JUDGE: DRUG REHAB FOR EX-CONS WOULD HELP EMPTY STATE PRISONS

MONTGOMERY - Drug treatment for convicts after they leave prison would
reduce the high number of repeat offenders going back to Alabama's crowded
prisons, a Birmingham judge told a state panel Friday.

Jefferson County District Judge Pete Johnson, who handles criminal cases,
said that in his 17 years on the bench, as many as seven of every 10
defendants have been "dirty for drugs" and keep coming back on new crimes.

"I kept dealing with the same people," said Johnson, who is on the
15-member Alabama Sentencing Commission. The commission was created by the
state Legislature last year to study the state's sentencing structure and
recommend specific changes next year.

"If we don't address the issue of drug addiction, we'll see them (drug
defendants) again," Johnson said.

Stephen R. Glassroth, president of the Alabama Criminal Defense Lawyers
Association and a member of the commission, said he has been a criminal
defense attorney for 20 years, and as many as 75 percent of his clients
have drug or alcohol problems.

For Alabama to try to solve its prison crowding problem by building more
prisons would be to "spend ourselves into oblivion," Glassroth said.

Chris Retan, executive director of the Alethia House treatment center in
Birmingham, said recent studies have shown that convicts get no benefit
from drug treatment in prison unless they are in follow-up treatment
programs after prison.

Retan headed another sentencing panel appointed by Gov. Don Siegelman. He
told the governor in a report last month that community corrections
programs, drug courts and treatment alternatives could cut the prison
growth rate and save $358 million in prison construction and operating
costs over the next five years.

Prison Commissioner Mike Haley, another member of the commission, said
Alabama prisons are nearing the 27,000-inmate population mark and could be
approaching 35,000 by 2005.

"We have run out of space to put these inmates," Haley said.