Request By:
Mr. Bill Stephens
Supervisor
County Fee Systems
Department of Finance
Capitol Annex
Frankfort, Kentucky
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
Your questions are telescoped into two short paragraphs, which read:
"If a prisoner is transferred from a county jail to the hospital for treatment, does KRS 441.010 as amended by House Bill 50 of the extraordinary session of the legislature provide for reimbursing the sheriff or jailer for his mileage in transporting the prisoner to the hospital? If a mileage allowance should be paid what should the rate be? While at the hospital is there any provision to pay the sheriff for guarding the prisoner or does that function remain a responsibility of the jailer? If so, how much per hour?
"The Department of Finance is currently paying a person $5.00 per hour to guard a prisoner while at the hospital. This payment, as far as I can tell, is pursuant to KRS 29A.180. Do you see any justification in KRS 29A.180 to pay a guard $5.00 per hour for guarding a prisoner in a hospital?"
Assuming that the prisoner is not lodged in a city jail or in an urban-county facility, the sheriff in the county where the trial is to be held would have to transport him. KRS 441.500.
Assuming that the prisoner is in the county jail and is an indigent under KRS 441.010, as amended by H.B. 50 [Ch. 21, Ex. Ess. 1979], that statute provides only for medical care costs. There is nothing in the entire statute that suggests that "medical care" includes transportation costs. Under these circumstances, the sheriff would have to bill, through a documented claim, the county for reimbursement of actual and necessary expenses incurred in the transportation of the prisoner. See KRS 67.080 and 67.083(3)(e). Also see
Barkley v. Gatewood, 285 Ky. 179, 147 S.W.2d 373 (1941); and
Funk v. Milliken, Ky., 317 S.W.2d 499 (1958).
The responsibility for providing security for the prisoner at the hospital also rests with fiscal court of the county of trial, including the payment of the guards for their services. KRS 29A.180 relates to transportation of jurors and the furnishing of security for the trial. It has no application here.