Alabama House committee approves bill limiting good time for prison inmates

Ralph Chapoco
·2 min read
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An Alabama House Committee Wednesday approved a bill that would cut the sentence reductions an inmate can get for good behavior in prison.

The House Public Safety and Homeland Security Committee overwhelmingly approved HB 9, sponsored by Rep. Russell Bedsole, R-Montevallo.

Prison inmates currently receive correctional incentive time, also known as good time, based on where they fall in a four-tier system. At the highest level, an inmate can get 75 days off their sentence for every 30 days served.

People who are in the Class II category may earn 40 days for every 30 days served, while those in Class III can earn 20 days. Inmates do not automatically earn good time and must work their way up through the tiers through good conduct.

Bedsole’s bill would cut the top tier to 30 days for every 30 days served; 15 days for 30 days served in the second tier, and 5 days for 30 days served in the third tier.

Alabama prisoners would get less time off their sentence for good behavior under a bill approved by a House committee.
Alabama prisoners would get less time off their sentence for good behavior under a bill approved by a House committee.

The legislation stemmed from the death of Bibb County Sheriff’s Deputy Brad Johnson. Johnson was shot and killed while pursuing a motor vehicle last June. Another deputy was wounded. Austin Patrick Hall, charged with murder and attempted murder in the shooting, was released early from Alabama Department of Corrections despite a previous escape attempt, which should have revoked the good-time credits he received.

About a dozen law enforcement officers attended the Wednesday meeting to support the bill.

“We are failing the system in many ways in that our offenders are placed through judicial guidelines and sentencing guidelines, they are inserted into our correctional system for a rather brief period of time,” Bedsole said. “We accelerate that process by offering good time to many of those offenders who are eligible. Subsequently, they are serving such a short time in our corrective system that our corrective system doesn’t even have the chance to do the job that it is supposed to, which is fully correct if we could, but rehabilitate and educate.”

Republican members of the committee backed the proposal.

“I just know back in my district that I hear a lot from my constituents, they want people to serve the time they are given,” Rep. Tracy Estes, R- Winfield.

Alabama’s prisons are overcrowded and plagued by violence that has led to a lawsuit from the U.S. Department of Justice. Rep. Chris England, D-Tuscaloosa, a member of the committee, said cutting good time incentives would only make overcrowding worse.

“The fact that we are trying to massage the good-time laws to make it more difficult to get good time is going to massively increase the prison population that is already 150% larger than our facilities allow,” he said.

The bill moves to the full House for consideration.

Alabama Reflector is part of States Newsroom, an independent nonprofit website covering politics and policy in state capitals around the nation.

This article originally appeared on Montgomery Advertiser: Committee approves bill limiting good time for prison inmates