Delay Sought on Warden’s Confirmation

Two days into the new administration of Gov. Gray Davis, officials Tuesday asked the Senate Rules Committee to postpone a confirmation hearing for the warden at troubled Pelican Bay State Prison.

The committee had scheduled a hearing today on Robert L. Ayers Jr., who was appointed warden one year ago by former Gov. Pete Wilson. Committee aides said the delay will be granted.

Robert B. Presley, Davis’ cabinet-level secretary of the Youth and Correctional Agency, said Tuesday he asked for the postponement because officials believe Ayers is a “victim of incorrect information.”

Presley, a former state senator with expertise in prison construction and corrections department policies, said the new Davis administration decided against going ahead with the Ayers hearing until more facts are known about a continuing FBI investigation at the prison and a separate probe by the Del Norte County district attorney.

He said experience has shown that if unsubstantiated charges are aired at confirmation hearings, “things can get totally out of hand. We want to make sure the information is exactly correct.”

Presley declined to elaborate, but said top correctional officials think alleged brutality at the maximum-security Pelican Bay prison on the state’s far north coast appears to have occurred before Wilson appointed Ayers.

“Most of [the problems] occurred before he went up there, but he is getting tagged with it,” Presley said. “We think there is some erroneous information that we need time to get straightened out.”

But at least one senator, Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles), who is not on the committee but has been a severe critic of prison management, was having none of it.

He said he opposes Ayers’ confirmation and said Davis should go outside the Department of Corrections to find a new warden for Pelican Bay. “I don’t think it would be appropriate for us to reward someone at this institution with that [warden] position,” Polanco said.

Pelican Bay is home to some of California’s most violent criminals. It is also one of the most notorious and allegedly brutal prisons in California.

The prison is dogged by allegations that guards used unnecessary violence against prisoners. The instances appear to have occurred in the early and mid-1990s.

A recent investigation by The Times reported that Department of Corrections investigators were stopped short when they tried to examine a group of guards suspected of abusing prisoners.

Ayers is an up-from-the-ranks former guard who held many managerial and supervisorial posts in the department. He was warden of New Folsom Prison near Sacramento and chief deputy warden at Pelican Bay from December 1994 through September 1997.

Like most other gubernatorial appointees, Ayers can serve one year without Senate confirmation. But his deadline is Jan. 15, said a Rules Committee source.

If Davis decides to withdraw the nomination, if only to stop Ayers’ time from running out, Ayers can remain indefinitely as acting warden, the source said.