Prisons aren’t generally thought of as the preferred setting for grand social experiments, but a statewide rollout of a desegregation policy that hit Folsom this month is being watched closely from both sides of the bars. First of a two part series from the Folsom Telegraph.

As of Feb. 1, race is no longer playing a primary role in how inmates are grouped to cells at Folsom State Prison. This upends years of an unofficial practice by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to shy away from putting inmates of different races in the same living quarters.

The new policy has been controversial among both inmates and some prison personnel at California’s gang-infested prisons, but advocates hope the state mirrors the progress made in Texas prisons, where a similar policy was implemented in 1991.

How It Came About
In Cnmate’A lawsuit proved the impetus for creation of the policy, said CDCR spokeswoman Terry Thornton.

The inmate claimed his civil rights were violated at a state-run reception center, a designation afforded to 11 out of 33 state prisons that process new inmates coming from county detention.

“We never had a policy on segregating inmates,” Thornton emphasized. But she acknowledged that, “as a mechanism to keep people from killing each other, sometimes those decisions were made” to house inmates of the same race in a cell.

A series of appellate decisions, culminating in a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2005, resulted in mediation that laid the groundwork for the department confronting its unwritten segregation policy.

Thornton said the department conducted extensive research, hired consultants and academics, and looked at other states that had implemented similar programs.

In October 2008, the Sierra Conservation Center in Jamestown and Mule Creek State Prison in Ione were the first institutions to implement the program. The California Medical Center in Vacaville began phasing in the program this past November, while Folsom State Prison became the fourth California institution to enact the program this month.

The Stakes
It’s a late November afternoon inside the stone-gray walls of Folsom State Prison, and the cafeteria is entirely empty.

It’s been five weeks since an Oct. 7 riot erupted in the expansive dining hall, an incident in which race played an incendiary role, say prison officials, and one that sent the institution into an extended segregated lockdown.

The mess hall, a contained space with a sea of bolted-down tables, is a bad place to start trouble, one commander observes. Walled by a chain link fence and flanked by overhead guard posts, prison staff can put down any skirmish with brute efficiency, as they did that volatile October afternoon using pepper spray and blast dispersion grenades. Eight prisoners were hospitalized following the melee.

More than a month later, the prison was still feeling the after-effects as the lockdown was in the process of being gradually lifted. A statewide plan to ensure race doesn’t play a primary role in matching inmates to cells was being met with skepticism by both inmates and prison staff.

Reflecting on the cafeteria fracas that started as a fight between white and black inmates, the commander said staff was anticipating some problems in rolling out the integrated housing program, still weeks away at the time. The tendency here, where gang activity is rife and largely demarcated along racial lines, he explained, is to self-segregate and for some inmates to intentionally provoke violence if their fellow inmates do mix with other races.

It was an ongoing feud between rival gangs that caused an Aug. 8, 2009 riot that left more than 240 inmates injured and destroyed two housing units at the California Institution for Men in Chino, for instance.

That reality isn’t disputed by those responsible for implementing the program, nor is it being ignored, they say.

“I can tell you we’re not going to arbitrarily just shuffle the deck,” said Lt. Anthony Gentile, spokesman for Folsom Prison. “We have to use our best correctional judgment. We’re not just going to place inmates in a situation where there’s going to be a problem.”

janchavarie California, Jail and Prison Conditions

More than 1,500 parolees in Orange County may stop reporting to their parole agents under the same law that is releasing state and county prisoners early. According to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, there are currently 6,406 parolees in Orange County. Of those, 1,719 of them could be eligible for the so-called “non-revocable” parole. Story published in the Orange County Register.

Under non-revocable parole, recently released inmates in the state parole system:

• Would not have to report to a parole officer on a regular basis
• Can’t have their parole revoked by the parole board. Instead, a former prisoner who commits a crime would have to start from scratch in the judicial system
• Can still be searched without a warrant or probably cause by law enforcement officers

In the county’s most populous city, Santa Ana, that means that 338 of the 1,326 parolees currently registered there could be eligible for the new system. In Anaheim, 294 of 1,223 may qualify.

To qualify for the new parole category, inmates must not have a violent or serious felony conviction in their records. Those who are required to register as sex offenders would also not qualify. They must also not be a member of a prison gang. Inmates convicted of crimes such as misdemeanor spousal abuse, vehicle theft, prostitution or embezzlement may qualify.

Under the same law, more than 6,500 state prison inmates are due for early release this year and hundreds of inmates in county jails have already been freed early.

Officials with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said the new system will reform the state’s flawed corrections approach, reducing the number of cases each parole officer handles and allowing them to focus their attention on the most serious offenders. The result, they say: a half-billion-dollar savings to the state by the end of the year.

But local law enforcement – faced with its own budget challenges – oppose the changes. Before Jan. 25, when the new law took effect, all freed state inmates were placed in the parole system. They had to report to a parole officer, keep the officer abreast of travel plans and follow additional rules and restrictions. Any violation of parole could send them quickly back to prison — a decision that was made by a parole board.

Under the new law, those inmates who and deemed “low-risk” may be placed under a non-revocable parole, meaning they can be searched, at any time. But if they break the law or the rules of parole, they are not returned to state prison. Instead, they must be charged and processed through the justice system. The law applies to soon-to-be-released inmates as well as those already reporting to parole officers around the state.

Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas said in the new system may clog local courts with cases that were once handled by the state officials. The new system, Rackauckas said, is not reform, but simply a way to save money. But while the state saves money, the costs will be shifted to local law enforcement.

Non-revocable parole, says Rackauckas, takes away the penalties that released inmates were meant to follow: “It’s a parole that can’t be violated.”

CDCR spokeswoman Terry Thornton counters that the new law reforms a broken system. “I’ve seen someone in state prison on a non-serious offense do eight months, get out on parole, and spend three years back in state prison on parole violations,” she says. “We have to do something about that, too.”

janchavarie CA Orange County, Parole

Sheriff Stan Sniff received the full support of the Riverside County Board of Supervisors today to begin hiring guards and other  personnel needed to staff new cell blocks at the county’s Banning jail. Reported by KESQ News Service.

In a 5-0 vote, the board affirmed that the Sheriff’s Department would have the $12.6 million Sniff requested to fund 142 new positions in fiscal year 2010-11, in addition to roughly $750,000 for hiring in the current fiscal year.

“We’re very pleased with the board’s decision,” the sheriff told City News Service.

The expansion of the Larry D. Smith Correctional Facility is expected to wrap up next month, but many of the personnel needed for security and administrative functions have yet to be hired.

Sniff warned the board twice last year — in May and November — that he was short of the funds necessary to hire people to work in the new facilities. But faced with a then-$50 million — and growing — county budget deficit, the supervisors shied away from new financial commitments.

he $12.6 million in next year’s budget will assure funding to hire 45 sworn law enforcement personnel to work at the jail, 49 non-sworn correctional deputies and 48 “classified” employees, including food service workers, clerks and accountants, according to the sheriff.

