Along with questions about oversight of the president , she was asked about the death of Jeffrey Epstein. The good morning, everybody. We will get started just in a second. Welcome. I have a very brief opening statement. Thank youa for coming. We will get you sworn in here in a moment. Its important that we have this oversight hearing and there are a couple of areas of inquiry. One is Jeffrey Epstein and hopefully about the implementation of the act and where can we go from there, how can we buildst upon that, those are the three areas that i would like to talk about and they will turn over to senator feinstein. Thank you very much, mr. Chairman. I want to welcome you. Its wonderful for me to see a woman in charge so we can celebrate for a few brief moments o at least. [laughter] you are responsible for the care s d custody of over 180,000 federal inmates, and one of the Justice Departments largest employers with approximately 35,500 employees as of may of this year. As the chairman mentioned, there are two issues i hope that we can focus on. One is the First Step Act which was mentioned in the second is problems with staffing and conditions within your department. Im going to put most of this in the record. I think what i will do in the interest of time is just that the statement in the record. Without objection. Last Year Congress came togetheres and passed what i consider to be one of the most important criminal Justice Reform laws in the generation. The First Step Act passed by overwhelming majority and was signed by President Trump and we now have an obligation to insure that its properly implemented. I think the chair for holding this hearing, but im disappointed that the department of justice refused the bipartisan request to testify today. This is one of the many troubling sign divvied cosines they are not on board implementing the First Step Act. The act of 2010 which i coauthored like senators grassley and the reduced the disparity from 101 down to 181 but the department of justice is persisting retroactive acts for individuals in some cases even working to put them back behind bars. I wrote the provision that reduces these unjust sentences for nonviolent offenders and in a position the Justice Department is taking is just plain wrong. The department of justice should be working to identify eligible individuals and get them out not wasting valuable time. 1600 people have been released because of the application of the sentencing act. There should be more. I would like to recognize to visitors that are here today that have benefited from the First Step Act and in particular i would like to recognize my constituent entities thank you for joining us could you raisese your hand. Received a life sentence by two minor drug convictions and served 16 years in prison and became one of the first people released under the First Step Act. Given a Second Chance, he and others have joined us today are making our criminal Justice System better and more just. Its worth all of our time and effort that it took to pass the First Step Act. I hope it will inspire all of us to search a little harder forj mepartisan solutions in the department of justice to change the mind and join us. Thank you mr. Chairman. Thank you. Doctor sawyer joined in 1976 as a psychologist at the federal Correctional Institute in 1983 named the chief psychologist psychological services. She said increasing responsibility since then. Previously3as served as directof the bureau of prisons from 1992 to 2003. She was reappointed as the director in august of this year. Would you please rise . Do you solemnly swear the testimony youre about to give us the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so hopsohelp you god . I do. Welcome, and the floor is yours. Good morning chairman graham, Ranking Member feinstein and members of the committee. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss the mission and operations of the bureau of prisons. Ap i thank you for your work with the bureau of her many years. Your support has been in trouble for many decades including the years of tremendous population growth, rapid expansion and opening up of many institution. I also think you and your colleagues for your groundbreaking criminal justice work and bipartisan support in the First Step Act. I look forward to sharing our progress in implementing this critical piece of legislation. Programming to assist those lawabiding citizens has been a cornerstone of. We felt that the reentry journey begins the day they arrive in custody. With the first step ac act act k forward to helping improve the lives of inmates and thereby help keep the i community safer. I was honored for three months ago to be selected by the attorney general to return to lead the bureau and work alongside the finest correctional professionals in the world. I began my career as a psychology intern at one of the prison and helped to include morgan,a associate organ, before my original point is the purest of the director in 1992. A position i held until my retirement in 2003. While much has changed in the 16 years that i was outside of the bureau since i last served as directothe director of the founn of the bureau is still quite down. Weve been challenged by dramatic lows weve experiencedd an insert with a significant budget cuts to follow the tragedy of 9 11 when the shift from the focus to shift came from crime to terrorism and our budget suffered severely after that appear to. Over 35,000 staff play criticala Critical Role in the criminal Justice System and did the great work every day goes largely unseen by the general public. It is inherently dangerous work particularly at the highest security institutions were the most dangerous inmates serve as a responsibility we take very seriously. Cu