OFF-SCHEDULE INMATE MOVE IRKS DEPUTIES

DUNCAN -- An off-schedule transfer of a state senator's daughter from the
Stephens County jail to prison sparked the ire of the sheriff's deputies
and the senator.

Deputies claim Sen. Carol Martin, R- Comanche, used her political clout to
persuade state Corrections Department officials to take her daughter,
Alisha, to prison apart from other inmates on Monday, when they normally
only take death row prisoners.

The senator, however, said political pull had nothing to do with the move.
She said a court order required that her daughter be moved by Monday, and
because of the crowded jail, Martin wanted it enforced. "On the days that
my daughter was in there, from Thursday to Sunday, a six-man cell had 13
women, plus my daughter, in the cell, and eight of the women had to sleep
on the floor," Martin said Wednesday. Because of the jail's reputation,
Martin said, she made sure the court order would transfer her daughter no
later than Monday. Stephens County Deputy Mary Lou Hosler said she's never
seen an inmate transferred on a Monday in nine years, unless the inmate was
going to death row. To her, the off day move was favoritism. "Why make a
state agency that has been going by a certain policy for many years change
that to accommodate one person?" Hosler asked.

Alisha Martin, 20, pleaded no contest to charges of conspiracy to
manufacture a controlled dangerous substance.

She was sentenced to 128 days and will begin a drug rehabilitation program.