Workers at 2 California prisons have coronavirus; 4 inmates at Mule Creek being observed

Two state prison employees have been confirmed as testing positive for coronavirus — one at California State Prison, Sacramento, outside Folsom and another at San Quentin — officials said Friday.

So far, no inmates have tested positive for COVID-19, corrections officials said.

“If at any point it is determined there is a potential exposure to the incarcerated population, the agency will restrict movement at the institution while a contact investigation is underway and quarantine those deemed at-risk for an observation period,” the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said.

The disclosure comes as officials and attorneys for the inmates are wrestling with how best to handle the coronavirus crisis and fears that the disease could spread rapidly throughout an overcrowded state prison system.

At a court hearing Friday, convened by telephone because courthouses have been closed, U.S. District Judge Kimberly J. Mueller ordered the creation of a task force of inmate lawyers, CDCR officials and others to discuss how to address the rapidly evolving crisis.

The task force is to report back to the judge by next Friday.

Michael Bien, lead attorney for inmates requiring mental health care under the landmark Coleman case, said the issue is a “crisis.”

“The staff and the prisoners are all in a dangerous situation and CDCR needs to address the crisis,” Bien said. “I call it like a cruise ship without staterooms, and with a staff that goes on and off three times a day.

“This is a situation that needs to be addressed.”

The state already has made a number of policy changes in how inmates are being handled. Documents filed in federal court in Sacramento show all inmates received by the system are asked if they have a cough, a fever or difficulty breathing and have their temperature taken.

Any inmates who answer yes or have a temperature above 100.4 degrees Fahrenheit are isolated. All others who answer no to the questions are quarantined for 14 days.

Prison hospitals suspend admissions

In addition, the Department of State Hospitals has suspended the admission of inmates needing mental health care for 30 days, a move that inmate attorneys say goes too far.

“If you’re having a heart attack, they’re going to send you (to a hospital),” Bien said. “And if you’re having a psychotic episode they’re not.

“There’s still a shortage of beds, so taking these beds offline is dangerous, in my opinion, and the suicide rate is at astronomical levels in CDCR. This is a stressful event, so we are going to see an increase in psychiatric illness because it’s scary for people.”

Bien suggested that the prisons, which are about 131 percent of capacity, could reduce population further by releasing aged and infirm inmates who are at risk from the disease and would pose little threat on the outside.

Prison Law Office Executive Director Don Specter agreed, telling the judge that reducing the density of prison populations is critical.

“To me, that’s the overriding issue,” Specter said. “Because mental health programs don’t matter if people aren’t alive to receive it,” he said.

In addition to state hospitals suspending acceptance of inmates needing psychiatric or mental health care, the court-appointed special master monitoring care inside the prisons filed court documents Friday stating that in-person monitoring and tours of the prisons has been suspended until April 6.

Concerns about the impact of coronavirus spreading in the prisons also are affecting staffers who are worried that not enough precautions are being taken to protect them.

Mule Creek inmates under quarantine

One corrections department source said Thursday that four inmates at Mule Creek State Prison near Ione have been quarantined because they developed coronavirus-like symptoms, but that the inmates were still being allowed to use the yard by themselves every 72 hours and that they were being housed near other inmates.

The source also said that, until recently, workers were worried that corrections officials had continued to transport inmates between prisons without any medical safeguards to prevent a spread of the virus.

The source, who was not authorized to speak on behalf of the department, provided information to The Sacramento Bee on the condition of anonymity.

Corrections officials did not respond to requests for comment Thursday or Friday on whether inmates at Mule Creek were being held over suspicions of having the disease. They also did not respond to queries about how many inmates statewide have been isolated because of concerns they might have the disease, how many have been tested for the disease or how many had been transported between prisons since Gov. Gavin Newsom’s state of emergency declaration on March 4.

CDCR did say it has since severely limited the movement of inmates between institutions.

“CDCR has taken the step of limiting transfers of inmates between CDCR facilities to only the following scenarios: removal to and from restricted housing units; transfer from reception centers after being assessed by medical and other staff; for medical and mental health needs; conservation camps, Male Community Reentry Program, Custody to Community Transitional Reentry Program; Alternative Custody Program; Modified Community Correctional Facilities due to deactivation efforts; and ordered court appearances,” the agency said.

Officials also have halted acceptance of out-of-state parolees and inmates to California for 30 days.

Families on outside concerned

The growing coronavirus crisis also has left family members of inmates concerned about the fate of their loved ones in crowded conditions.

Vanessa Ashford said she hasn’t spoken to her husband, Mark, since Tuesday, when he called from the Correctional Training Facility at Soledad and told her he had “a really bad cough and a runny nose.”

The next day she heard from a friend that her husband had been taken to a medical unit and placed in isolation, she said.

Ashford said she managed to reach his counselor by phone. “I said, ‘have you tested him specifically for coronavirus,’ and she said no,” Ashford said.

Her husband has a release date of September on a four-year sentence for evading police, she said, and had been housed in a dormitory-style unit with 200 other inmates packed in bunk-beds. The crowded conditions worry her given how coronavirus spreads.

That prison is currently at 154 percent of capacity, CDCR says.

Corrections officials have said the only confirmed coronavirus cases so far are at San Quentin and the facility often called “new Folsom,” but she worries that a lack of tests overall may mean there are many inmates who are infected and don’t yet know it.

“I haven’t gotten to talk to him at all,” she said from Gilroy, where she lives. “We drove down there yesterday and tried to get past the gate.

“The guard said, ‘I can promise you there’s no coronavirus there or I wouldn’t be here,’” she said.

This story was originally published March 20, 2020 at 10:38 AM.