Hattiesburg American
By Cathi Carr
$1,500 fines will be leveled for noncompliance
It took 10 years to add teeth to the state’s Biddle guard law. On Thursday, Gov. Kirk Fordice signed a measure that will fine violators $1,500.The law, which takes effect July 1, bans the release of state prisoners into cars without a protective barrier between the front and back seats of patrol cars. For Carolyn Biddle, the enforcement was too long in the making.
“It was already law, I just wish it had been there earlier,” she said. “I’m just thankful he did sign it.”
The law was named for her husband, Rankin County deputy T.O. Biddle, who was killed Feb. 6, 1989 by two inmates he was transporting from the state penitentiary. Once they escaped their handcuffs, they reached over the seat and commandeered his gun, eventually killing him on the side of road.
“I can’t imagine it not being enforced now,” Carolyn Biddle said.
The law has always mandated that law officers use cages when transporting maximum security state inmates. When lawmakers first adopted it, a penalty was not included because many law officers objected to being fined without first being provided money to purchase the cages.
According to a December survey by the Hattiesburg American , one-fifth of the sheriffs in the state surveyed continued to transport prisoners in cars without cages. But lack of compliance and a wrongful death lawsuit changed many legislators’ minds this year.
The death of three law enforcement officers in 16 months has been blamed on the loophole. In February, 1997, Jefferson Davis County Deputy Tommy Bourne, 41, and Jailer J.P. Rutland, 53, were killed by an inmate transported in a car without a cage.
This year’s push to strengthen the law followed the June slaying of Moody, Ala., police officer Keith Turner, who was killed when two inmates escaped from Jones County Sheriff Maurice Hooks in June. Turner’s family has since filed a $10 million lawsuit against Hooks and the state blaming them for his death.
The inmates, Mario Centobie, 32, and Jeremy Granberry, 19, escaped from Hooks’ cageless car June 27 as they were being transported from Parchman to Laurel. In the days that followed, Turner, 29, was shot and killed when he stopped a stolen vehicle believed occupied by Granberry and Centobie.
For Brandy Turner, Keith’s widow, the law’s passage means that no other family must endure what she has. Her daughter Ashlynn turned 1 on April 2.
“I’m very excited for all the other police officers,” she said from her Ragland, Ala., home. “Now if they just follow it. I’m stunned and relieved. I guess it’s a start.”
The representative who wrote the bill originally wanted a $5,000 fine attached to it. Rep. Joe Ellzey, D-Ellisville, represents the county that Hooks patrols and knew the importance of passing a tougher law.
“You’ve heard of an ounce of prevention,” Ellzey said. “This is worth a million pounds to me.”
Other lawmakers who toiled for the bill’s passage echoed Ellzey’s sentiments.
“I believe we did the right thing and this will go a long way to ward off situations we get into when transporting prisoners,” said Rep. Lee Jarrell Davis, R-Hattiesburg, who wrote the amendment that bans the release of prisoners into cageless cars. “This will be a deterrent.”
Most sheriffs supported adding teeth to the law as well. According to the American’s survey, 73.2 percent of the county’s 82 sheriffs supported making the law tougher. The last two holdouts to the law, Monroe County Sheriff Ruble Maxey Jr. and Clarke County Sheriff Billy Ray Evans added cages to their cars this year. Previously, they had no cars in their fleets with the cages and continued to transport state prisoners without them.
