PRISONERS
OF PROFIT
Corp. as an inducement to help
the company win contracts.
As Davis ultimately pleaded,
the company had for four years
supplied its vans to transport
HUFFINGTON
11.03.13
spread evidence of earlier undisclosed gifts to state lawmakers,
including free rides and dinners.
Correctional Services Corp. agreed
to a settlement in which the com-
“Children are choked and slammed head first into
concrete walls, their arms and fingers are bent back
and twisted to inflict pain for infractions as minor
as failing to follow an order to stand up.”
her to and from the state capitol in Albany free of charge. In
exchange, she helped the company secure contracts to operate
halfway houses in New York City.
Davis pleaded guilty to accepting
bribes in connection with Correctional Services Corp. and a
scheme involving a separate nonprofit group. She was sentenced
to three months in jail and nearly
five years’ probation, and agreed
to never again seek public office.
At the time of her 2003 pleading, Correctional Services Corp.
no longer had contracts in New
York. But an investigation by New
York’s Temporary State Commission on Lobbying found wide-
pany admitted no wrongdoing but
paid a $300,000 fine for failing to
document the gifts.
It was then the highest fine ever
assessed by the commission, besting a $250,000 fine doled out to
Donald Trump and his business
associates for failing to disclose
money spent lobbying against new
casinos in upstate New York.
A CLEAN RECORD
Even as the evidence mounted
that Correctional Services Corp.
had a tendency to land in trouble,
Florida did not hesitate to give the
company new contracts.
Indeed, as the company pursued a fresh round of contracts in
2003, none of its scrapes with authorities in other states emerged