At a time when local law enforcement agencies are being forced to cut budgets and freeze hiring, cities across Southern California have found a growing source of income — immigration detention.  This report from the Los Angeles Times.

Roughly two-thirds of the nation’s immigrant detainees are held in local jails, and the payments to cities and counties for housing them have increased as the federal government has cracked down on illegal immigrants with criminal records and outstanding deportation orders.

Washington paid nearly $55.2 million to house detainees at 13 local jails in California in fiscal year 2008, up from $52.6 million the previous year. The U.S. is on track to spend $57 million this year.  The largest federal contract in the state is with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, whose 1,400-bed detention center in Lancaster is dedicated to housing immigrants either awaiting deportation or fighting their cases in court. The department received $34.7 million in 2008, up from $32.3 million the previous year.  Some smaller cities have seen their income rise much faster. Glendale received nearly $260,000 in 2008, triple what it got the previous year. In Alhambra, last year’s $247,000 was more than double the previous year’s payments.

For some cash-strapped cities, the federal money has become a critical source of revenue, covering budget shortfalls and saving positions.  Santa Ana’s Police Department, for example, expects as much as a 15% budget cut and has had a hiring freeze since October that has resulted in more than 60 sworn and civilian positions remaining vacant, Police Chief Paul Walters said. To offset reductions, Walters plans to convert two multipurpose rooms at the 480-bed jail into dormitory rooms this spring. That will accommodate an additional 32 immigrant detainees, which he expects will bring in $1 million more in revenue each year. He also hopes to get approval to raise the nightly price per detainee from $82 to $87.
“We treat [the jail] as a business,” Walters said. “The cuts could have been much deeper if it weren’t for the ability to raise money there” …

The federal contracts cover nearly the entire cost of the jail, said Russell Davis, the jail administrator. On a recent day, the jail housed 20 Santa Ana arrestees, 283 U.S. Marshals prisoners and 165 immigration detainees. Some of the detainees, from Mexico, Vietnam, El Salvador and elsewhere, had landed in immigration custody after serving state prison sentences. Others were arrested after ignoring deportation orders or because of criminal records that made them eligible for deportation.     The contract with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency brought in more than $3.7 million in 2007 and $4.8 million last year.  If he had to do it all over again, Davis said, he would have built another floor on the jail.

There is a lot more detailed background in the article at the Los Angeles Times.

vericatrajkova CA Los Angeles County, California, Economic Issues, Federal Payments, ICE, Immigration Issues / Illegal Aliens

For years, the Los Angeles County jail has been a revolving door for the vast majority of its female inmates, many of whom are homeless, poorly educated and struggling with substance abuse, according to a watchdog’s report released yesterday.

[T]he findings in the report provide the most detailed examination yet of women in the nation’s largest women’s jail facility. According to a survey of inmates, 81% of women in custody have served time behind bars in the past — most of them in Los Angeles County. The report predicted that most of the inmates were likely to come back in the future. “Many of them report that they cycled in and out of the criminal justice system for years,” Merrick Bobb, special counsel to the county supervisors, wrote in his semiannual report on the Sheriff’s Department, which operates the jails …

Bobb surveyed 330 of them in September and found that 45% were on probation and 22% on parole at the time of their arrests. Nearly six out of 10 had a history of substance abuse, and slightly more than half were unemployed or disabled when they were arrested. The inmates were disproportionately African American — 43% of the jail population, compared to 10% in the county.   Most were single women with children under 18 years old. Most were awaiting trial and could not afford the bail to get out.  Roughly 32,000 women pass through the women’s jail system annually…

Because of jail overcrowding, most women serve just 10% of their sentences — compared to slightly less than 70% for men. Overcrowding has forced the department to immediately release “any inmate whose sentence is less than 180 days,” Bobb wrote.

vericatrajkova CA Los Angeles County, California, Female Inmates, Overcrowding

Sheriff Lee Baca of Los Angeles County is in talks with court officials to determine whether reducing bail for nonviolent offenders would cut jail overcrowding at a time when he’s considering closing down the Men’s Central Jail for budget reasons.

