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| PA must repay county expenses |
| By NEPA News |
| Published: 07/20/2006 |
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MONTGOMERY COUNTY, PA - The one-sentence order issued Tuesday confirmed a 6-1 ruling by Commonwealth Court last year that sided with 21 counties that sued the Corrections Department seeking repayment. The Corrections Department had argued that a change to state law in 2000 only required it to pay for prosecution in escape cases. Montgomery County, where Graterford State Prison is located, billed the state for $65,000 in trial costs for 21 alleged crimes that occurred in the prison over two or three years. The Corrections Department said it would only pay for escape trials, leading Montgomery and 20 other counties to sue, asking for a clarification of the law. The state had argued that the prosecution costs would require "massive amounts of funding," but was uncertain of the precise cost. The Corrections Department also expressed concern that it might be forced to pay for prosecutions that it does not support or that it has handled through internal misconduct procedures. "I still think the administrators in the prisons are going to have some control by virtue of what they report" to local prosecutors, said Philip W. Newcomer, chief of litigation with the Montgomery County solicitor's office. Corrections Department spokeswoman Sue McNaughton said the department was disappointed by the decision and could not calculate its cost. "Because we've never paid for them in the past, we believe it's impossible for us to estimate at this point in time the financial impact this ruling will have on the (Corrections Department) and the commonwealth, because criminal activity is difficult to predict and would vary from prison to prison," she said. The General Assembly in 2000, responding to high-profile escapes from the Huntingdon and Dallas state prisons a year earlier, amended state law to make the state pay to try "crimes and offenses committed on the grounds or within the buildings of any state penal or correctional institution." The counties, which each house at least one state prison, were seeking reimbursement of witness fees as well as expenses for court personnel, court-appointed lawyers and other items. Before the 2000 law change, a county in which a prison crime occurred could bill prosecution costs to the county that sentenced the inmate. The Supreme Court ruling listed only 20 counties - Lycoming County was not included - but Newcomer said Lycoming was still a plaintiff and suspected a clerical error. |
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