unfortunately, weve experienced Staff Shortages that make our job even more difficult. In my first 12 weeks, i have placed an emphasis on killing almost 3,000 vacancies nationwide. Since returning as director, ive mobilized the overview to identify areas of strength and weakness and have identified three significant areas that need this. One is staffing, when his training in the third is anew ts in every commitment to the basic practice. Our system is the largest inta e Nation Housing roughly 176,000 inmates across the entire bureau in this return to the bedrock of the corrections is critical to ensure that our staff nationwide are following the policies and procedures that keep staff, inmates and the public safe. The bureau nationwide also continues to face dangerous Security Threats from the introduction of contraband. Illicit narcotics and contraband cell phones are some of the chief threats, the use of drones to drop contraband on prison grounds is an ongoing problems that continues to evolve. Weve deployed contraband technologies and we continue to leverage the new technologies and cuttingedge solutions to effectively detect and interdict prison contraband. The aging infrastructure is another concern. Almost half of prisons over 30yearsold and date back to over 80yearsold and some to the earliest periods of correction. Prison facilities are subjected to heavier than normal wear since they are continuously used 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and this aging infrastructure affects security, as Critical Systems sustain wear and tear as well as premature deterioration. The implementation of the First Step Act is the priority for the bureau of prisons and im pleased to report we have made great progress. Weve updated the policies and implementing the requirements od the act. We are looking closely with the department of justice and independent review committee on the risks and Needs Assessment that it requires. We listened to the important comments from the interested stakeholders from victims to a broad array and the statutory timelines in the act or very formidable. But im proud to say the bureau and the department of the deadline particularly the release of the new risk and Needs Assessment system and we continue to remain focused on the full and balanced implementation of the First Step Act. Ha this concludes my statement and i would be happy to answer any questions that you may have. Thank you very much. As i indicated in my statement, i want to talk about the death of mr. Jeffrey epstein. Do you concur with the opinion that it was a suicide . That was the finding ofr. The coroner. Do you have any evidence to suggest otherwise . I do not. How could this have happened . Unfortunately, the death and the whole situation are under the investigation of the fbi and Inspector Generals Office and im not at liberty to discuss the specifics ofsi the case. I discuss issues around institutional operations, but i cant specifically talk about that particular issue. With the case this highprofile, theres got to be the major malfunction of the system or criminal enterprise to allow this to happen. So are you looking at both come is the fbi looking at those . The fbi is involved in smoking, yes. Do we have people in custody today in this highprofile nature and have we done anything to address this since mr. Epstein stepped . We take every life very seriously. A high profile prisoner is no more significant in terms of our operations than the average in a that comes our way. Highprofile and somebody on a suicidere watch. I have to explai explain a se watch system if i may. I cant talk about epstein tht we have differenbutwe have difff response if we identify those that have suicidal thinking, and i came in as a psychologist and worked with a lot of suicidal inmates and was awarded the facility. I know how difficult it is to always predict who is suicidal and who is not. One is we have a suicide watch operation placement. Its a very difficult setting where everything is stripped from the room except the mattress. They get a course down to where that cannot be twisted in any way they can hang themselves from it. They have one mattress and one blanket and are watched constantly. Theres nothing else in the room. Was mr. Epstein on suicide watch . Yes he was but the average time iss about 24 hours because it is a stark and depressing situation. Ge we then move into another tier r tier of observation which is psychological observation. Did that happen in this case . I cant speak specifically of ensuring this so you understand the procedure. They then can move another tier which is psychological observation where they get their clothing back into the air in a more normalized setting. They are watched and scrutinized every moment of the day but its a more normal environment do they have roommates . They do not when they are on suicide watch because they are being watched continuously. Did mr. Epstein have a roommate . Though he did not. Psychologists see them routinely and interview them repeatedly and once it is determined that the threat of suicide seems to have passed within the inmates can be returned back to open population. Well, clearly it didnte work here, so we will await the report because all of the victim said mr. Epstein have had their hearts ripped out and will never see justice. One was paroled alleviated from the system . I became director in 92 and it was already gone for new cases. The old cases had to move onto this was like the late 80s or early 90s. You have to ask congress. It c was the bodies here that me the decision. Do you have any recommendations as to whether or not we should look at reinstituting parole at the federal level . I was encouraged by the First Step Act. How would it be