Currently we've been negotiating, and have negotiated, with the employer that for maximum and medium security inmates, when they are in that security level, there are two officers, and they are armed. For our minimum security level, there is no ratio, so one officer could be taking six, seven, eight, twelve inmates out, minimum security.
For ETAs, in the cases that I spoke of, there was one officer in an open vehicle both times. It was an unsecured vehicle. Both times the inmates took control of the officer and took the vehicle. It was while the officer was distracted by driving. The one inmate faked a heart attack. The officer was pulling over, and the inmate produced a weapon. We take inmates, these first- and second-degree murderers, for the first time out into the community with one officer, if they're at the minimum-security level. Back in 1987 it was an inmate from a maximum security level institution with one officer, open vehicle, into the public.
For us, it has to be changed. We can't keep maintaining that type of thing. In the bill it hasn't been addressed. Right now it could be the fact that it wouldn't even be a correctional officer. It may be a volunteer of the institution from a church group who may take an inmate on an escorted temporary absence. That hasn't been addressed or tightened up in the present bill, and we feel it must be.