Did Idaho Gov. Butch Otter get CCA out of jail cheap?

[IDemo]

Remember the "Gladiator School"? It's Idaho's largest penitentiary, located near Boise. It gained its name after becoming an extremely violent place under the care of CCA - the Corrections Corporation of America. Along with failing to monitor and control the violence levels, CCA was accused of fraudulently billing the state for hours never worked. They were booted out of the state last year, but now questions are being raised by Democratic gubernatorial candidate A. J. Balukoff about Otter's role in gaining a sweet settlement for CCA, one of his donors. GladiatorGate, anyone?

Here is a release this morning from Balukoff:

BALUKOFF DEMANDS GOVERNOR RELEASE ALL CCA RECORDS IMMEDIATELY

BOISE, Idaho—Democratic gubernatorial candidate A.J. Balukoff today demanded that Gov. Otter
immediately make public all records and communications related to the Corrections Corporation of
America (CCA), after a news story linked Gov. Otter’s top staff to the "sweetheart deal" the state made
with CCA, a major Otter campaign donor accused of defrauding the state.

"Gov. Otter has said several times that he had nothing to do with the sweetheart deal cut with his
campaign donor, CCA, that let the company off the hook for only $1 million when it's possible CCA
defrauded the state for many millions," Balukoff said. "Now we find out that, in fact, Gov. Otter's top
staff was directly communicating with CCA officials over the most minute details of that settlement
agreement. Does the governor expect the public to believe his staff was not reporting to him about the
biggest scandal in his administration? This news story shows that Gov. Otter's claim that he had no
involvement in the CCA settlement was a bald-faced lie."

Emails show that Otter aide Mark Warbis, liaison between Otter's office and the Board of Corrections,
Otter's chief of staff David Hensley and chief counsel Tom Perry, and Corrections Director Brent
Reinke were directly involved in negotiating the $1 million settlement with CCA. [source:
http://www.idahostatesman.com/2014/10/16/3430976_emails-show-otters-staffinvolved.html?sp=/99/1687/&rh=1]

An audit found that CCA over-billed the state for more than 26,000 hours never worked in just one year
of the 10 years of CCA's $29 million annual contract to manage the state prison south of Boise. CCA
has given $20,000 to Otter's campaign war chest. The FBI is now investigating the case.

"The voters of Idaho are seeing the true face of Butch Otter, and discovering that he has become just
another politician who's beholden to his big campaign donors at the expense of the people he's supposed
to defend as governor," Balukoff said. "We already knew that his administration misled the public,
claiming for months there was an investigation taking place when there was never any investigation. The
responsible next step for Gov. Otter to take is to release to the media and the public all records and
communications related to the Corrections Corporation of America."

"Gov. Otter has bungled this debacle badly, and now there's very good reason to suspect criminal
wrongdoing at some level in state government," Balukoff added. "It got so stinky the FBI had to step in.
But voters should not have to wait until the results of the ongoing FBI investigation become public--that
could take months."

"If Gov. Otter wants voters to believe that he deserves a third term in office, he has a responsibility to
show voters just exactly what has been going on in this affair, and he should answer all questions the
media and public have about it."

[Kelvin Mace]

1. It's not that people can be bought that shocks me,

it's that they can be bought so cheaply.

$20,000 bought Otter and got them a $28 million discount.

[gvstn]

2. It has always amazed me the damage a politician

will do for such small amounts of money. "You want me to waste $10 million of taxpayer money? That will cost you $5,000." Corrupt and bad at math.