Audit finds reporting issues with Florida prisons over use of force incidents
(The Center Square) — An audit of the Florida Department of Corrections has uncovered several issues related to the use of force, untimely reporting times and information technology access controls.
The Florida Auditor General reviewed incident reporting, maintenance requests, Correctional Officer timekeeping records and the state-operated Institutions Inmate Welfare Trust Fund with the DOC.
Department records between July 2021 and February 2023 showed 354,184 incidents, including 14,265 incidents involving the use of force against an inmate, spread across 50 state-operated correctional facilities.
According to department procedures, all incident report forms must be reviewed and include an initial deposition by a shift supervisor or department head. The security chief must then review all incident reports and pass them to the warden for final review.
One hundred and one incident reports were reviewed by auditors, filed between 2021 and 2023 at 13 different state correctional institutions. Three incident forms were completed by correction officers between two and six days after the incident. While the shift supervisor reviewed reports in a timely manner, the chief of security did not review the incidents until between five and 14 days after it happened.
Another incident’s report review by the shift supervisor was delayed due to a staff mix-up, which caused at least a three-day delay in moving the incident through the review process.
All incidents involving the use of force must be reported by all officers who were involved or witnessed the event, detailing the incident and the circumstances that led to the use of force. Two incident reports were filed up to 18 days after the incident happened and another six reports were not filed for an average of 20 days after.
It was further found three incidents were not given to the warden until up to 33 days after the incident had first been reported.
Sometimes, work orders and maintenance requests did not include cost or labor hours to complete needed repairs. Over 40 maintenance requests were disproved between July 2021 and February 2023, nine of which had no reason included for their denial.
The AG recommended strengthening policies and procedures, ensuring any incidents are reported in a timely manner, ensuring disapproved work requests include a reason for the disapproval and improving the department’s information technology control access, which had delays in removing ex-employees from the system.