He doubted all the money that was approved would be needed and predicted the new jail units would be fully operational in 12 months.

The two-year, $80 million Smith expansion includes 582 inmate beds in three housing units encompassing 173,000 square feet.

With the pending release of some 40,000 convicted felons from state penal facilities — in compliance with a federal judicial panel’s mandate that California’s prison population be reduced for health reasons — opening the new cells can’t come a moment too soon, said Supervisors Jeff Stone and John Benoit.

“We are going to have to have the capacity to house more dangerous criminals that we shouldn’t be responsible for housing in the first place,” Stone said, alluding to expectations that the parolees will offend again.

“We have to make our facilities function as prisons when they’re detention centers,” he said.

Sniff agreed, saying law enforcement officials statewide were preparing for a spike in crime — and greater pressure on local resources.

“It scares all of us, with scarce resources and additional loads being dropped on us,” he said. “The county jail is at the front end of the system. We just don’t have the bed space.”

The sheriff said the county has 3,600 inmate beds available, compared to 6,000 in neighboring Orange County. Some 3,500 prisoners were released before the completion of their jail terms in 2008 due to overcrowding in the county jail system, according to the Sheriff’s Department.

Supervisor Bob Buster wondered whether talk of risks to public safety from recidivism wasn’t “grossly exaggerated” and suggested more money might be diverted to rehabilitation programs and deputies drawn from other areas to staff the jails.

Sniff replied that pulling deputies from the field would leave a gap in patrols assigned to unincorporated communities.

According to the sheriff, in the coming months, he will “laterally” move inmates from older jail units to the new cell blocks, without realizing an immediate net gain in jail space.

The shift will instead give sheriff’s officials a chance to exercise the equipment now in place at Smith, as part of a “warranty” check to ensure all the mechanisms are functioning as promised.

“We can’t just let that stuff sit there and not put a load on it,” he said. “If anything is broken, it needs to be fixed by the people who supplied it.”

janchavarie CA Riverside County, Personnel Issues

The city’s high-risk parolees may soon be subject to additional oversight and receive job training and other assistance intended to prevent them from returning to prison. Story in the San Bernardino Sun.

The new programs, however, would probably not be offered to inmates now being set free early under legislation intended to ease pressure on California’s strained budgets.

“The low-end offenders are being cut loose,” said Kent Paxton, an aide to San Bernardino Mayor Pat Morris.

In San Bernardino County, the Sheriff’s Department has thus far released 404 inmates from its four jails, spokeswoman Arden Wiltshire said. The department has also ended the commitments of 244 offenders who were sentenced to work release or subjected to electronic monitoring.

In addition, some 6,500 state prisoners may be released without being subjected to standard parole requirements.

The Morris administration, working with Cal State San Bernardino personnel and California prison officials, have sought during the past few years to create new programs focused on preventing ex-convicts from re-offending.

The basic idea behind the proposals is that former inmates, who typically leave prison with $200 and a host of personal problems, require various services such as schooling, job training and substance-abuse care to make the jump from felon to reformed citizen.

The ideas have languished, however, because of a lack of money from Sacramento. That could change within the next few months, but prisoners set free under the current early-release push are not likely to be eligible for the new programs. Nonviolent offenders will not be subject to same parole requirements as more dangerous inmates.

What that means is low-risk offenders are being released from jail at a time when it’s difficult enough for those without criminal records to find jobs. In San Bernardino, unemployment is around 19 percent, Paxton said.

Paxton said city officials have met with San Bernardino Employment and Training Agency personnel to discuss how $200,000 in federal funding could be used to keep ex-inmates out of the ranks of unemployed.

“They’re actually going to be using those funds to find employers who would be willing to help hire or train those guys,” Paxton said. “They’ve got parolees coming into their office every day.”

“Not many employers are ready to take a chance on people who admit to a conviction on their job applications,” said Kim Carter, the director of the nonprofit Time for Change Foundation. “You can see time and time again when we’ve had employment fairs for people who are coming home from prison, trying to find a job, the employer participation is very low.”

The new programs that could soon be enacted to deal with high-risk parolees are built around Day Reporting Centers.

Cal State San Bernardino and the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation are on the brink of a $1.2 million deal to create such a facility in San Bernardino, said Carolyn Eggleston, director of the campus’ Center for the Study of Correctional Education.

The Day Reporting Center, Eggleston and Paxton said, is intended to serve only ex-inmates who lived in San Bernardino before being incarcerated.

A location has not been established, but Paxton said the plan is to put the facility in an industrial area away from homes. He said the center will enhance safety because parolees required to report there will not be on the streets for part of the day.

Paxton is also working on an application for a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice.

The grant proposal is likely to be presented to the City Council on March 1. The government makes the grants available for programs such as job placement, substance abuse treatment and mental health care. And even more help could be on the way.

State Sen. Gloria Negrete- McLeod, D-Montclair, introduced a bill Monday to create a re-entry program in San Bernardino County.

Cal State San Bernardino is expected to factor heavily into such a program if McLeod’s bill becomes law and the Legislature provides funding. Eggleston and her colleagues are seeking state funds for a program called Crest – Community Reentry Education/ Employment Services and Training Center – which they envision as a comprehensive effort to aid ex-prisoners.

janchavarie CA San Bernardino County, Inmate Programs, Parole

The 173,000 square feet of new jail space at Larry D. Smith Correctional Facility in Banning will be Riverside County’s most secure and advanced when completed next month. As reported by the Press-Enterprise.

Construction began two years ago on the $80 million, 582-bed expansion. There’s just one problem. The county hasn’t yet found the nearly $13 million a year needed to operate the new jail expansion.

If there is no new funding, the facility still could open but it would not provide the net increase in jail beds county officials had sought.

Riverside County is facing what some officials call its most challenging budget situation in history.

Supervisors are grappling with ways to bridge a $71 million budget gap and have said that over the next two years they might need to lay off as many as 1,600 workers.

The county’s discretionary revenues, which supervisors have control over, dropped to $609 million this year, while ongoing expenses top $680 million.

County CEO Bill Luna last week gave supervisors three options that would cut the county’s public safety departments, which include the Sheriff’s Department and district attorney’s office, anywhere from 3 to 10 percent in an effort to balance the county budget within two years.

The options included backfilling some of the sheriff’s losses in Prop. 172 sales tax revenue — a special fund for public safety — but not the nearly $13 million needed to run the Smith jail expansion.

Including the jail money would throw off the plan to balance the county’s budget within two years, Luna told supervisors.

Supervisors have long said public safety is their top priority, but some have said every department, including the sheriff’s, must make sacrifices and live within its means.

Sheriff Stan Sniff said he and his staff worked hard this year to find budget savings.

