Jails a COVID-19 ‘tinderbox,’ Sacramento defenders tell high court in plea for early releases
Sacramento County’s jails are a public health “tinderbox” that could further threaten the community in the middle of a worsening pandemic say county public defenders who are demanding the state’s high court force a hearing on the early release of inmates there.
“The crisis worsens, the lower court pays no heed and the intervention of this Court is urgent,” attorneys argued in the filing this week to the California State Supreme Court and obtained by The Sacramento Bee, saying state and local authorities “have placed Sacramento inmates in peril” and that people held in the county’s jails have been ignored by Sacramento’s judiciary.
For months, Sacramento County Public Defender Steven Garrett has called for Sacramento judges to reduce the jail population at the county’s downtown Main Jail and at Rio Cosumnes Correctional Center near Elk Grove to single-cell occupancy during the coronavirus pandemic.
“The superior court has refused to act and the jail system remains a tinderbox risking not only petitioners’ lives, but the lives of law enforcement, medical personnel, jail staff, attorneys, court personnel and the community at large,” the attorneys wrote. “Continued inaction threatens to destabilize emergency infrastructure across the community.”
Attorneys filed the petition on behalf of medically vulnerable inmates whose health and lives attorneys argue are at risk amid what they say are unsafe and substandard conditions in the county’s jails.
They argue the numbers of inmates in custody in two-bunk jail cells and barracks-style dormitories make physical distancing nearly impossible; say access to hygiene and sanitary products is limited and, even with the release of hundreds of inmates from county custody in the months since the pandemic crisis reached Sacramento jail cells, say more needs to be done to reduce the numbers of people behind bars.
About 2,500 inmates were housed in the county’s downtown Main Jail and Rio Cosumnes Correctional Center near Elk Grove as of late June - a decrease of 1,200 from the start of the pandemic, attorneys say in the filing. That number should be temporarily capped at 1,800, they argue, to curb the virus’ spread.
“Containment is impossible unless the court takes steps to reduce the population,” the attorneys argued. “The infectious nature of COVID-19 can quickly overwhelm jail medical staff,” they continued, saying hospitals would have to pick up the slack to treat the sick in custody. “By allowing the jail system to operate at single-cell capacity, the court can save lives in and out of the jail.
Attorneys claim community support for more jail releases and the latest call comes amid deepening concern over the spread of COVID-19 in the state’s jails and prisons including recent outbreaks at the Placer County Jail in Auburn and the state prisons in Susanville, Chino and at San Quentin State Prison where COVID-19-positive inmates this week declared a hunger strike to protest conditions there.
Meantime, counties from Sacramento to San Diego are seeing a dramatic resurgence of the viral contagion forcing public health clampdowns of indoor dining and most official celebrations just as the Independence Day weekend begins.
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