Sex offenders brewing alcohol

04/07/2006

Bill would stiffen penalty for possession

BY MARTIGA LOHN
Associated Press

Sex offenders committed by the courts to two locked state treatment facilities have used plastic bottles, fruit, juice and sugar to brew their own alcohol, breaking program rules and prompting a lawmaker to propose stiff penalties.

Right now, having alcohol in a secure treatment facility is not a felony but can bring up to a year in prison or a fine of up to $3,000. The treatment program addresses violations with counseling and loss of privileges, said Mike Tessneer, who oversees the Minnesota Sex Offender Program. But in an environment filled with convicts who have done prison time, such measures have little effect.

“These are people who aren’t going to respond to someone saying you can’t go to the gym,” said Tessneer, head of state-operated services at the Human Services Department.

The incidents prompted the Human Services Department to seek legislation making it a felony — punishable with up to 10 years in prison — to have alcohol in a secure treatment facility.

That would bring alcohol penalties in line with those for illegal drugs, weapons and explosives in prisons and state hospitals, making them stricter than the current alcohol penalties in prisons.

The bill’s House sponsor, Rep. Matt Dean, R-Dellwood, said criminal violations in the Sex Offender Program should be treated as such.

“They are acting out criminally,” he said. “If you act in that way, you get sent back to jail.”

Some 340 sex offenders deemed sexual psychopaths or sexually dangerous are confined to the treatment facilities in Moose Lake and St. Peter, and state authorities expect that number to rise rapidly in coming years.

Program staff caught one offender making alcohol in St. Peter last year; he was sent back to prison because he still had time left on his sentence, Tessneer said. Staffers have found home brew or evidence of it 10 times in the past two years.

In state prisons, hooch is common enough that officials limit inmates’ access to packs of sugar, fruit, fruit juice, yeast, plastic soda bottles and trash bags, said David Crist, warden at the medium-security prison in Lino Lakes.

Still, offenders find ways around the restrictions. A slice of bread has enough yeast in it to start the fermentation process. Sometimes they’ll ferment alcohol inside a tied plastic bag to try to cover what Crist described as “that sickeningly sweet smell of a fermenting liquid.”

“The ingredients are typically poor, but it’s enough for a fellow that’s been away from alcohol for quite a while to get a fairly good buzz,” Crist said.

The Minnesota Sex Offender Program has restricted the use of large plastic drink bottles, and staff monitor patients who take large amounts of fruit juice, fresh fruit or sugar. They’ve also stepped up unannounced searches of patients’ bedrooms and common spaces.

Not only does alcohol break the rules, it’s often a factor in sex crimes and can endanger staff and patients, Tessneer said.

“You have the risk of somebody with a violent criminal history under the influence of a mood-altering substance, which makes that person far more dangerous,” he said.

There’s also potential savings in an alcohol crackdown that moves offenders from a secure hospital to prison. Each prison inmate costs the state $76 a day, compared with about $300 for secure sex offender treatment.