In a letter last week to supervisors, Sniff said the department is projected to close a $22.3 million budget gap by the end of the fiscal year on June 30. The deficit was erased through a hiring freeze, early retirements, leaving promotional vacancies unfilled and securing a large federal grant, officials said.

But Sniff said his balanced budget does not include funding for the jail expansion. Additional cuts would be hard to absorb and would come from either jail operations or patrols in unincorporated areas, he said. “We are pretty threadbare,” Sniff said in an interview.

On a recent tour, workers were busy finishing the jail’s interior. Cell walls are 2 inches thick and made of 12-gauge metal, which maximizes space and is more secure.

The expansion’s 582 beds are in three housing units that are two stories each, and surround centralized medical and mental health services.

Each cell holds two beds — not dormitory style like in older jails — and each is easy to see into. Inmates won’t have to travel far for needed services, either — something sheriff’s officials say adds security.

Recreation areas are close by, as are areas for visitations, which will be done through a video link. “This is state of the art,” said Deputy Chief Steve Thetford, who oversees corrections. “It will be the most secure facility in our system.”

Sniff said the jail expansion is critical, given space shortages and the prospect of California releasing state prisoners into county custody, a move included in Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s most recent budget proposal.

“We are in crisis,” the sheriff said. “We already are in a position with no space.” The expansion will make the Smith correctional facility in Banning the county’s largest, with more than 1,500 beds.

Thetford said the Sheriff’s Department must hire 142 additional people to operate the jail. Sniff said it takes time to hire and train people. He said he needs a decision on how to move forward. “I need a signal pretty soon,” he said.

Board of Supervisors Chairman Marion Ashley said finding the funding for the jail is a priority for him. “I believe that public safety is not only our constitutional duty but our No. 1 goal,” he said at last week’s board meeting.

“We need to open Larry Smith and get that operating as soon as possible. Our jails are going to be under a lot of pressure, and we really need to expand our jail.”

But Supervisor Bob Buster said the jail should be looked at closely, noting that supervisors did promise taxpayers that it was one of their top priorities.

“The sheriff in his other operations needs to participate in reductions and skillful management so that he can free up money to help staff this jail,” Buster said. “He himself came in and agreed it was a top priority.”

Where the money will come from, though, remains in doubt. Supervisors are expected to again take up the county’s fiscal troubles Feb. 9.

Sheriff’s officials said even without the extra money to operate the Smith expansion, it won’t sit idle.

The department will shift inmates and staff from existing jails into the expansion. Plus, the county must eventually vacate 289 beds in an old jail in downtown Riverside because of seismic safety issues.

janchavarie CA Riverside County, Jail and Prison Construction

A board that oversees vocational training and work programs in California prisons has voted to stop allowing undocumented immigrant inmates set for deportation to participate. News reported in the Sacramento Bee.

California Prisons Industry Authority spokesman Tom Collins said the aim of the Prison Industry Board action Thursday is to “ensure that the effective vocational training that CalPIA provides is first applied to inmates who will return to California’s communities following their parole, rather than training individuals who will not.”

The certification program, established in its current form in 1982, provides training and jobs in the manufacturing and agricultural industries for inmates in 22 prisons across the state.

Approximately 427 of the 5,700 inmates now participating are under an Immigration and Customs Enforcement hold and will be deported once their sentence is completed. Fifty-two of the 727 inmate workers enrolled in certification programs are also under an ICE hold, according to a staff report recommending the change.

Collins said he did not know why inmates with ICE holds were not previously deemed ineligible for the program but that the recommendation for the change came up as the board was exploring options for lowering costs and improving the effectiveness of the program.

Recidivism rates for inmates who participated in the program are significantly lower than inmates who do not – 12 percent of certification program participants paroled in fiscal 2007-2008 reoffend, compared with 42 percent of the general prison population paroled during that time, according to the report.

The report also estimated that limiting the program to inmates eligible for parole in California could translate to fewer inmates reoffending and a savings of $784,000 a year in corrections costs.

“The Board’s action allows CalPIA to focus on what is best for the taxpayers of California,” Collins wrote in an e-mail.

“CalPIA would welcome funds from any government, foreign or otherwise as allowed by law to pay for vocational training of inmates who will subsequently be deported.”

The change takes effect March 1, though undocumented inmate workers now enrolled will be allowed to complete the program.

janchavarie California, Illegal Aliens, Inmate Programs

A new state law that took effect Monday is expected to reduce supervision of more than a quarter of Barstow’s parolee population. As reported in the Desert Dispatch.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a bill into law last October which created a non-revocable parole status for low-risk parolees. Parolees who didn’t receive serious disciplinary action while incarcerated, weren’t convicted of violent or sex crimes and have not been proven to be members of a gang can qualify for non-revocable parole.

Gordon Hinkle, press secretary for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said that qualified parolees will not be sent back to prison for parole violations and wouldn’t be directly supervised by a parole agent. However, if a parolee commits a new crime they could be sent back to prison, according to Hinkle.

Hinkle said that although non-revocable parolees will have less supervision, parolees will still be subject to searches by law enforcement at any time.

“People seem to think we’re just letting them go free,” Hinkle said. “They are still monitored and have to let us know where they live. We keep a database of all parolees and that system will include non-revocable parolees. If a police officer hears something on the street about a parolee breaking the law they can just go search without a warrant.”

Hinkle said CDCR hopes the new law will reduce the case load for parole agents in the state. The average parole agent currently oversees 70 parolees, but that number is expected to drop to 45 a year after the law takes effect, according to Hinkle. The new program is also expected to save the state $100 million, according to a CDCR report.

“Non-revocable parole will allow parole agents to focus on the more serious offenders,” Hinkle said. “Right now our agents have the highest average case load of any state.”

The new law also increases the amount of early-release credits inmates can earn for completing education programs and training for or working as inmate firefighters. Hinkle said the CDCR is anticipating a reduction of 6,500 inmates from the state prison population in the next 12 months due to the new incentives.

“If inmates are rewarded for improving themselves when they are incarcerated they will hopefully continue on that road, and they will not become repeat offenders,” Hinkle said.

janchavarie California, Community Corrections, Parole

California will begin to reduce its prison population by about 6,500 inmates over the next year under a state law that takes effect Monday. Story published in The Washington Post.

The bill was signed as part of last year’s state budget package. Under it, early release credits for inmates who complete educational and vocational programs will be expanded, letting more inmates leave prison earlier.

At the same time, the state will stop its monitoring of low-level offenders after their release. That is designed to reduce the number of parolees returned to prison, essentially because the state will not know if they are violating the terms of their parole.

Corrections Secretary Matthew Cate told The Associated Press on Thursday that the law will let parole agents concentrate on more dangerous ex-convicts.

