100 Inmates Return From Louisiana Prison Authorities File Detainers On 23 Who Face Charges There

A hundred Idaho inmates flew back to Idaho from a private prison in Louisiana Thursday - including 23 who have charges pending against them in Louisiana.

Idaho corrections officials said Louisiana authorities have decided to let the inmates serve their Idaho time first, but they have filed detainers on them that will require them to face the Louisiana charges upon release from Idaho prison.

“They’ll come and get them,” said Lisa Cates, an Idaho prison administrator. “This isn’t unusual.”

The group of Idaho inmates picked by Louisiana to come back includes all four recaptured escapees. Five Idaho inmates escaped from the Basile Detention Center on Sept. 25; one, Kootenai County child molester Kallahan Lee Ziegler, still hasn’t been found.

Twenty-two other Idaho inmates face Louisiana charges for rioting at the private lockup in July, when inmates destroyed bunk beds, microwaves and more, causing up to $35,000 in damage.

Eighteen of them are in the group that was sent back. One inmate, burglar Leroy James, is facing both rioting and escape charges.

Basile asked to send the group of inmates back after Evangeline Parish District Attorney Brent Coreil launched an investigation of the private prison, saying he believed it was only supposed to house non-violent offenders.

The group sent back Thursday included 63 violent offenders, according to a comparison by The Spokesman-Review of the list of names with a database built earlier from state prison records.

Twenty-three of the 100 are serving life sentences. The group includes nine rapists, 23 murderers, nine kidnappers and 18 child molesters.

Cates said all were brought into the evaluation unit at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution, south of Boise, where they will be evaluated and new security levels will be set for them. Then they’ll be assigned to appropriate prison beds within the Idaho prison system.

Families will be allowed to visit the inmates, the Corrections Department said. Returned inmates from North Idaho include:

From Latah County, Roger Dale Babb, Everett Bowers, Michael Hardway, Michael Lamach and Raymond Martin.

From Kootenai County, Philip Carle, Theodore Dickey, Isaac Dooley, Michael Lake, Donald Reeder, Dexter Tatro, Christopher Tucker, Charles VanGuilder and Fred Stacy.

From Bonner County, Richard Barnes, Eugene Mistelke and David Robertson. From Shoshone County, Bobby McFarland, and from Boundary County, Harry Reed.

, DataTimes