O.C. Jail Inmates Sue to Curb Overcrowding : Justice system: Prisoners want population cap to apply to all five county facilities, not just main jail. Meanwhile, jailers reluctantly free 33 inmates.

Lawyers for inmates in Orange County’s overcrowded jail system have asked a federal judge to restrict the number of prisoners held at each of the five county facilities, a move that could force the government to release or find new beds for more than 1,200 inmates by the end of next year.

The request was filed in federal court earlier this week, but some county officials learned of it only Thursday as sheriff’s deputies, who operate the jails, battled yet another flashpoint: With the system overflowing, they were forced to release 33 prisoners being held for violating court orders. That outraged local judges.

All of the county’s jails are operating with more prisoners than their state-rated design capacities, and officials said a court-ordered cap could wreak havoc on the county system. That system today relies heavily on crowding prisoners into four of the facilities to relieve pressure at the main jail, where a federal court order has already set a maximum for its inmate population.

The motion filed this week seeks to modify that order by extending it to every jail in the county. A hearing is scheduled for Dec. 11.

“This would just add more kerosene to an already-burning fire,” said Supervisor Don R. Roth, chairman of the county board. “It would bring more chaos to a festering problem.”

Overcrowding has touched off a heated debate between the Sheriff’s Department and local judges, who want their prisoners to serve their full sentences. To deal with the problem, Sheriff Brad Gates has released some inmates early.

Even so, releasing prisoners held on so-called bench warrants--issued by a judge when a person fails to show up for a hearing or otherwise disobeys the court--used to be unheard of in Orange County. As recently as a year or two ago, the Sheriff’s Department held all bench warrant prisoners until they appeared in court; even today, releasing them remains the last resort to relieve overcrowding, sheriff’s officials say.

But Thursday morning, jail administrators faced a situation in which they had to find beds for dozens of inmates within five hours or face being in contempt of a 1978 federal court order. That order, which capped the inmate population at the Santa Ana men’s jail, also required the county to find beds for arrested people within 24 hours of being brought into the jail system.

“We’ve reached the maximum,” said Sgt. Thomas Fox as he and other jail administrators huddled over the morning reports. “We don’t like to release them. None of us wants to . . . but we can’t violate the federal order.”

But Municipal Judge Richard W. Stanford Jr., who learned of the releases later Thursday morning, called the decision to free bench warrant inmates “ridiculous” and “flatly illegal.”

“A guy who’s in there on a bench warrant has already said, ‘I’m not going to do what I tell you I’m going to do,’ ” Stanford said. “It’s ridiculous to release them based on their promises to appear.”

Stanford has said that he and other judges are considering contempt charges against Gates for his early releases as well as for a related policy of releasing some misdemeanor prisoners without ever making them serve jail time at all. Instead, those prisoners are cited and released after being told when to appear before a judge.

During the first three days of this week, more than half of the prisoners released under that program failed to appear at their hearings, a Municipal Court survey indicated.

Those prisoners will have to be re-arrested and face additional charges. If convicted, that means longer sentences, which will add to jail overcrowding--the very problem that the release program is intended to mitigate.

While Thursday’s release of bench warrant inmates infuriated Stanford and added fuel to the debate about Gates’ policies, the motion filed in Santa Ana federal court could have much longer-term consequences for the jail system.

Submitted by the same lawyers from the American Civil Liberties Union who have long tangled with the county about jail overcrowding, the latest action calls on the court to take sweeping new measures.

“The fundamental problem is that if only one jail of five has a population cap, the ‘uncapped’ jails will be overcrowded,” according to the action, which seeks to modify U.S. District Judge William P. Gray’s 1978 order limiting only the population at the Santa Ana men’s jail. “The system should be capped at the present number of prisoners in custody to be reduced to rated (design) capacity” when the first phase of a branch-jail expansion is completed.

Phase 1 of that expansion, at Theo Lacy Branch Jail in Orange, is expected to be completed late next year, so the cuts would take effect then if approved by the judge.

For some of the jails, that would mean dramatic reductions. At the James A. Musick facility, for instance, the rated capacity is only 713, but approximately 1,200 prisoners are now being held there.

Likewise, Theo Lacy is rated to hold 622 inmates, but currently houses more than 800. Even the main jail in Santa Ana, which is under the federal court order, currently is allowed to hold slightly more inmates than its state-rated design capacity. The Musick jail puts some of the prisoners in tents, and the legal action would allow that to continue but would still sharply limit the overall population.

“That would be devastating,” said Dan Wooldridge, an aide to Supervisor Roth who has dealt with jail issues for years. “There’s just no way we could do it. We’d just have to put people out the door. . . . It’s an unacceptable alternative.”

A recent Sheriff’s Department report found deep overcrowding problems throughout the jail system. Prompted by that, Judge Gray last month ordered a special monitor to return to the Orange County jails and report back on conditions inside them. The monitor’s report is expected by the end of November.

The motion filed this week also asks that inmates receive expanded exercise time and that their lawyers get unannounced access to the jails to conduct inspections.

In addition to those provisions and the jail population maximums, the ACLU lawyers’ motion admonishes county municipal judges for issuing “no-bail” warrants, which prevent a prisoner from being released early. Rather than challenge the releases, the courts should stay open for longer hours and hold special sessions, lawyers for the inmates maintained.

“The local courts must rely on themselves, not the county jails, as the vehicle for maintaining their own integrity in the warrant process,” the legal motion argued.

On that, the lawyers for the inmates and Gates are in rare agreement. Sheriff’s Department officials have long balked at no-bail provisions, which they say gum up the effective functioning of the jail and make it harder to comply with the federal court order.