Agents will be responsible for supervising an average of 48 parolees instead of the current 70 because the law ends California’s practice of automatically putting every released convict on three years of parole.

Ex-convicts deemed less dangerous or less likely to commit new crimes will not be monitored at all, although they still can be searched without a warrant.

The reduced caseload will let the state more intensively watch gang members, sex offenders and violent felons, using lessons it learned from its failure to catch Jaycee Dugard’s accused kidnappers, Cate said. Parole agents have been faulted for failing to learn that paroled sex offender Phillip Garrido was hiding the young woman in his backyard for nearly 20 years.

“We’re going back to the time when the parole officer not only has time to be a cop, but add that social worker factor,” Cate said in a telephone interview. “We could see the recidivism rate actually go down in California, so that’s the great hope.”

Groups representing crime victims and the union representing Los Angeles police officers criticized the new law.

“California has decided to begin jeopardizing public safety with no perceivable financial benefit,” said Los Angeles Police Protective League President Paul M. Weber in a statement.

He argued that despite the short-term financial gain, an increase in crime will cost the state and victims more in the long run.

Cate acknowledged some unsupervised ex-felons will inevitably commit serious crimes after their release. But he said residents will be safer in general because parole agents will be able to concentrate on higher-risk parolees.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the law in October. Finance officials estimated Thursday the measure will save the state about $500 million its first full year.

janchavarie Budgets, California, Overcrowding

California’s recidivism rate is second to none (60 percent for adult inmates). At the forefront of preventing recently released inmates from becoming just another statistic is San Francisco-based PHATT Chance Reentry Program, a place where last February, Thomas Christian underwent a process that he assures turned his life around. Story from New America Media.

Christian, 45, had been incarcerated for drug-related crimes on more than one occasion. But in October 2008, after having been released from a Nevada State prison, he made his way back to his hometown of San Francisco in hopes of a fresh start.

He soon found that the transition from captivity to free-living encompassed numerous ups and downs.

“At first, you appreciate your liberties a lot more, but one of the main downsides to this transition is adjusting to not having a built-in structure instilled upon you in prison. I was being told what to do all the time,” recounted Christian.

According to a 2008 Report from the California Department of Corrections, throughout a three-year span, 60 percent of adult inmates in California re-engaged in criminal activity and were returned to prison. That same year, more than half of its inmate population arrived after violating their parole. Two years ago, Christian was among those re-incarcerated.

Once in San Francisco, a parole officer recommended Christian to the Northern California Service League – a non-profit organization that works inside and outside jails and prisons – which then referred him to PHATT Chance Reentry Program.

“It’s been a constant blessing ever since,” affirmed Christian who has been a client of the rehabilitation and housing center for more than a year.

Providing a way out
In 2004 Armando Martinez, 56, and George Turner joined forces to create PHATT Chance Reentry Program, a secondary treatment program for individuals struggling to reintegrate themselves into society. “We reach out and try to cover all the bases so the person has the best chance to turn their life around,” explained Martinez, deputy program director of the agency.

PHATT Chance works in collaboration with several organizations to provide housing, food, drug rehabilitation, anger management classes, recovery meetings, job training and education for those undergoing personal struggles. Christian underwent a 90-day drug rehabilitation program as an outpatient while living at a PHATT Chance house.

Clients are housed across three transition homes-two in San Francisco and one in Oakland-operated by a staff of eight. There are approximately 40 people currently living in the transition homes.

Most clients are referred to PHATT Chance by other similar organizations, or find their way to the agency through the penal system, county jails and word-of-mouth recommendations.

“We get letters from guys in prison who want to join us,” said Martinez. “And if they’re serious, we bring them in.”

Approximately 90 percent of PHATT Chance’s clients were recently released from a correctional facility. The rest are students seeking assistance.

Among those students is Mike (whose last name was witheld for confidentiality), a 28-year-old Native American male who spent four years at one of the San Francisco houses after being referred by Friendship House, a non-profit that provides housing and substance-abuse treatment to Native Americans.

He turned to PHATT Chance for guidance and was offered a place to live as long as he attended school and maintained his grades. The organization is a fierce advocate of education.

A 2005 report released by the Institute for Higher Education Policy found a direct correlation between educational attainment and recidivism rates. Results suggest that after being released from prison, the higher the inmate’s education, the less likely they will be to relapse into criminal behavior.

The young man who once arrived with a rather bleak future was transformed into the reflection of the program’s vision. In the spring of 2010, Mike will begin his first semester at UC Berkeley.

“We were going to get him into Stanford, but he changed his mind. He already moved out of the house and is on his way to becoming a lawyer for his native tribe,” said Marti-nez with a jubilant tone.

“When he came to realize his vision, he never waivered. He stuck to it, persevered and stayed the course. A lot of guys crumble when they are put under pressure. He didn’t do that,” he added.

Birds of a feather
Martinez’ background is similar to the individuals he helps. At the age of 13, he was homeless on the streets of San Francisco; an episode that led him to severe drug use and impending self-destruction.

Years later, he was brought to the now defunct Narcotics Education League, a center that once helped former Latino ex-convicts re-enter society.

“When I was a kid growing up, I had no guidance: there was no one there for me,” Martinez said. “I don’t want people to make the same mistakes I made. That is why I got into this business. Because when I was in my addiction I didn’t know a way out. But someone saw something in me that I couldn’t see in myself.” Like Christian, Martinez was incarcerated for the sale of narcotics.

Christian was first incarcerated in 2005 for possession and sale of drugs. He was then released and re-incarcerated in 2007, serving 14 months in the California state prison system under the same charge. “Being hooked on drugs is a self-imposed prison,” Martinez explained. “It takes work to stay out of jail.”

In 2008 the CDCR reported that, 18.2 percent of incarcerated adults in California are there due to drug-related offenses. Drug related crimes also made up 32 percent of offenses by felons first released to parole “We get a lot of people right out of jail who have nowhere to go. But they have five months to show effort and commitment to change,” said Martinez.

For those who qualify, the Northern California Service League funds a five month probationary period at PHATT Chance Reentry Program, where clients are encouraged to create a life plan for themselves and stick to it. If they manage to remain clean, sober, and productive, they are permitted to stay beyond the initial period.

“If they’re making something of themselves and doing good things, they can stay,” Martinez added. “If they are serious about their recovery and moving forward with their life, our doors are open for them. We’ll help them go forward. (But) If they’re just not doing anything, then they have to go and make a spot for somebody who is serious about changing their life.”

As soon a client arrives, they undergo an intense evaluation to determine what their needs are: mentoring, job training, education, etc. Unlike other similar transitional programs, at PHATT Chance, people leave when they are ready.

He believes programs within incarceration facilities-as well as those that commence once released-monitor individuals to the point where they are simply unable to make life decisions for themselves.

“You really don’t have to think or take responsibility for yourself. So when you get back out into society, you’re lost all over again,” he said.

