County Jail Population Shrinking With Efforts to Ease Overcrowding

The average daily population of the Orange County Jail has decreased in the last month, from the 2,000 range to the 1,700s, a drop Sheriff Brad Gates’ staff attributes to his partial cutoff of state and federal prisoners and his request that city police agencies be more selective about whom to send to jail.

U.S. District Judge William P. Gray on March 18 gave Gates 60 days to relieve overcrowded conditions in the jail or face a $10 daily fine for each inmate who must sleep on the floor more than one night.

Gray fined Gates and the county $50,000, and found them in criminal contempt for failure to comply with his 7-year-old order that each inmate have a bunk. Inmates have been sleeping on mats in the dayrooms attached to the cells, in the toilet and shower areas, and in front of cells.

The judge also appointed Lawrence Grossman, a former federal prison warden who lives in Brea, to monitor jail conditions and report back to him.

Many Without Beds

Grossman’s first report, dated April 5, says inmates are still sleeping on the floor in large numbers.

“We’re making every effort, but it’s not something you can do overnight,” said Undersheriff Raul Ramos.

Ramos said the recent population reduction has been helped by Gates’ letter to the police chiefs, asking their help.

The men’s jail in downtown Santa Ana has a capacity of 1,191, and the jail has bunks for 1,530. But in recent months, its daily average population has run close to 2,000 inmates, and on several days it surpassed 2,100. On the day of the hearing before Gray, there were slightly more than 2,000 men in the jail.

On April 6, a Saturday, the count was 1,745. It rose to 1,825 the next day, and was 1,864 on April 8. The number of inmates has dropped steadily since then. It was 1,777 on April 9, 1,734 on April 10, and 1,714 on April 11, according to the sheriff’s statistics.

Police Examining Bookings

Gates last week told a task force on overcrowding appointed by the county Board of Supervisors that he had removed 175 state and federal prisoners from the jail. Gates informed state and federal prison authorities, the day after Gray’s order, that the jail would no longer accept their prisoners. He later amended that, so that such prisoners can stay in the jail overnight.

Sheriff’s officials say it is impossible to tell, on a day-to-day basis, how the jail’s population is affected by the restriction on state and federal prisoners. Bob Gore, of the state Department of Corrections, said it was not uncommon to have 50 to 100 state prisoners incarcerated there.

Ramos said it was difficult to measure the impact of Gates’ letter to police agencies in the county, but that Gates had received a positive response from many of the police chiefs.

Santa Ana’s deputy police chief, Gene Hanson, said the sheriff’s request was passed on to patrol officers on the streets.

Santa Ana, the only large city in the county without a jail of its own, is the biggest source of jail inmates.

“I think it’s premature to say the sheriff’s letter has had a significant effect on our bookings at the County Jail,” Hanson said, “but we have put the word out, and we’re looking very closely at ways we can help.”

Hanson said that Police Chief Ray Davis is looking at three areas where jail bookings are numerous: Misdemeanors for which officers can ticket the offender without sending the person to jail (as in shoplifting and other petty-theft cases), public drunkenness, and other misdemeanor cases in which bail can be collected in lieu of a jailing.

Gates and county officials are exploring whether to use temporary facilities so that no inmate has to sleep on the floor more than one night, to comply with the court order.

500 More Beds Ordered

Gates has ordered 500 more bunks from the state’s Department of Prison Industries, which makes the beds using prison labor. An order of 65 bunks arrived unassembled last week, and another 100 bunks will be on the way next week, said David Craig, director of prison industries. Craig said all 500 bunks are to be shipped by June 4.

“We have a tremendous backlog of requests for cell bunks, but we understood Orange County’s request to be an emergency, so we’ve scrounged around to try to give them everything we have,” Craig said.

Craig said he did not have figures on the cost of the shipment, but that the bunks are sold for about $60 each.

There isn’t enough room in the men’s jail for more than a few of the new bunks, said Undersheriff Ramos.

“I can’t say at this point where all the bunks will go, because we’re still working on those plans,” Ramos said.