Former University of Central Arkansas Chief of Staff Jack Gillean was released from an Arkansas prison more than three weeks before his approved parole date as part of a program to ease prison crowding, records show.
Gillean, 59, was sent to prison in December for commercial burglary as a result of a test-cheating scandal at the Conway university.
Gillean, also a former deputy attorney general for the state, had been sentenced to three years in prison, but in April the Arkansas Parole Board approved a parole date of June 16 or thereafter for him, depending on his ability to obtain an approved residence plan.
According to vinelink.com, a website aimed at helping victims track offenders, the Arkansas Department of Correction released Gillean on May 26 under the Emergency Powers Act. The website does not say where Gillean is living. He formerly lived in Hot Springs.
In late February the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported that the Board of Corrections had approved the early release of 755 parole-approved inmates from state prisons under the act. The board has used the measure for nearly three decades to decrease the prison population of nonviolent offenders and clear space for those convicted of violent crimes, the article said.
At that time, Dina Tyler, Arkansas Community Correction spokesman, said the Emergency Powers Act has been invoked every 90 days for the past two decades "without fail." The act resulted in the early release of more than 24,000 state inmates between 2004 and 2014, the Democrat-Gazette reported.
In an email Thursday evening, Correction Department spokesman Solomon Graves confirmed that the Emergency Powers Act "is what triggered his [Gillean's] early release."
"The [law] gives the Board of Corrections the ability to adjust parole/transfer eligibility dates in order to address prison overcrowding," Graves added.
Gillean also was fined $35,000 and given 120 months of probation after he was convicted in March 2014 of commercial burglary.
Conditions after his release include completion of an employment plan, abstinence from drugs and alcohol, no association with UCA, periodic drug testing and no contact with a former UCA student who was involved in the burglaries with Gillean. Gillean also will have community service hours, at his parole officer's discretion, Graves has said.
Gillean was charged after the now-former UCA student, Cameron Stark, told police that Gillean had willingly given him school-issued keys and a key card with the knowledge that Stark planned to use them to enter professors' offices and steal tests.
Gillean resigned from his UCA position days after Stark gave university police Gillean's keys. Stark was given immunity and later testified against Gillean.
Gillean's past jobs also have included one as executive assistant for criminal justice when Jim Guy Tucker was governor.
State Desk on 06/10/2016