But at PHATT Chance, individuals are taught responsibility while being given significant room for individual growth. Christian added, “Back then, I was doing it more for them. Now, I’m doing this for me.”

Christian explained, “This program gives you the time and space to do you. Other programs try to do so many things to you, but this one helps bring out the best of what is in you.”

Because this is a fairly new organization, their success rate still remains to be accurately determined, but in the big picture-according to Martinez-more than 50 percent of individuals leave the program prepared to reintegrate themselves back into society.

“When they leave here, they’re either in school or working,” he added.

A population underserved
Of the 171,161 inmates in California’s correctional facilities, approximately 17,000 or 10 percent are in counties surrounding the Bay Area. The combined total inmate population for San Francisco and Alameda counties-the area in which PHATT Chance operates-is 6,133 or 3.5 percent of California’s total inmate population.

According to the CDCR, in 2006 there were about 2,200 individuals on parole in San Francisco alone. Of that total, nearly 20 percent entered treatment centers, leaving the remaining 80 percent with limited support while transitioning to free living.

A chance to give back

By September of 2009, Christian was asked to join the organization’s staff. Like Martinez, he also wants to devote his life to helping others move forward.

“(In) some of these guys, I see a part of myself at the time of my recovery. It helps me look at things from a whole different window. It helps me deal with the same population I’ve dealt with all of my life, just from a different perspective: giving instead of taking. And it really feels good to be a part of that,” said Christian.

Christian acknowledges that helping run PHATT Chance may often present a challenge. This is where the collision between the forces of inner-conflict, institutionalization, and a new set of principles occurs. PHATT Chance is the nexus of that transition. They are the first to deal with individuals’ emotional hurdles and the habits accumulated while locked up in prison.

Christian hopes to continue growing along with PHATT Chance. He describes his new lifestyle with renewed enthusiasm: “I go out there and walk the streets. I see the police and I’m not trippin,’ I see all the street guys and they don’t know me! You know what I mean? It feels good!”

janchavarie CA San Francisco, Inmate Programs, Re-Entry

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed appeals by California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Republican legislators of a federal court order to reduce the state’s overcrowded prison population by some 40,000 inmates within two years. Reported by Reuters.

The high court’s decision to dismiss the appeals for lack of jurisdiction occurred as part of a long-running legal battle over California’s 33 adult prisons and their often-criticized medical care for inmates.

A panel of three federal judges in August ordered the state’s prison population be reduced in stages over two years to relieve the overcrowding that has caused inadequate medical and mental health care.

California’s prisons have been filled to nearly twice their designed capacity of 80,000, according to the ruling.

The Supreme Court noted the state has come up with a plan to comply with the lower court’s order but the three-judge panel earlier this month put it on hold pending the outcome of the appeals to the high court. With the appeals dismissed, the plan can go forward.

Improving conditions in the nation’s largest state prison system has become a major legal, political and budget issue in view of California’s budget crisis and high unemployment.

janchavarie California, Overcrowding, Uncategorized

The second-in-command at San Quentin State Prison will become first-in-command on Monday. Reported in the Marin Independent Journal.

Vincent Cullen takes over the 157-year-old prison, the state’s oldest, after spending a year as chief deputy warden. His annual salary will be $107,493.

“I always wanted to work at San Quentin, but I never honestly believed it would come to fruition,” said Cullen, 47, a Vacaville resident who will soon move to the prison grounds. “When I first started out, attaining a warden’s job was almost beyond comprehension.”

Cullen assumes office in a climate of epic budget problems and a new state push to resume executions after a four-year suspension. The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has remodeled the prison’s death chamber and revised its lethal injection methods in the hopes of overcoming a court-ordered hiatus.

Assemblyman Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, a critic of the death row project, said Cullen is a “nice guy,” but that he hopes the new warden will focus more on rehabilitation than running “a warehouse for condemned inmates.”

“I would hope that he and all prison officials would get over their fixation on a Cadillac death row and focus more on cost-effective and beneficial strategies,” Huffman said. “If we can get over this idea of a shiny new death row, there’s a lot of good work to be done there.”

Cullen, who grew up in Millbrae and has a bachelor’s degree in science from San Francisco State University, started his correctional career in January 1990 as an analyst at state headquarters in Sacramento. A series of promotions landed him at various posts at the California Medical Facility in Vacaville, culminating in an associate warden position in November 2001.

“In my position, I’m not to express personal opinions,” Cullen said. “As the warden of San Quentin, I’m responsible for carrying out the law of California.”

In 2007, he was named an associate warden at the California State Prison, Solano, in Vacaville. He was named chief deputy warden at San Quentin last January.

Senate confirmation of his new post is pending. Cullen would be the prison’s 34th confirmed warden, said Lt. Samuel Robinson, a spokesman for the prison.

Turnover in the warden’s job has been high in recent years. The prison had three wardens from 1984 to 2004, but half a dozen in the five years since.

Cullen has the right blend of professionalism, stability and good humor to handle the job, said CSP-Solano Warden Gary Swarthout, who has known Cullen for about 12 years.

“San Quentin is certainly a very robust program. He’s going to have a lot of responsibility,” Swarthout said. “It’s going to require somebody with a lot of energy. He’s the guy who could do that.”

As San Quentin’s warden, Cullen will be responsible for an annual budget of $184 million, about 2,000 employees, and more than 5,200 inmates, including 697 condemned prisoners. Cullen said his new job is “one of the best positions you can have in this department.”

Cullen would not divulge his position on the death penalty. One of his more prominent predecessors, Jeanne Woodford, publicly opposed the death penalty after she left the job.

janchavarie California, Personnel Issues

A federal court panel on Tuesday ordered the Schwarzenegger administration to lower California’s prison population by more than 40,000 within two years to lessen overcrowding and improve health care. Reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, a follow up to previous post: Court, CA Governor Dig In Heels.

The three-judge panel said its order, the first to require the administration to meet deadlines for reducing the number of inmates, was compelled by the state’s “long-standing failure to provide constitutionally adequate medical and mental health care.” The panel noted that the state has already proposed to meet the goal by sending fewer minor offenders to prison.

But the panel suspended its order to await the outcome of the state’s U.S. Supreme Court appeal, which argues that the judges have no such authority.

“We will fight any decision that orders early release and endangers public safety,” said Schwarzenegger’s spokesman, Aaron McLear. He said the state expects the Supreme Court to hear its appeal and decide whether judges can issue orders that compel prisoner releases.

A federal judge appointed a receiver to manage the prison health care system in 2006 after concluding that substandard treatment was killing one inmate per week. Last August, the three-judge panel ruled that overcrowding in the 33 prisons, filled to nearly twice their designed capacity of 80,000, was the main reason that medical care violated the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

The panel said a 40,000 reduction in two years was needed to create the conditions for adequate care, found that it could be done safely, and left the details up to the state. After initial resistance, Schwarzenegger submitted a plan in November that relied on a combination of new prison construction, release of some low-level offenders, and changes in state laws and parole policies to send fewer people to prison.

