After an inmate tried to hang himself with a bedsheet on Friday in a maximum security cell, Penobscot County, Miane, Jail officials wanted the man placed in a mental health facility for treatment, but a Bangor hospital official ordered that the inmate remain in jail under increased supervision.
The official reportedly thought the inmate was trying to manipulate the system to get a hospital placement.

Six hours later, the man bit into his wrist in another attempt on his life, a frustrated Glenn Ross, Penobscot County sheriff, said Tuesday, addressing a special commission established to look at Maine's prisons and jails.

The incident at the Penobscot County Jail, while not common, is a graphic example of the growing problems facing corrections facilities in Maine, Ross told the Corrections Alternatives Advisory Committee.

In his three years as sheriff, Ross has faced 21 serious suicide attempts at the jail.

The eight-member commission, plus three alternates, represents state and county corrections facilities, municipalities, county government and the judiciary. The members have been charged with finding ways of making improvements in a corrections systems that is crowded, yet facing dwindling numbers of prison employees, increased costs and demands, as well as reductions in funding.

Although progress already has been made in reducing inmate populations through such things as alternative sentencing and drug courts, much work still needs to be done, commission members said.