Sheriff’s Spokesman Steve Whitmore said Baca is examining the current bail schedule for nonviolent offenders and wants to discuss with judges the prospects for reducing some of types of bail. Baca does not have the power to change the bail schedule, which would require the support of judges as well as prosecutors and public defenders.   Whitmore said that if more offenders could afford bail, fewer of them would be incarcerated at the jails, allowing the sheriff to house violent offenders longer.  The LA Times reports:

Baca said closing the downtown Los Angeles jail, which would greatly reduce the capacity of the county jail system and lead to more early releases of inmates, might be necessary to bridge what he estimates will be a $72-million gap in his budget.  But he was criticized today by some county officials. County officials said they have requested that he draft preliminary plans to reduce his $2.5 billion budget by [just] $62 million …

Some supervisors suggested areas ripe for trimming. “If the sheriff can’t find the savings, we’re willing to help him,” said Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, noting that the department’s administration budget has increased by 151% over the last 10 years and the patrol budget has increased by 115% over the same period. “The amount of overtime the sheriff spends is a scandal,” Yaroslavsky added. “We’ll be releasing numbers on that in the coming days.”

vericatrajkova Bail, CA Los Angeles County, California, Economic Issues

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca said yesterday he is considering closing at least one jail and possibly a second to cope with a $72-million budget gap, as reported by the Los Angeles Times.

Baca said his plans are still preliminary because he’s not sure exactly how much the Sheriff’s Department budget is will be cut.   But he said the facility most likely to close would be the aging Men’s Central Jail, which over the years has been hit by unrest and several murders by inmates. Jailers have long said the facility is outdated and extremely difficult to patrol. Such a move would probably require the department to release some inmates earlier than they do now, because the capacity of the county jail system would drop.

The county budgeting process often includes public threats of deep cuts –- which officials suddenly agree to reverse at the last minute. Baca acknowledged that it’s possible that no jails will close if the budget issues can be worked out. Still, he noted, the department had to slash more than $150 million during the last recession, earlier this decade.  Things are looking grim, he said.

vericatrajkova CA Los Angeles County, California, Early Release, Economic Issues

Los Angeles County CA Sheriff Leroy Baca dispatched four envoys [Thursday] to Dallas County TX to tour the jail facilities and meet with criminal justice types for ideas on how to improve his own situation.

Baca met Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez at a recent conference and the two learned they had some things in common. Like Dallas, LA County has a huge jail system that has had crowding problems and is the subject of Justice Department oversight.  So Baca sent two of his chiefs, a captain and a criminal justice director here to learn what Dallas County is doing right to manage its jail population and improve jail health, etc.

More at the Dallas News Crime Blog.

vericatrajkova CA Los Angeles County, California, Inmate Health, Overcrowding, TX Dallas County, Texas

Attorneys for the city of Los Angeles filed a lawsuit Monday seeking monetary penalties against nine imprisoned gang leaders, alleging that at least some of them continue to oversee their criminal enterprises from inside prison.

The defendants in the Los Angeles state court suit are reputed members of the Los Angeles-based 18th Street gang, which the suit calls “one of the largest and most violent criminal street gangs in the world” with an estimated 30,000-plus members in 15 states and five foreign countries.

In the past, prosecutors have filed criminal cases against imprisoned gang members for continuing to direct criminal operations from their prison cells. The Los Angeles City Attorney’s office says it believes this is the first suit that seeks civil monetary penalties for alleged damages to the public caused by such criminal activity. The city attorney’s lawsuit aims to take away any financial benefits the imprisoned gang members are enjoying from their alleged illegal activities, said City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo. “We’re going to hit them where it hurts, in their wallet.” City officials said they plan to seek damages of more than $1 million. If successful, authorities would then attempt to seize cash, homes, cars and other property connected to the defendants …

All nine have been in federal custody since at least September 2006, and two have been in prison since the 1990s with both now serving life terms, says Bruce Riordan, director of the city attorney’s anti-gang division. The two serving life terms, Ruben Castro and Frank Martinez, also are alleged members of the Mexican Mafia, a violent prison-based gang that law-enforcement officials say has long been involved in criminal activities inside and outside of jail.

