CCA Aids U.S. Marshals Service in Response to Iowa Floods

With severe flooding in Iowa, the U.S. Marshals Service has called on Corrections Corporation of America to assist in evacuating 125 detainees from several facilities in the state to the company’s Leavenworth Detention Center in Leavenworth, Kan.

CCA, the largest private operator of prisons and jails in the U.S., is an established partner of the U.S. Marshals Service. The 1,016-bed Leavenworth Detention Center already houses USMS detainees and has capacity to handle the displaced detainees from Iowa. Designed and built by CCA and completed in 1992, the American Correctional Association-accredited facility was the first maximum-security private prison under direct contract with a federal agency.

“We have a long partnership with the U.S. Marshals Service, and we’re proud to play a role in helping our client manage this crisis in Iowa,” says Damon Hininger, CCA Senior Vice President, Federal and Local Customer Relations. “One of the benefits we’ve always offered our customers is our ability to be flexible and to offer innovative solutions to unique challenges. Our staff in Leavenworth has a long history working with the U.S. Marshals Service and its detainees, so this is a case where we’re well-prepared to assist a customer in need and happy to do so. This exemplifies what we mean by having beds just in time.”

On Sunday, June 15, 2008, the inmates were transferred from Iowa to Kansas. There is no timetable for the detainees’ return to Iowa, but Hininger said the Leavenworth facility is prepared to house them as long as necessary.

CCA has provided similar relief to customers in the past. In 2005, when Hurricane Wilma set a potentially deadly course for the state of Florida, the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement called upon CCA for help, working together to successfully transfer 1,137 inmates out of harm’s way – in just four days. After the initial notification from ICE, CCA began to receive inmates within 24 hours. CCA and ICE collaborated on the transfer of detainees from several local and federal detention facilities in central and southern Florida to T. Don Hutto Correctional Center in Taylor, Tex. and Florence Correctional Center in Florence, Ariz.