SACRAMENTO — The California Senate has approved SB26, which creates a misdemeanor for any prison employee or visitor smuggling a cell phone into prison. An inmate caught in possession of a cell phone would lose early release credits of up to 180 days. Currently, possessing a cell phone in a California prison violates prison rules but is not illegal.
SACRAMENTO — Gov. Jerry Brown announced the layoff of more than 130 employees at the state prison system’s headquarters. Brown’s office said the layoffs would reduce general fund spending by $30 million and eliminate about 266 vacant positions at California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation headquarters. The cuts were first suggested when Brown released a revised budget plan that included eliminating 5,500 positions statewide. The measure will eliminate 32 executive-level corrections jobs and more than 100 management and supervisory positions, Brown’s office said. More than 1,000 headquarters positions, or about 25 percent, have been eliminated during the past 18 months, reducing staffing levels to about 2005 levels, Brown’s office said.
HUNTSVILLE, TX — A 42-year-old convicted killer, Gayland Bradford, was executed for the robbery-murder of a Dallas grocery store security guard almost 23 years ago. Four days after Christmas in 1988, he took $7 from 29-year-old Brian Williams, then gunned him down. Bradford was on parole for a robbery conviction when he was arrested for the murder. Bradford became the fourth Texas prisoner executed this year.
MEXICO CITY — Calling the global war on drugs a costly failure, a group of high-profile world leaders is urging the Obama administration and other governments to end the war. A report by the Global Commission on Drug Policy has recommended that governments try new ways of legalizing and regulating drugs, especially marijuana, as a way to deny profits to drug cartels. The recommendation was swiftly dismissed by the Obama administration and the government of Mexico. The two administrations are allied in a violent 4 1/2-year-old crackdown on cartels that has led to the deaths of more than 38,000 people in Mexico.
