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LePage Says He’ll Add ‘Minimal’ Staff to Prison

LePage Says He’ll Add ‘Minimal’ Staff to Prison

Photo: clipart.com


AUGUSTA, Maine (AP)   The Latest on the Maine’s shutdown of a state prison (all times local):

3:40 p.m.

Republican Gov. Paul LePage says he’ll comply with a court order by adding a “minimal” number of staffers and inmates to a state prison he shuttered without legislative approval.

LePage said Monday that the Maine Department of Corrections plans to take such steps by the week’s end. The governor said he met with Department of Corrections Commissioner Joseph Fitpatrick, who plans to continue plans to close the facility when its funding expires in June.

But a lawyer for laid-off prison workers says the governor’s plans are too vague. Attorney David Webbert says he expects to be back in court soon to demand the governor fully comply with the court order.

Superior Court Justice Michaela Murphy ruled that LePage didn’t have authority to shutter the prison, but she stopped short of ordering all of the inmates to be returned.

___

2:33 p.m.

A lawyer for laid-off prison workers is growing impatient over the governor’s delayed response to a judge’s conclusion that he lacked authority to empty a prison in eastern Maine.

The governor was supposed to meet with Corrections Commissioner Joseph Fitzpatrick Monday to discuss the ruling and the next step.

But attorney David Webbert says the administration shouldn’t have waited to discuss the order, which became public on Thursday.

He said he’s going back to court if the Downeast Correctional Facility isn’t reopened immediately.

Superior Court Justice Michaela Murphy ruled that LePage didn’t have authority to shutter the prison, but she stopped short of ordering all of the inmates to be returned.

She left it up to the Department of Corrections to determine staffing and the number of inmates.

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