A state Senate committee is expected to vote next week on Governor Greitens’ nominee for Missouri Department of Corrections director. Anne Precythe would lead the department facing dozens of lawsuits filed by prison workers claiming things like harassment, humiliation, groping, poisoning and assault by supervisors and co-workers to engage in sexual acts.
Anne Presythe – Photo courtesy of North Carolina Department of Public Safety
“I come from a state where we enforced a zero tolerance policy and that, to me, is very important, whether we’re talking about how we’re dealing with our offender population or whether we’re talking about how we’re dealing with staff,” says Precythe. “This is 2017. We should be conducting business in a professional manner.”
An investigation by the Pitch.com says the state has spent more than $7 million during a four year period to settle some of these cases.
“About 97% of the people in our institutions are coming back to our communities and if we are not turning out a better product, than what came to us, then we’re not being successful at what we’re supposed to do. That comes from the way staff role models with the offender population. Every single one of them. I’ve got to paint the big picture,” says Presythe.
Presythe was the Director of Community Corrections at the North Carolina Department of Public Safety. She served in that position since March 2013.
Prior to that, she spent six years as an administrator at that state’s Department of Corrections. Presythe attended the University of North Carolina at Wilmington from 1983 to 1987, where she majored in Psychology.
The committee is also considering Carol Comer as Natural Resources director, Sarah Steelman for Office of Administration, Chris Chinn as the head of the State Agriculture department and Andrew Juden as Public Safety director.