The proposal includes some measures the Legislature has already rejected, such as allowing some elderly or ailing prisoners to finish their sentences in local custody or home confinement, sending criminals to county jail instead of prison for crimes such as drug possession and writing bad checks, and raising the threshold for felony grand theft from $400 to $950.

Administration officials said they would resubmit those proposals to lawmakers. In the meantime, they said, the court could put the measure into effect by ordering prisons to accept only inmates who met the proposed standards – for example, someone who had stolen $950 or more.

janchavarie California, Overcrowding

Schwarzenegger’s proposal to allow private prisons to compete with public prisons could add billions of dollars to the general fund a year, he said. That money could then be funneled into the education system. Changes could be expected to California’s prisons in 2010 as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger aims to reduce prison costs. Reported in the San Bernardino Sun.

Although official plans have yet to be decided, the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has been looking into various models to adhere to the governor’s goals.

“The immediate answer is we’re still evaluating, and if we want to pursue the governor’s goals in creating a competitive market that might mean a mix of private and public staff, especially in health (for the inmates),” said Gordon Hinkle, press secretary for the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

The agency has been looking at successful models used in other states, he said.

Hinkle said it is too soon to foresee an impact on the California Institution for Men and the California Institution for Women in the Chino Valley.

Various mandates on caring for the health of inmates have contributed to increased costs on the prison system and the oversight of federal judges has created additional obstacles, Hinkle said.

California spends $50,000 per prisoner, whereas the 10 largest states in the county only pay an average of $32,000.

If the state’s costs were lowered to the average of other large states, it

“They spend less, and yet you do not see federal judges taking over their prison health-care system,” Schwarzenegger said. “Why do we have to spend so much more than they do?”

The news release also cited the system’s high payroll as a cause of increased spending on prisons.

The California Correctional Peace Officers Association released a statement in response to Schwarzenegger’s proposal calling his ideas for prison reform “business as usual.”

The Association represents more than 30,000 correctional peace officers working in California prisons and youth facilities as well as parole agents, according to their Web site.

Fred Stevens, CCPOA chapter president for the California Institution for Men, views privatizing prisons as a public safety concern.

“When you put state inmates in a private prison, it doesn’t take the liability of the state off of those inmates,” Stevens said. “When things go wrong at private prisons, and they need to call 9-1-1, it’s our officers that respond to it.”

Stevens said the state needs to look at wasteful spending going on in prisons throughout the state.

“At CIM for instance, they just paid over $1,200 to rent 12 movies for the inmates,” Stevens said.

Officials from The Association condemn the governor’s idea of privatizing prisons.

“Giving billions of dollars in the form of state contracts to large campaign contributors does little to solve the state’s budget crisis,” said Mike Jimenez, state president of the California Correctional Peace Officers Association. “Reducing bureaucratic waste, reforming our state’s parole system and helping released offenders succeed once they return to our communities would save real dollars and greatly improve public safety.”

Assemblyman Curt Hagman, R-Chino Hills, said he agrees with Schwarzenegger’s goal of reducing spending on the prison system.

“We have to look at everything state government does and see if there are more cost-efficient (ways) and more benefits for the public – if we look at privatizing or going out to compete for things that are traditionally state-run monopolies,” Hagman said.

could save California $4 billion a year, according to a news release issued Monday from the governor’s press office.

janchavarie California, Private Prisons

Plans to build a 500-bed state prison facility on the northern edge of town are back before the council Tuesday. News reported by the VV Daily Press.

The town first expressed support for the reentry facility in May 2008, citing its goal to reduce prisoner recidivism and promises it’ll employ 325 to 350 people with average salaries of $85,000.

Now the state is asking Apple Valley to execute a “Will Serve” letter, agreeing to provide sewer service to the planned 22,000-square-foot prison adjacent to the Juvenile Detention Center on Dale Evans Parkway.

The Secure Community Reentry Facility will house inmates during the last six to 12 months of their sentences, with counseling and job training planned to help them reintegrate into society.
It grew out of 2007’s Assembly 900 prison reform initiative to reduce overcrowding in the state prison system and reduce the state’s 70-percent recidivism rate.

Candidates for the Apple Valley prison will be screened for selection, with the CDCR looking for those most likely to return to prison after their release.

janchavarie CA San Bernardino County, Jail and Prison Construction

For the past 10 years, Randy Bland has held a job that might make some people nervous.He oversees the mill and cabinetry class at Sierra Conservation Center, a program that teaches inmates the basics of the cabinet-making trade. News reported by the Union Democrat.

That’s 27 felons bearing power tools. “I love it,” Bland, 51, said, standing in the kitchen that his wife, Susan, designed and he created in their Sonora home. “It’s a satisfying thing. I’d do it until I retired.”

However, deep cuts in the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation budget mean that this, a graphic design class and a print shop all will be axed from the SCC curriculum by the end of January.

The Department of Corrections saw a $1.2 billion budget cut in 2009, forcing the department to pick certain programs to be reworked or discarded, according to spokeswoman Peggy Bengs.

Adult programs and rehabilitation programs took the brunt of it, as two-thirds of their budgets disappeared. Cutting certain classes, like mill and cabinetry, on a statewide scale saves the department $250 million, Bengs said.

“The state is emphasizing programs that reduce recidivism,” Bengs said. “We’re looking at vocational programs linked to job market demands that take 12 months to complete. Those reduce recidivism by 9 percent.”

The programs that survived budget cuts tended to be those that provide certification on top of satisfying the job market in the area where prisoners spend their parole periods.

The state prioritizes programs that can provide those certificates, Bengs said. Those include the automotive or welding programs, among others.

In Bland’s view, the mill and cabinetry program provides his students not only skills that can be used in a number of areas, but also valuable life skills that prepare people who haven’t had normal social interaction for the workplace.

“It can be tough,” he said. “You have a small shop and a lot of people. Personalities can clash.”

And part of the training is learning to work with people of different races, personality types and backgrounds. Learning a trade teaches them confidence, he said, a commodity a person doesn’t have a lot of when they are released with the stigma of having served time.

Bland created the class using state-mandated curriculum and textbooks, but put a heavy dash of his own hands-on style in to make sure his students learned. Students who had been around longer were put in charge of projects and given a team of less-experienced students to encourage peer teaching, Bland said.

He was there to supervise, answer questions and solve problems, both with the cabinets and between the inmates. He also made sure the shop had what it needed to be a good learning environment.

At this point, he said, the shop is state-of-the-art.

“It’s a wonderful shop, the state has been kind to me,” Bland said. “They put you in there and you make it what it is. You decide what to buy, what kind of machinery and how you run it.”