The suit alleges that 18th Street gang members are “vertically integrated” with the Mexican Mafia and funnel criminal proceeds to jailed Mexican Mafia members through various means, including deposits into bank accounts that the men maintain at the prison. Prisoners can have individual bank accounts to buy sundries.

More on this from the Wall Street Journal

vericatrajkova CA Los Angeles County, Gangs (STGs)

Hoping to relieve overcrowding and keep dangerous and violent offenders in jail longer, the Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to spend nearly $3 million to buy electronic monitoring devices to expand Los Angeles County’s home detention program.

Now, about 350 of the county’s 18,000 to 20,000 jail inmates are serving their sentences at home under electronic monitoring. The additional money will allow the Sheriff’s and Probation departments to perform electronic monitoring of up to another 2,000 adult and juvenile inmates.  The money also provides personnel to track down and detain those who violate the program by leaving their homes without permission.

The new program comes as Sheriff Lee Baca has sought to increase the time inmates spend in jail. After budget cuts a few years ago, Baca began releasing tens of thousands of inmates after only serving a fraction of their sentences. At one point, most inmates were only serving 10 percent of their time.  But as the supervisors have increased the sheriff’s budget in recent years, Baca has reopened jails and hired hundreds of new deputies, reducing overcrowding. Most inmates are now serving about 70 percent of their sentences. With the program, county Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich said he expects serious offenders to now serve all of their sentences …

“Currently, an early-release program and voluntary (electronic monitoring program) is in place to relieve overcrowded jail conditions,” Chief Executive Officer Bill Fujioka wrote in a memo to the supervisors. “The ability to place a greater number of inmates on a home detention program via electronic monitoring will provide additional bed space for the more dangerous and violent felons to serve a greater percentage of their sentences.”

From a report at the Press-Telegram.

vericatrajkova CA Los Angeles County, Electronic Monitoring

In Los Angeles, gang members can find a way out through the continuing success of Homeboy Industries.

The corporation, Homeboy Industries, runs a silkscreen business, for example, that produced revenue of $1.1 million last year from sales of custom T-shirts and other apparel for radio stations running promotions and college and private groups holding events. The business employs former gang members to make the T-shirts …

Homeboy Bakery has a new plant that has $3 million in ovens and machinery and its managers hope to produce millions of dollars in revenue within a year or two, said the master baker, Alvaro Ocegueda. He supervises 25 former gang members who have become bakers under his guidance …

There is also a Homegirl Café, that has a staff of 27 girls who were “gang impacted” either as auxiliary gang members or as residents of neighborhoods under gang influence. The cafe has brought in more than $220,000 in five months of serving breakfast and lunch six days a week …

Homeboy Maintenance takes in about $6,000 a month, and a Homeboy retail store sold $25,000 in Homeboy shirts and caps in a recent three-month period.

Homeboy is a non-profit that emphasizes rehabilitation over profits.

“The aim of the cash-producing businesses is that they bring in enough to pay for the free services,” said the Rev. Gregory Boyle, a Jesuit priest who founded Homeboy Industries in East Los Angeles two decades ago and is now its executive director. Those services include mental therapy for former gang members, housing assistance, job development counseling and tattoo removal treatments.

It is an inspiring story. Read more at the New York Times.

vericatrajkova CA Los Angeles County, Gangs (STGs), Re-Entry

A massive $672-million jail building plan is going forward to the Los Angeles County Supervisors.  The plan would

reorganize Los Angeles County jails and ultimately shut down the Men’s Central Jail, long a symbol of inmate violence and overcrowding in the nation’s largest jail system.  This is far-reaching,” said Sheriff Lee Baca. “I have been wrestling with this problem for the past 10 years. This is the time to be making the big change.”

The proposal is a massive revision to the $258-million plan approved in 2006, when supervisors chose the least far-reaching of six overcrowding-relief proposals to avoid raising taxes. This more expensive approach, county officials say, can be achieved with a combination of already-budgeted funds and borrowing. No new taxes would be needed, they said …

In all, the expansion would add 1,146 beds to a beleaguered jail system by 2012 while eventually closing the Men’s Central Jail in downtown Los Angeles.

More details in The Los Angeles Times.

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