Plug pulled on visitor to women in jail

BROWNSVILLE - Gail Hanson is an unassuming, soft-spoken and deeply Christian woman.

However, she also has an unwavering belief that women in jail should be treated humanely and that they be provided with educational tools and services to improve themselves.

After more than eight years of seeing inmates almost every week, Cameron County Sheriff Omar Lucio has now banned her from visiting, ministering to, and counseling woman in the county jails.

He views her as a threat to the security and stability of the jail system, and said that she is too personally involved with the inmates.

"While spiritual guidance may be helpful, personal involvement and advocacy for inmates is not within the acceptable limits of spiritual guidance and counseling and may foment unnecessary and counter-productive unrest among the jail population," Chief Deputy Gus Reyna Jr. said on Lucio's behalf in a statement to the Herald.

"It may even rise to the level of threatened security breach," he said.

Hanson instead suggests that Lucio is taking her concerns as a personal affront.

"I have never criticized this sheriff or tried to cause any trouble," she said. "I just want to see conditions continue to improve for all inmates to end the cycle of re-incarceration.

"This attitude toward people that you have to control them and lock them up, it's just so sad. People are so paranoid, judgmental and filled with punishment."

Hanson agrees that she has become personally involved with inmates.

"What is wrong with that? I can't separate my ministry from my relationships," she said. "I just don't understand that."

Lucio's relationship with Hanson soured earlier this year when concerns regarding the unmet needs of women came to the forefront, she said. Hanson and others also called for a town meeting to talk about conditions.

Lucio countered that troublemakers and politics were behind the reports. She was advised in March that she would no longer be welcomed.

Still, she was allowed to make several visits. Reyna said she returned when she gave assurances that she would confine herself to "spiritual concerns."

"Recently, the line between counseling and personal involvement has become blurred once again," Reyna wrote on Lucio's behalf last week.