By Associated Press
Huntsville, AL – The Madison County Sheriff's Department plans to move prisoners to lockups elsewhere in Alabama and is telling area law enforcement agencies that it can accept only felony suspects in an effort to relieve overcrowding.
Chief Deputy Chris Stephens said the jail set a record this week with one-thousand-32 inmates in all of its facilities. He told The Huntsville Times that several inmates will go to DeKalb County and that the jail will no longer accept people arrested on misdemeanor charges starting today (Thursday).
City and county leaders voted in July 2002 to merge the county and city jails, which held 702 inmates at the time. A 24-point-36 (m) million dollar contract was awarded in February 2004 to build an eight-story jail addition with 900 inmate beds. But it has been plagued by cost overrun, with construction halted for a time due to structural problems.
It was to be completed last April. But Bruce Taylor, the city's director of facilities and fleet management, said the completion is still a year away and that the cost is now estimated at more than 44 (m) million dollars.
(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)