When the Southeastern Ohio Regional Jail reaches capacity, officials contact other local county jails to help house inmates. When that does not stop the overflow, inmates are released prematurely.
Because there are fewer beds for women, female inmates have been released from the jail before the end of their sentences.
But, according to Athens County Sheriff Patrick Kelly, releasing a female inmate prematurely is a rare occurrence.
Kelly went on to say that records are not kept in regards to how often that rare occurrence actually occurs. That is just a gross disregard for innocents' safety.
First, the fact that inmates are being released prematurely is extremely unsettling. It could be dangerous to have criminals roaming free when they have not completed their jail sentence. Kelly said that when the need arises, he might release a woman who's in on a lesser offense. But when there aren't any lesser offenders, what happens then?
Rather than release the inmates, SEORJ officials should widen their search beyond local county jails. It should not be difficult to find jails that can accommodate the overflow.
Normally, jails operate work release programs, boot camps and other specialized services and try to address educational needs, substance abuse needs and vocational needs while managing inmate behavior. If inmates are released early, they lose those services essential for readjusting to society.
Second, no records are kept of these premature releases. That is a very reckless and deeply troubling practice. Without records, there is no knowledge of the frequency of premature releases. We have no idea how many inmates have been released before the end of their sentence during the past five, even 10 years.
If the still-incarcerated inmates are not keeping a tally on the wall, then someone should. If this is such a rare occurrence, then keeping track of these women should be relatively easy.
A simple system needs to be set up to monitor the frequency of this incident. SEORJ already has an inmate catalogue available online. It should not be that difficult to create a prematurely released inmate database.
Editorials represent the majority view of The Post's executive editors.
4 Opinion
Early inmate releases go unrecorded at local jail
