Thanks to statewide reform in sentencing for most Alabama inmates this year, Cullman County found itself sharing the burden as Alabama implemented a prison reform step that returned inmates still serving prison time back to their communities.
In late January, 400 inmates monitored by the Alabama Department of Pardons and Paroles became early-release beneficiaries after the state implemented a piece of 2015 legislation that, in a step to alleviate prison overcrowding, freed them from incarceration anywhere from three months to a year ahead of their scheduled release dates.
The step meant an additional 13 announced inmates would be returning to Cullman County — even as local law enforcement officials voiced disapproval, citing added demands on their limited resources in addition to what sheriff Matt Gentry described as “an injustice to society, and especially an injustice to the victims and their families.”
Under terms of the release, ADPP was tasked with remotely supervising the early-release inmates via location monitoring using electronic ankle bracelets. All state inmates who’d served their requisite time — including some in prison for violent crimes and drug trafficking offenses — were eligible for early release, with the measure applicable to all inmates except those convicted of sexual crimes against children.
Though lawmakers noted the early release measure was not ideal, they described it as a necessary move to address prison crowding issues that in recent years have presented the state prison system with the threat of a possible federal takeover. The same legislative session that gave approval for the early-release measure also approved construction of additional state prison infrastructure to more permanently alleviate the overcrowding issue, though new facilities authorized under the law will not be ready to accept inmates until the first of them comes online in 2026, at the earliest.