Opinion ID: 1691337
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Statutory Authority to Grant Work Release Privileges Outside County of Confinement.

Text: The sheriff last contends the district court lacked statutory authority to grant work release privileges beyond Linn County in violation of the sheriff's own rules. In support of this contention, the sheriff presents several arguments. First, he maintains that allowing a defendant to complete the work release program through employment outside the county will dramatically increase the sheriff's administrative burdens regarding (1) supervision of inmates on the job, (2) collection of inmate wages or salaries, (3) furnishing or paying for transportation of inmates to their employment, and (4) investigating alleged inmate violations of work release agreements at the place of employment. Second, he warns that to allow Renfer out-of-county employment in this case will open the door to absurd results. He cautions that in the wake of an adverse decision, a district court could grant an inmate employed in Council Bluffs work release privileges in Dubuque. The conditions of this work release privilege would be impossible for the sheriffs involved to administer. Third, he argues the language of section 356.32 clearly implies the legislature intended that courts should generally restrict work release privileges to the county in which an inmate is sentenced and confined. The sheriff further argues that the court's discretion under section 356.32 to grant out-of-county work release privileges is limited to certain and conditioned circumstances. He fails to state what these circumstances are, but indicates the instant case is not one of them. He also believes that, before a court can grant out-of-county work release privileges, the statute necessarily implies there must first be an unequivocal agreement between the respective sheriffs. Finally, the sheriff analogizes the power of the district court in the instant circumstances to the limited power the court possesses in the state correctional scheme. He maintains that once the individual is sentenced and placed in the custody of corrections officials, ... the authority and jurisdiction of the court terminates except for very limited and special circumstances as provided for by statute. The fact that the court has sentenced an individual does not confer upon the court the authority to review any program into which the individual enters, any facility to which the individual is committed, or any claim or complaint the individual makes known to the sentencing court. There is nothing in the statutes governing work release privileges that restricts the district court's authority to allow work release privileges outside the county of confinement. The district court's authority in this respect is broad. Section 356.32 envisions that the district court will grant such privileges. This section allows the district court by order to authorize the sheriff to whom the prisoner is committed, to contract with a sheriff of another county, for the employment of the prisoner in the other's county, and while so employed to be in the other's custody, but in other respects to be and continue subject to the commitment. Iowa Code § 356.32. We, however, do not view this section as the exclusive procedure for allowing out-of-county work release privileges. Rather, we view it as an accommodation to the sheriff if the sheriff deems such an arrangement desirable. For example, here, the sentencing order was broad enough to permit out-of-county work release privileges. Under the order, the sheriff was authorized to allow Renfer to work outside the county without any contractual arrangement with the sheriff of the county in which Renfer was employed. If the sheriff preferred such a contractual arrangement, he could have asked the district court to authorize it. The district court implicitly recognized this option when it used the following language in its April 28 order: IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that if the Linn County sheriff deems it necessary, he is authorized to contract with the sheriff of another county for the employment of the defendant in the other's county, all as authorized by section 356.32 of the Iowa Code. (Emphasis added.) Our interpretation of section 356.32 does not adversely affect the sheriff's control of, and supervision over, any inmate with out-of-county work release privileges. Iowa Code section 356.26 provides that [a]ll released prisoners shall remain, while absent from the jail, in the legal custody of the sheriff, and shall be subject, at any time, to being taken into custody and returned to the jail. We have interpreted this provision to mean that an inmate while on work release remains in the constructive custody of the sheriff. See State v. Eads, 234 N.W.2d 108, 111-12 (Iowa 1975) (when prisoner, while on work release from county jail, left for Colorado without permission there was departure from legal or constructive custody of sheriff constituting crime of escape). Finally, we think the hazards that the sheriff warns will occur as a result of our decision are slight at best. We doubt that district court judges, in their discretion, will routinely arrange work release for local defendants in remote counties. And, if for some reason a judge may deem such an arrangement is appropriate, section 356.32 provides a mechanism to carry out such an arrangement without affecting the inmate's incarceration during nonworking hours. Section 356.32 evinces legislative recognition of judges' need for flexibility in providing work release privileges in situations in which the county line has no practical meaning.