Duffy Threatens to Put Lid on Jail Population

Frustrated by the county’s chronic jail overcrowding problem, San Diego County Sheriff John Duffy presented the Board of Supervisors with an ultimatum Tuesday, saying that unless he is given money to hire more deputies, he will impose a limit on jail populations that could result in hundreds of potentially dangerous prisoners being released weekly.

Saying that the longstanding controversy over jail overcrowding has “gone beyond being an emergency--it’s a crisis,” Duffy bluntly warned the supervisors that his limits would either result in the release of more people arrested in connection with serious crimes or force the sheriff to “jam and squeeze” more prisoners in the already overburdened County Jail downtown. That latter approach, Duffy emphasized, could place both himself and the supervisors in contempt of a court order setting inmate limits for the downtown jail.

“I’ve had it--I’m not going to wait until a deputy gets stabbed or we have a jail break,” Duffy said. Although he said that he sympathized with the supervisors’ budget problems, Duffy pointedly added that he is no longer willing to patiently wait for a solution that has eluded public officials during more than a year and a half of intense debate on the subject.

“I suspect that you’re not going to have any money (and) you’re not going to do anything about the security in the jail,” Duffy said.

Sharp Exchanges

Duffy’s remarks prompted some sharp verbal exchanges between the sheriff and the supervisors and a few heated words among the supervisors themselves.

Disputing Duffy’s contention that the county is not spending enough on law enforcement, Supervisor Brian Bilbray pointed out that public safety is the top priority in the county’s budget. Duffy, though, argued that the county spends money on some “non-essential” programs that is needed more in law enforcement.

“You’re still doing some things you don’t have to--we disagree on that,” Duffy said. When Supervisor Susan Golding asked Duffy to identify programs that he considers “non-essential,” he did not list any specific ones but promised to give the board “a very complete list” before budget hearings begin later this month.

Complaining that Chief Administrative Officer Norman Hickey’s proposed $86.4-million fiscal 1988 Sheriff’s Department budget falls about $5 million short of his needs, Duffy told the supervisors that unless the additional funds are forthcoming, he will unilaterally impose the jail population limits this summer after their approval of the budget. Duffy, whose department’s current annual budget is $75.1 million, said the extra funds are needed to hire 45 additional deputies and to take other steps designed to improve law enforcement generally, including reducing deputies’ response time to emergency calls.

Although his warning about the possible jail limits was coupled with a budget increase demand, Duffy insisted that his remarks were not merely a bargaining ploy intended to wring more law-enforcement dollars out of an already tight county budget.

“It’s not a tactic--I’m just serving notice that I will no longer continue to accept prisoners that endanger my staff,” Duffy said.

180% Above Capacity

Emphasizing that the inmate population in county jails currently is more than 180% above capacity, Duffy said that his limits would be roughly double the jails’ official capacity. Even so, the restrictions would leave the sheriff with two options: releasing large numbers of prisoners, including felony suspects, and simply ordering them to return for their court dates, or likely violating the court-ordered 750-inmate limit at the downtown jail.

For example, Duffy pointed out that he would establish a 250-inmate limit at County Jail in El Cajon, which has a capacity of 120 but on Tuesday held 418 prisoners. Similarly, Duffy’s limit at County Jail in Chula Vista, where there are 541 inmates--nearly three times the capacity of 192--would be 400, and there would be a 450-inmate ceiling at the Descanso jail, which has a capacity of 225 but 398 current inmates.

If any of those prisoners were directed to the downtown jail, it would exacerbate that facility’s already serious overcrowding problem, Duffy said. Despite the 750-inmate limit, there were 994 prisoners at the jail Tuesday, though some of them were merely being held pending transfer to other jails. However, Duffy, understating the obvious, said that judicial authorities “might get upset” at the prospect of potentially hundreds of more prisoners being sent to the downtown jail.

Another policy change that he would make if his staffing demands are not met, Duffy said, would be to reserve County Jail in Vista for criminal suspects arrested in North County. Currently, police from the City of San Diego book prisoners at the Vista jail when the downtown jail has reached its capacity. An end to that practice would produce a situation that the sheriff likened to “an overflow from a sewage backup.”

Detention Camps

In an attempt to ease overcrowding in the county’s six jails, Duffy said that he also plans to ask the supervisors later this month to place the six detention camps operated by the county Probation Department under his control. “It simply doesn’t make sense,” Duffy said, to have a “bifurcated system” that includes six heavily overcrowded jails and six relatively uncrowded detention camps.

Supervisor Leon Williams, while stressing that he did “not want to do anything to hurt prisoners,” suggested that the capacities of local jails may be outdated and perhaps should be revised so that the figures are not “used as a bogyman to say we’re bad people.”

After Duffy explained that the capacities are based on a general standard of about 60 square feet of cell space per prisoner, Williams, alluding to a trip that he made to China last year, said that many Chinese work in less space than that--implying that prisoners perhaps could do the same.

Trying to expedite the debate, Bilbray interrupted Williams to note that Duffy has no role in setting the capacities--prompting a sharp rejoinder from Williams to his colleague.

“When you talk, I try to refrain from interrupting, if I can, and I ask that you do the same with me, if you can . . . unless I’m really out there in goofy land somewhere,” Williams told Bilbray.

Supervisor George Bailey put that exchange and others at Tuesday’s debate in perspective a few minutes later when he said, “The basic thing behind all the finger-pointing is a great deal of frustration.”

Last November, San Diego voters defeated a proposed one-half cent sales tax increase that would have been earmarked for new jails and courts. (On a related matter, the supervisors on Tuesday laid the groundwork for the addition of six new local Superior Court judgeships, passing a resolution that will generate $720,000 in state grants to help fund those courts.)

The 1986 ballot measure received a 50.7% favorable vote, but, under guidelines established by Proposition 13, required a two-thirds margin for approval--illustrating the need, Duffy and the supervisors said, to repeal the two-thirds requirement for proposed tax increases to be used for public safety. A bill introduced by Sen. Wadie Deddeh (D-Bonita) to require a simple majority vote on such measures currently is before the Legislature.

Despite his assertion that he was not simply posturing in preparation for budget negotiations, Duffy declined to flatly state that he would impose the jail population limits unless his demands are met in their entirety.

What would happen, Duffy was asked, if, for example, he received only enough money to hire 20 additional deputies--about half the number he has requested?

“Then we’d have to talk--we’ll just have to wait and see what happens,” Duffy said. “But this isn’t just some kind of a bluff.”