(The Center Square) — For the fourth consecutive year, the Louisiana Legislative Auditor’s Office found the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections wasn’t properly reviewing inmate time computations.
Time computations are the calculated amount of time an inmate has to serve, which can be altered by things called credits and forfeitures, both based on the prisoners behavior.
The audit conducted for the period from July 2023 through June 2024 said the department did not have an adequate review process in place for subsequent changes to inmate time computations related to the application of credits and forfeitures.
In addition, the department did not ensure complete and accurate information was kept in the department’s computer system.
A test of 31 subsequent changes to initial time computations between July 1, 2023, and Dec. 31, 2023 noted 20 of these related to credits and forfeitures did not have reviewer initials or other support to indicate the change entered in the system was reviewed by someone other than the preparer.
Although no errors related to the 20 changes to credits and forfeitures were identified in the most recent time computations, auditors said without an adequate review process in place, there is an increased risk that errors in offender records won’t be identified and corrected in a timely manner.
Another issue outlined by the audit is the corrections services do not have adequate controls in place at five different facilities to ensure that fuel card transactions are properly monitored.
Not doing so increases the risk of theft and waste, which has been an issue LLA has found in auditing other departments.
Pulling 30 fuel card transactions between July 1,2023, and December 31, 2023, 17 of them were noted as not recorded on a log or the log was not accurately completed.
Eleven were state vehicle transactions not recorded on the Daily Vehicle Usage Log, one was a gas can transaction also not marked, and five were gas can or farm card transactions not recorded because the department and facilities do not have a policy that requires these transactions to be logged.
The agency said in their response that they do not concur with the finding of inadequate reviews of changes to time computations and argued for the current practices. They did however agree with the fuel card transaction deficiencies.
