MoreyUnit

Records obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests by The Arizona Republic and research by The Republic show that state-run and private prisons in Arizona have the kind of problems only a prisoner could love.

These include holes under the fence at the Lewis state prison that were "big enough for a person to crawl through unimpeded," according to an auditor's report.

Breathtakingly lax security was found even after the heightened scrutiny that followed last year's escape from a privately run prison in Kingman, which led to the murder of an Oklahoma couple.

The July 30, 2010, escape by three prisoners was aided by an accomplice who threw tools over the prison fence. Alarms went off when the fence was being cut, but prison guards ignored the sound because that alarm had been malfunctioning for 2 ½ years.

Nobody was watching when convicts John McCluskey, Tracy Province and Daniel Renwick walked away. McCluskey, Province and Casslyn Welch, who threw the tools over the fence, are expected to be tried in New Mexico in the murder of a couple kidnapped from a rest area while the convicts and Welch were on the run.

Charles Ryan, director of the Arizona Department of Corrections, ordered a review of every state prison after the escape, according to The Republic's Bob Ortega. Stunning lapses in security were found, including admissions by prison officers that they didn't understand the perimeter-security systems.

Ryan ordered improvements. Changes were made, although it took eight months for Utah-based Management & Training Corp., which runs the Kingman prison, to correct things to Ryan's satisfaction.

Subsequent audits of prisons revealed more problems, including findings in February that staff uniforms and tools were stored in rooms at the Yuma prison that were accessible to inmates and that there were areas where visitors could throw things over the perimeter fence unseen.

Carelessness and complacency should not describe how a prison is run. But, in Arizona, those words can be applied to what was found at both state-run and private prisons.

This is important to keep in mind because discussions about the proper way to house prisoners in Arizona are contentious, and facts can be applied for the sake of convenience.

Studies have found that private prisons are not necessarily cheaper for the state when all factors are considered, but Arizona's Republican-controlled Legislature favors including them in the mix. More private prisons could be in the offing with companies bidding to manage 5,000 prison beds in Kingman under a state contract.

The escape from the Kingman prison was used to argue against use of private prisons by those who oppose them. Yet lax security was found in both public and private prisons.

Arizonans from both sides of the policy debate need to acknowledge and work to correct what appear to be systemic problems in both types of prisons.

Most people assume the facilities that house prisoners are tightly and professionally run. But what has been revealed about prisons in Arizona suggests that more scrutiny and strategic improvements are necessary to protect public safety