Colorado Ships 240 Inmates To Oklahoma, First Transfer Since 2004

Friday, December 15th 2006, 5:59 am

By: News On 6

DENVER (AP) -- With 20-thousand beds in publicly owned and private prisons are at 99 percent of capacity, Colorado decides to make its first out-of-state transfer of inmates in two years.

Colorado Department of Corrections spokeswoman Alison Morgan says 240 medium- and minimum-security inmates arrived safely at the North Fork Correctional Facility in Sayre, Oklahoma, yesterday. Prison officials didn't know how long the inmates would remain there, but said more would be transferred to out of state prisons.

Morgan said nearly one-thousand inmates sentenced to state prisons are backlogged and housed in county jails across the state.

The state, which is experiencing a shortage in prison cells because of longer sentences and budget cuts, is in the midst finding ways to build new prisons or expand existing facilities.