To get some of the supplies, Bland wrote grants and lobbied for resources.

The happy beneficiaries of the program include not just prisoners, but also budget-weary state and local agencies that need the services the program provides but can’t afford — like the Mi-Wuk-Sugar Pine Fire Protection District.

Fire Chief Randy Miller had a problem. The department needed a new firehouse, but it had a $20,000 budget to create a multi-purpose 1,300-square-foot building.

“You pay for stuff and then you blink your eyes and that budget is gone,” Miller said.

By using Bland’s shop, the fire department only had to pay for the materials needed to make the cabinets for the kitchen, saving a hefty sum of money for quality work, Miller said.

“For what it cost us, there is no way I could get this stuff, no way,” he said. “We had them put a cabinet in that we’ll put a counter top on. When it came back, we had to nudge that thing in there. It fit perfectly.”

Now that the program is ending, Bland is already getting calls for cabinet work in the county. He owned a business, Precision Woodworking, in the area from 1982 to 2000 when he quit to work in the prisons. But he’s not sure if he wants to launch a new business at this point in his life.

He doesn’t have a shop, and the shop at the prison will be dismantled. Equipment that can’t be used by the Education Department as a result of reductions will be given away to other institutions that request the equipment, Bengs said.

“If I’m laid off, I’m going to have to do something,” Bland said. “It’ll be low key.”

janchavarie Budgets, California, Inmate Programs

The banal sounds of multiple televisions float down the sterile, white corridors of the Napa County Department of Corrections. Story in the Napa Valley Register.

There are no Christmas trees, lights or stockings here. For inmates, Christmas Day will be like any other day. Last week, however, the inmates received a little splash of holiday color in the form of bags filled with Christmas cards, hot chocolate and cookies donated by Butter Cream Bakery.

“No way!” one inmate exclaimed, at the receipt of a bag. “God bless you,” another called to the men delivering the bags.

Each year, parishioners from local Catholic churches — St. Apollinaris, St. John the Baptist and St. Thomas — work to fill the bags in a program called Cookies with a Prayer. A few church members distributed the 275 bags to the jail inmates and 50 to Juvenile Hall after students at St. John the Baptist School put the care packages together.

For many inmates, it may be the only holiday cheer they see, other than a menu that has some traditional holiday fare.

“It’s basically business as usual,” said Lenard Vare, director of the Napa County Department of Corrections. “Being a correctional facility, there’s not a whole lot we can do.”

Vare said inmate morale dips during the holidays, but just how much depends on the inmate. He noted that relatives of inmates also suffer when close family members are behind bars at a time that most families are gathering.

Jail staff members sometimes act as social workers, or for serious cases, make referrals for inmates to speak with professionals, he said.

“They understand the population they’re dealing with and try to treat them with a lot of dignity and respect,” he said.

Christine Camp, 26, is behind bars now, and said she misses decorating the tree, hanging stockings and putting cookies out for Santa.

She has a 5-year-old who will do those things without her this year, she said. “It hurts.”

Camp has been in and out of jail for much of her life and has spent three Chirstmas holidays behind bars.

For Christmas, her mom is sending her books to read in her effort to acquire her GED.

In the meantime, she was happy to accept a Cookies with a Prayer bag, covered with a drawing from one of the students at St. Apollinaris School.

Tom Kennelly, who with his wife, Susan, coordinates the Detention Ministries of St. John the Baptist and St. Apollinaris parishes, was a federal prosecutor for 10 years and also worked as a defense attorney.

His successful efforts as a prosecutor and unsuccessful work as a defense attorney landed many people in jail, he said.

“I figured it is time to do something positive for these people as a Christian,” he said. “Jesus said that when you visit someone in prison you have visited me.”

Kennelly, who was among those delivering the bags, called the efforts a “corporal work of mercy.”

“These are generally the forgotten people,” he said.

St. John’s also gathers gifts to give inmates’ children. Volunteers delivered those items Saturday and Sunday.

Inmates can mail the Christmas cards included in their bags to their families with postage the jail provides.

DJ Johnson, assistant director of corrections, said the inmates appreciate the effort at a time of year when incarceration can be even more unpleasant than usual.

“Anytime you’re away from your family during the holidays, certainly that’s stressful,” he said.

Suicides and suicide attempts within jails and prisons often rise during the holiday season, he said.

“Showing that someone cares might make a difference,” he said.

Jeffery Main, 28, of Napa, was grateful for the gift. He has spent many Christmases since 2000 in jail, or in the case of last year, prison. “This is kinda getting old,” he said.

He said charges against him have been dismissed and he expects to be paroled in a couple of weeks. But it will be too late for Christmas.

The hardest part of being in jail at the holidays is not being able to see his family or children, he said. “Nobody likes to be away from their loved ones,” Main said.

Jason Slusher, 28, was convicted of assault and will be in jail until March. He’d rather be with family, but as for the holiday plans in jail, he said, “We watch TV and wait for our court dates.”

One bright spot in the monotony is recent news that his girlfriend is pregnant with his child. It’s enough of a incentive to keep him from coming back to jail, he said.

“Hopefully, next Christmas will be different.”

janchavarie CA Napa County, Inmate Programs

A loss of open space and the potential for resulting development of the rural area are unavoidable impacts from a proposed new, 7,200-bed jail in Whitewater. Complete report on The Desert Sun.

A draft environmental impact report, released by Riverside County officials Wednesday, describes the effects resulting from planning, constructing and operating the proposed jail facility, which would be built with 2,000 beds in an initial phase and could be expanded to 7,200 beds.The report also identifies appropriate, feasible mitigation measures and alternatives that may be adopted to reduce or eliminate impacts.

“It’s a step that must be completed before we can move forward. So at this point, it’s the most important step so far,” said county spokesman Ray Smith.

The report deems numerous potential environmental impacts — including traffic, noise, light pollution — “less than significant.”

“From the looks of it, there’s no silver bullet that would kill this project or any project like this. That’s good news,” Riverside County Supervisor Marion Ashley said.

But some opposed to the controversial jail location dispute that classification, saying the report downplays many negative impacts on the surrounding community.

“That’s typical Riverside County planning,” said Les Starks, president of the homeowners association in nearby Snow Creek and an opponent of the proposed jail location.

“Nothing will have any effect on anything. This will be fine because this is what they want.”

The public now has until Jan.15 to comment on the report, the normal 45-day comment period being extended due to upcoming holidays.

The jail is proposed for a nearly 200-acre site at the intersection of Rushmore Avenue and Tamarack Road on the north side of Interstate 10.

The Whitewater location preferred by county officials has garnered intense criticism from several Coachella Valley leaders, who argue it would be an eyesore along the highway, create public safety concerns and ultimately deter tourists from coming to the desert. A group of civic leaders has urged the county to look at land just outside Desert Hot Springs.

