Action urged to ease Pa. prison overcrowding

HARRISBURG - A two-month moratorium on parole last year compounded the prison overcrowding that is expected to force hundreds of Pennsylvania inmates to be boarded in other states, Pennsylvania Corrections Secretary Jeffrey Beard said yesterday. He urged lawmakers to take steps to slow the growth of the prison population.

At a hearing before a panel of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Beard advocated stepping up efforts to divert nonviolent offenders into non-prison settings and reducing the number of parolees sent back to prison for minor "technical" violations.

Sen. Stewart Greenleaf (R., Montgomery), the committee chairman who presided over the hearing, said it made sense to reserve prisons for the most dangerous offenders, who need to be separated from society, and to develop more constructive options for nonviolent criminals.

Beard said the parole rate dropped after two highly publicized shooting deaths of Philadelphia police officers in 2008, and after Gov. Rendell imposed the statewide moratorium. - AP