Federal Suit Says Deputies Abused Inmates

Orange County sheriff’s officials said Friday that they will investigate claims that a small cadre of jail deputies beat inmates and used some prisoners to intimidate others.

A lawsuit filed Thursday in federal court in Los Angeles includes allegations that, at the Central Men’s Jail in Santa Ana, deputies assaulted one inmate for speaking to a public defender’s investigator about the alleged beating of a man charged with killing two toddlers at a Costa Mesa preschool last year.

Orange County Assistant Sheriff Rocky Hewitt called the claims “baldfaced lies coming on the tail end of the Rampart [Division police] scandal in Los Angeles.” He said at least one of the beating allegations had already been investigated and refuted. The department’s homicide unit, officials said, will nevertheless conduct a routine probe of the claims.

“We take every allegation seriously . . . but a couple of those allegations sound wildly outrageous,” said department spokesman Jim Amormino. “I’m sure that when it comes out, those allegations will be unfounded.”

The suit comes as the Sheriff’s Department also reviews claims that deputies used excessive force while ending a jailhouse protest in November. Sheriff’s officials said they had found no wrongdoing by the deputies.

The Thanksgiving weekend disturbance, which involved 48 inmates and about 30 deputies, was considered one of the most serious incidents at the jail in several years. More than two dozen inmates involved in the melee later sued the county for $5 million, alleging that deputies in riot gear beat and doused them with pepper spray.

The alleged wrongdoing in the latest lawsuit covers a period from October to last month.

In a recent interview, Hewitt defended his jail staffers, saying they enjoyed good relations with inmates despite working in one of the most crowded jail systems in the country.

Crediting deputies, Hewitt said the jail has one of the lowest inmate suicide rates in the country. He said he has asked county officials to fight all claims that the department considers bogus and suggested that deputies targeted by false claims countersue.

“The staff does a great job, and we’ve got to support them,” he said.

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The most recent accusations involve the protective custody unit of the jail’s Intake/Release Center. The suit claims that there, in separate incidents, deputies beat two inmates in a hallway out of view of video cameras.

One inmate, Jesse Allred, alleged that his nose was broken, his face badly cut and his knees and back so badly injured that he is unable to walk and needs a wheelchair.

Allred claimed a dozen deputies beat him after he told a public defender’s investigator that he watched jail staff assault fellow inmate Steven Allen Abrams. Abrams is accused of killing two preschoolers by plowing his car into a Costa Mesa day-care center last year.

Hewitt said sheriff’s investigators reviewed the claims and determined that Allred attacked and seriously bruised the deputy first. Other deputies intervened, using enough force to stop the brawl, he said.

“Allred knocked the deputy down,” Hewitt said. “Sure, other deputies came to assist, but any time Allred wanted to stop fighting, he could have done so.”

But one of the most unusual allegations is that deputies used an inmate to hurl urine and excrement at other inmates as a form of intimidation.

The inmate was widely believed to be infected with hepatitis and HIV, according to the suit. One of the plaintiffs who claimed he was targeted by the inmate says he has since contracted hepatitis.

“It comes down to, at best, forms of intimidation,” said attorney Joe Freeman, who filed the suit. “At worst, it comes down to . . . a sick game played by half a dozen deputies who enjoy hurting people in their power.”

The lawsuit also accuses the Sheriff’s Department of preventing attorneys from photographing clients’ injuries in the jail. Hewitt said the policy was set by lawyers for the county.