SAN QUENTIN Battle brewing over Death Row

[Sequoia]

Many in Marin oppose plan to build $220 million facility

Richard Wade Farley sat at a table over a chess board with a few of his San Quentin prison buddies and shrugged at the prospect of a new Death Row.

The balding, bespectacled 56-year-old killer doesn't seem to care much about the battle that is about to be waged over what to do with San Quentin and its 629 condemned inmates.

The state Department of Corrections was given the go-ahead by the Legislature last year to build a new $220 million Death Row on the grounds of San Quentin, to the dismay of Marin County supervisors, politicians and real estate agents who would like the prison to just go away.

A public forum will be held this evening at the Marin County Civic Center, and comments on the environmental report for the new building, capable of holding 1,408 inmates, are being solicited in preparation for a hearing next week.

But the man who gunned down seven people during a 1988 rampage at ESL Corp. in Sunnyvale said new digs won't change his prospects.

"This is my retirement plan," Farley said Monday, indicating the tiered cell block and metal grating separating him from his questioners during a press tour of Death Row. "I don't think anyone is going to commute my sentence. "

Farley is a problem for prison officials, not because of his behavior, but because he and a growing number of murderers like him must be managed and taken care of for, in most cases, the rest of their lives. The Death Row population is increasing by some 30 inmates a year, and only a tiny percentage of them actually are put to death.

With too many inmates in a crumbling and insecure environment, everyone agrees that something must be done. The problem is, a great many people in Marin County are against what prison officials propose to do.

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http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/10/27/BAGL39GQPF1.DTL

I seem to "recall" one of the reasons the state dumped Davis was because of his prison buddies and everyone crying about the money for this when we can't even take care of things the voters want. But Ahnold himself has his own agenda and special interests when it comes to this place. My head hurts.