Report continues on The Desert Sun.

janchavarie CA Riverside County, Environment and Energy, Jail and Prison Construction

State prison officials announced a five-year plan Friday to add beds and treatment space for about 2,600 mentally ill inmates, in response to years of federal court rulings that found substandard psychiatric care in California’s penal institutions. Reported in the San Francisco Chronicle.

Most of the construction would be in converted juvenile prisons that are no longer needed because the state has shifted most incarcerated youths to county custody. The sites include the former Karl Holton Juvenile Correctional Facility in Stockton and other locations in San Joaquin, San Luis Obispo and San Bernardino counties.

“The department is trying to demonstrate its commitment to meeting our constitutional requirements and providing the bed space needed,” said Matthew Cate, secretary of the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

A federal court filing in which the state outlined its plans acknowledged uncertainties, however, about bond funding for the project.

Legislators approved $7.3 billion in prison construction bonds in 2007 but have not yet signed off on use of the money for mental health centers, state lawyers said. There is no guarantee that state agencies will authorize the bonds or that investors will buy them.

The state may also meet local resistance, said Ernest Galvan, a lawyer for prisoners who have sued the state over mental health care. He said prison officials have already encountered opposition in Stockton after announcing plans to refurbish the Holton lockup for adult inmates.

“The state has not demonstrated that people have the stomach for another wave of prison building,” Galvan said.

He also questioned whether juvenile prisons that are “in terrible shape” could be converted to mental health centers.

The inmates’ lawyers haven’t decided whether to oppose the plan in court.

In the court filing, the state said the corrections department is meeting with local residents and officials to hear their concerns.

Federal judges have ruled that medical and mental health care in state prisons violates the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment. A three-judge federal panel ruled in August that overcrowding at the 33 prisons, now packed to nearly twice their designed capacity of 80,000, was the main cause of poor health care.

The panel has given Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s administration until Thursday to present a plan to lower the prison population by 40,000 in two years.

Cate said Friday that the new mental health centers would lessen the need for reducing the inmate population.

Schwarzenegger has said he would appeal any population reduction order to the U.S. Supreme Court. His administration has also asked a federal appeals court to return prison health care to state authority and remove the receiver appointed by a federal judge in 2006 to manage the system.

Despite their legal conflict, the receiver, J. Clark Kelso, joined Cate on Friday in announcing the plan for new mental health centers.

“It’s a good agreement,” Kelso said.

As for the state’s readiness to resume supervision of prison health care, he said, “we agree to disagree.”

janchavarie California, Mental Health Issues

A federal court panel responded sternly Wednesday to the state’s defiance of its order to reduce overcrowding in California’s prisons within two years, telling Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to submit a plan within 21 days that meets the panel’s goal of lowering the inmate population by 40,000 or face a court-imposed plan.  Reported by the San Francisco Chronicle.

The three-judge panel stopped short of holding Schwarzenegger in contempt of court, as requested by lawyers for prisoners who sued over their health care and mental health treatment. But the panel said it was “unaware of any excuse for the state’s failure to comply” and would view any further noncompliance “with the utmost seriousness.”

Schwarzenegger was unbending. “We continue to object to the panel’s arbitrary cap under a two-year timeline and are continuing our appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court,” said Rachel Arrezola, a spokeswoman for the governor. The state’s appeal argues that federal courts have no authority to order a reduction in the prison population.

The panel ruled in August that overcrowding in the state’s 33 prisons – now filled to nearly twice their designed capacity of 80,000 – was the main reason that health care for inmates violated the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment. A judge appointed a receiver to manage the health system in 2006 after finding that substandard care was killing one inmate per week. The court gave Schwarzenegger until Sept. 18 to present a plan that would reduce the population from 150,000 to 110,000 over two years, saying it could be done safely by such measures as sending low-risk inmates to county custody and treatment, and halting imprisonment for minor parole violations.

The governor had already proposed measures he said would lower the inmate population by 37,000 in two years. But after the state Assembly spurned all proposals to release inmates early, Schwarzenegger presented a plan to the court that would remove fewer than 20,000 prisoners in two years, and would take five years – and passage of previously rejected legislation – to come close to the court’s population goal. The plan includes extending a current program to transfer some inmates to other states, releasing some sick and elderly inmates to home detention, reclassifying some felony theft crimes as misdemeanors and increasing prison construction.

The court rejected the plan Wednesday and said it was running out of patience. State officials have had ample time to propose changes that would bring the prisons up to constitutional standards, the panel said, and if they again fail to comply, the court “will be left with no alternative but to develop a plan independently and order it implemented forthwith.” The panel members are U.S. District Judges Thelton Henderson of San Francisco and Lawrence Karlton of Sacramento and Judge Stephen Reinhardt of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

jakking California, Overcrowding

State prison officials have confiscated 4,130 contraband cellphones this year, more than all those seized in the previous three years combined, according to an internal report released Thursday.  Reported by the LA Times.

More than 100 illegal phones were discovered at the California Institution for Men in Chino, including 10 in August, according to the report from Matthew Cate, head of the state prisons system. But he said there is no evidence that inmates used the devices during a riot that occurred there Aug. 8.

“Investigations conducted within California prisons have supported allegations [that] cellphones have been used by incarcerated felons to participate in criminal activity,” wrote Cate, secretary of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.  Crimes committed by inmates using cellphones have included the planning of escapes, restraining order violations, use of stolen credit cards to purchase inmate quarterly packages and the coordination of smuggling contraband into prisons, Cate said.

Two years ago, state Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Pacoima) proposed legislation that would have made it a crime for inmates to possess cellphones in prison. He also proposed subjecting all prison visitors and employees to more rigorous screening, including the use of metal detectors. His ideas were shelved because of the state’s budget problems.  “We knew this was a problem two years ago, and it seems to be growing exponentially worse,” Padilla said.   In his report, Cate acknowledged that a test program that planned to use “airport-style screening” at prison entrances had been planned. But he said that “due to the current budget crisis, this pilot program has been placed on hold.”

Other prison officials said one reason for the increase in confiscations is Operation Disconnect, in which guards have stepped up searches for cellphones, in some cases with the assistance of a phone-sniffing dog, Caesar. “Our detection methods have definitely been increased and various, which has helped,” said Paul Verke, a spokesman for the prison agency. “But it also appears there is a higher incidence of this sort of activity.”

Visitors and prison staff have been caught bringing cellphones into prisons, but existing criminal laws are not clear enough to prosecute them, officials said.  Cate said he supports pending state legislation, SB 434 by Sen. John Benoit (R-Palm Desert), which would make it a misdemeanor, with a penalty of up to $5,000, to possess or intend to deliver a cellphone in a state prison.   He also said he backs a federal bill that would allow governors to petition the Federal Communications Commission for wireless signal jamming within a prison.

jakking California, Inmate Telephones