[Vision2020] its not a joke

[Mark Solomon]

This just in from Betsy Russell's blog. Betsy is the Spokesman-Review 
reporter in Boise.

Mark Solomon

Bus riding may SEEM like prison, but...
This is just absolutely incredible, unbelievable. According to the 
San Diego Union-Tribune, federal prison officials have been sending 
federal inmates on Greyhound buses - unescorted - across the country 
to transfer them from one prison to another. Surprise, surprise - 
some got off before their final destination.

One was Dwayne Fitzen, a motorcycle gang member and cocaine dealer 
convicted in Idaho and sentenced to 24 years in prison back in 1992. 
Last fall, the feds put Fitzen on a bus in Waseca, Minn., bound for 
the federal prison in Lompoc, Calif. Fitzen got on the bus on Sept. 
14, but didn't arrive as scheduled at the minimum-security Lompoc 
lock-up two days later. He was last seen in Las Vegas, where he 
withdrew $12,000 from a bank account and disappeared. A press release 
from the U.S. Marshals Service says the 55-year-old dealer, known as 
"Shadow," is "considered armed and dangerous," and U.S. Marshals have 
"made the apprehension of this fugitive a top priority."

The San Diego newspaper reported that eight prisoners bound for San 
Diego alone have escaped during their Greyhound rides since 1996. 
That's when federal prison officials started the bus-transfer program 
as a money-saving move. It releases prisoners who are being 
transferred to low-security facilities on a furlough for their bus 
ride, after they sign a letter promising they won't try to escape, 
according to the Union-Tribune's report. The feds call the program 
"voluntary surrenders." But when the San Diego newspaper's reporters 
checked with Greyhound, the bus line's spokeswoman said Greyhound had 
never been told that it was carrying unescorted prisoners alongside 
its regular passengers. "If this is happening, we are going to ask 
that it stop," spokeswoman Kim Plaskett told the newspaper.

Federal prosecutor Monte Stiles, who prosecuted Fitzen in Idaho, told 
the Union-Tribune, "When I first heard it, I couldn't believe it. I 
thought it was a joke."

The San Diego newspaper reported that Federal Bureau of Prisons 
officials wouldn't say how many of their convicts have escaped during 
bus transfers, but the paper documented "dozens" who are still at 
large.
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