.
Bureau of Prisons Director Colette Peters praised the bill when she testified before Congress this week. But she told the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Federal Government Surveillance that the agency needs tens of millions of dollars in additional funding “to effectively respond to the increased oversight and to achieve that meaningful, long-term change.”
Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Gov.) introduced the oversight bill in 2022 when he led an investigation into the Bureau of Prisons as chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee’s Investigations Subcommittee.
Ossoff and the bill’s two other sponsors, Judiciary Committee Chairman Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Sen. Mike Braun, R-Ind., launched the Senate Bipartisan Prison Policy Working Group in February 2022 amid turmoil at the Bureau of Prisons, much of which was exposed by AP reporting. Reps. Kelly Armstrong, R-N.D., and Lucy McBath, D-Ga., cosponsored the House version of the bill.
Under the legislation, an independent federal prison ombudsman would collect complaints through a secure hotline and an online form, investigate and report dangerous conditions that endanger the health, safety, welfare and rights of prisoners and staff to the attorney general and Congress.
In addition to inspecting prison facilities, the legislation requires the Justice Department’s inspector general to report findings and recommendations to Congress and the public. The Bureau of Prisons would then have to respond within 60 days with a corrective action plan.
Last year, Inspector General Michael Horowitz launched an unannounced inspection program of federal prisons, finding serious deficiencies, including understaffing in health and education programs, crumbling infrastructure, and moldy and spoiled food served to inmates.
The oversight bill “recognizes the importance of our inspection program,” Horowitz said. “We look forward to working with Congress to expand its impact.”
Peters said the bill “really improves” what the inspector general does, while also allowing the agency to more quickly collect data and flag problems.
“We’re going to see more announced visits — more unannounced visits by the inspector general,” Peters told the House subcommittee. “And then I think the ombudsman position is also very powerful because it’s a place where individuals can file complaints and there’s someone who makes sure those complaints are filed and answered.”
Biden signed a separate bill from Ossoff in December 2022 that would require the Bureau of Prisons to repair broken surveillance cameras and install new ones.
A continuous Associated Press investigation has exposed serious, previously unreported deficiencies within the Bureau of Prisons, the Justice Department’s largest law enforcement agency with more than 30,000 employees, 158,000 inmates and an annual budget of approximately $8 billion.
It has emerged from AP reporting dozens of escapeschronic violence, deaths and serious staff shortage That has hampered emergency responsesincluding attacks on prisoners and suicides.
In April, the Bureau of Prisons announced it would close its women’s prison in Dublin, California. known as the “rape club”, Abandoning efforts to reform the facility after an AP investigation revealed widespread sexual abuse of inmates by staff.
Last year, two well-known inmates were attacked and another committed suicide in federal prisons.
Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was stabbed 22 times by a fellow inmate at the Federal Correctional Institution in Tucson, Arizona, last November. The assailant said he targeted Chauvin because of his notoriety for Killing George Floydaccording to federal prosecutors.
Disgraced former sports doctor Larry Nassar was stabbed to death in a federal prison in Florida in July 2023, and “Unabomber” Ted Kaczynski committed suicide in June 2023 in a federal medical center.
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Sisak reported from New York.