Judge to rule soon in Tamms inmate-hearings matter

BENTON -- A federal judge says he'll decide within weeks whether Illinois prison inmates should get formal hearings before being transferred to the state's only supermax lockup.

U.S. District Judge G. Patrick Murphy heard testimony Wednesday in Benton from the state's corrections chief, Michael Randle, in a lawsuit dating to 2000 by three dozen inmates. Murphy says he'll rule by Jan. 1.

Murphy has presided over a string of lawsuits involving the Tamms Correctional Center in southern Illinois' Alexander County for nearly a decade.

At issue is whether conditions at Tamms are so harsh they amount to added punishment worth review by a panel of prison officials before inmates are sent there.

About 225 inmates are held at Tamms, all in solitary confinement.