Correction contractor may have double-billed

BOISE – The state Department of Correction is working to negotiate a settlement with a contractor that the agency says billed Idaho for work it did for Alaska on a system the two states use for tracking inmates.

Correction Director Brent Reinke made the comments in a memo emailed Friday to the agency’s 1,600 employees, the Idaho Statesman reported.

Reinke also said in the email obtained by the newspaper that a May 2010 internal investigation was referred to Ada County prosecutors. Reinke did not say how much money was involved.

Reinke wrote that prosecutors “determined that while there was evidence of double-billing by the contractors, there wasn’t enough evidence to pursue prosecution.”

Ada County Chief Deputy Prosecutor Roger Bourne told the newspaper that prosecutors decided the matter was a contract dispute.

“Even though it appeared that the contractors were using resources that should have been used to produce the Idaho product, in a sense they were,” Bourne said. “We just couldn’t find there was any criminal intent or evidence that anybody was trying to defraud or steal.”

The newspaper also obtained a copy of the investigation by the Office of Professional Standards on Tuesday after submitting a public records request April 19.

The investigation found irregularities going back several years.

Lorie Brisbin, an investigator with the Office of Professional Standards, wrote that contractors had been “engaging in unauthorized activities” as early as May 2007. She also wrote that “it appears there was a long-term pattern of the contractors using IDOC equipment without restriction.”

She noted that evidence suggested “that some of the contractors worked almost exclusively on the Alaska Corrections Offender Management System with little or no work performed for IDOC.”

CRI Advantage Inc. subcontracted the work to AnalyzeSoft Inc. Both companies, based in Boise, declined to comment.