different than parole plaques it would be different in one respect, the respect i was going to comment on is they gave him instead to want to do well to get involved in programs and to do positive things because they solve a benefit isaw the benefiy could earn earlier release from prison for sure. If the hearing was favorable. For the firstt step act has done is offer new incentives to want to perform well and want to engage in programs because we have a lot of programs out there for the past many years and the numbers enrolled were never as high as we were hoping for because a lot of times they thought they didnt see a benefit for them to the first setback incentivized inmates to want to improve themselves and move forward. What would give the most flexibility in terms of deciding who to release if somebody has been 25 or 30 years on a 40 or 50 year sentence, would it be different than the first step . It allows the group of people to interview him and made periodically with different points in their career and institutions and they would look at the progress and how theyve done somehow theyve benefited and whether they would have recidivism in the future. Should we reinstate parole at the federal level . We would be happy to take a step back and look we would be happy to review that. Thank you mr. Chairman. On november 17, the New York Times published a story called hazing humiliation, care for working while female in the federal prison. Now, given the fact come and i wrote this in a letter inan the other of last year that the bureau has been onn notice since 2010 and it was clear at that time of sufficient steps were not taken to protect female guards and i requested that the department of justice investigate the failure to adequately address the harassment of female guards and ask that they look into the situation. What is the situation today and what has been done to address this issue . When you have women, and im obviously a Woman Working in the system for 30 years now, when you have women with mails you have a lot of knuckleheads in thathe constitution. Just as a woman on a metro car you have to be careful that someone is and when to move up and try to touch or you walk down the street and get cat calls from workers on the side. They are all over the place in terms of the way men treat women. There are going to be times when the inmates behave very inappropriately to the female staff and female staff need to stand up boldly and avarice. Thaddress that. The problem with the Sexual Harassment issues that troubled me greatly is when the female staff did not feel the male raunterparts were coming to their assistance. Thats where we dropped the ball in the bureau. We cant always control the behavior of inmates because they are an institution. You put them in special housing for little while, they come back, but the part of this that angered me tremendously as when the female staff said the male staff for not stepping up to help them so thats where the attention has been with educating all of our staff out there that we are all colleagues and me to b need to be treated professionally and it is never okay tois allow any one to disrespect our other colleagues. We now have different if we hold the rest of the staff accountable. With me ask you this question. Today do managers separate a female correctional staff officer from a senior officer who made sexual comments and propositions . Whenever we become aware of its traditional date ofer a thrt assessment and determine whether or not those individuals can continue to Work Together in the same environment and if there is any concern, then they are separated. What exactly has been done to remedy that situation . How many have you separated and what have you done a i dont have the numbers but we can get them to you. Weve increased the penalties on the inmates behave that way and weve educated our staff in terms of thehe Inappropriate Conduct and if we find male or female Staff Members we will take actionn on those as the situation is investigate investd take appropriate action because that is unacceptable. I would like to see the documentation of what you have done in that regard. So i would request that now i served for six years and decent sentences and got into the proles who ran the womens prison and a so i know a little bit about prisons and ive been in a large number, every one in california as a matter of fact. I am concerned about this on the federal level. I think that it is vague and imprecise and i would like to know exactly what has happened and what has been done to remedy the situation and if you can provide that to me i would be very grateful. I share your concern and we will get that information over. Before i ask questions i want to thank the people that supported the First Step Act for coming here to the Due Process Institute into the prison loca locals. Before i get to the questions about the First Step Act, i want to comment because some critics of the First Step Act have noted the case of Joel Francisco a prisoner of new jersey released as a result of the adjustment in the way that croaking debate coach cocaine sentences are [inaudible] in october he was arrested for firstdegree murder. He would have gotten out of prison even without the First Step Act is that correct and would you agree that the First Step Act will help prevent crimes like this in the future by steering more prisoners away from future criminal conduct . I would hope so, sir. In regards to the act in portland i want to compliment the people at the prison where senator durbin and i visited a couple of months ago. What i get from them is a real good faith effort to carry out so my question is since the First Step Act seeks to reduce recidivism among the nonviolence of this, Congress P