Page 12-Friday, May 15, 1981-The Michigan Daily
1,000 inmates to
get early parole
4
LANSING (UPIr - The Michigan
Supreme Court yesterday upheld as
constitutional a controversial law
providing for the early release of about
1,000 inmates to ease prison crowding.
The ruling, which came with only one
partial dissent, reversed a Michigan
Court of Appeals decision against the
1980 law issued two weeks ago.
RELEASE OF ABOUT 1,000
prisoners under the law was imminent
when the appeals court ruled.
The law requires that virtually all
inmates' minimum sentences be
slashed by 90 days when the prison
population exceeds capacity for 30 con-
secutive days. Those within 90 days of
completing their originally sentenced
minimum, thus, are immediately
eligible for release through the normal
parole system.
An Ingham County Circuit Court
judge has ruled Michigan's prisons
legally overcrowded and ordered steps
to ease the problem.
IT WAS NOT CLEAR how soon
prisoners will be released.
Gov. William Milliken had warned
Michigan's aging and crowded prisons
would face serious problems - in-
cluding possible disruptions - if the
law was not upheld.
Milliken and other leaders have war-
ned the federal courts may step in and
take over the prisons if the long-
standing problem is not alleviated.
THE STATE Corrections Com-
mission had notified Gov. Milliken
earlier this year that the law's con-
ditions had been met for him to issue an
emergency crowding declaration.
The law was passed after Michigan
voters rejected a proposal to raise the
state's income tax for five years to con-
struct new prisons.
The supreme court action came in a
suit brought by L. Brooks Patterson,
Oakland County's hard-line prosecutor
and a frequent critic of the governor.
Patterson charged the law makes the
governora"lackey" of the legislature.
HE WARNED THE sudden release of
1,000 felons would send shock waves
across the state.
The appeals court said the law
violates the governor's exclusive power
of commutation under the state Con-
stitution.
The supreme court said the law was
within the legislature's power to ap-
prove indeterminate sentences and
provide for the release of inmates sen-
tenced under them.
ALTHOUGH THE LAW has con-
sequences similar to commutation, it
derives from a separate constitutional
grant of power, said the majority
opinion signed by Chief Justice Mary
Coleman and Justices Blair Moody Jr.,
Charles Levin, Thomas Giles
Kavanagh, John Fitzgerald and James
Ryan.
"The purpose of the instant
legislation is to reduce the intolerable
level of over-crowding which charac-
terizes Michigan's prison system," the
court said.
Justice G. Mennen Williams dissen-
ted in part, saying it is constitutional as
applied to sentences imposed after Jan.
26.
4
AP Photo'
Modern art?
Picasso's famed sculpture in Chicago's Daley Center Plaza provides an
unusual backdrop for viewers examining an Air Force A-10 attack jet Wed-
nesday. The jet was on display as part of Armed Services Week in Chicago.
Oil industry opposes
state leasing policy
new casses eginning
May 18
ballet
modern
jdZZ
es
LANSING (UPI) - The proposed oil
and gas leasing policy for 230,000 acres
in northern Michigan is a "useless ex-
periment" and will push independent
drillers out of the bidding and the state,
petroleum firms complained yester-
day.
At a meeting of the state Natur al
Resources Commission, oil and gas in-
dustry representatives opposed a plan
to substitute a "royalty bid" system on
15 percent of the acres up for lease for
Michigan's standard "bonus bid"
system.
THE COMMISSION is expected to
vote today on the methods to be used for
the tentative summer auction of the
acres in Missaukee and Roscommon
average about $100 per acre with some
parcels going for much higher prices.
A FLAT 16.66 PERCENT royalty
would then be charged on gas or oil ex-
tracted from the site.
Under a royalty system, a flat $100
per acre lease would be charged with
firms bidding for the share of profits
they would pay the state on their
petroleum production.
Department of Natural Resources
staff members say they want to test the
system to see if the state could reap far
greater profits this way, particularly in
the light of the recent oil bonanza in the
northern counties.
0
6
Information 995 4242
Donce
Thco re
S~udio
711 N University
Ann Arbor
counties - a mineral lease sale which "THIS IS AN unnecessary ex-
could be the most profitable in state periment and you're never going to
history. prove that it worked," said one oil com-
"The independents will essentially be pany representative.
squeezed out of the bidding process," The oil companies said the royalty
said Bill Stelzer of the Michigan Oil and system would encourage unreliable
Gas Association. bidders who would lease land, but never
sink wells.
The now-used bonus bid system Industry representatives also spoke
requires petroleum speculators to out against a plan to hold the auction
make competitive offers during auc- using sealed, rather than spoken bids.
tions for the right to lease a specific The inability to hear competitors' bids
1 arcel of land. Successful bids at the would prevent independent companies
, < upcomingl ease spea, .heii p)wi 4y ; fr ,jging t arc, teyspd
eseparate classes for:
r " ," ~e Amo 'S Ys crE',v moe ' Jz
. Fl sy " bi i2 'X r t g f4.a~xr' 4 '<ea 'fx"~" . e ,":.a