Jail Suicides May Spur Oversight Changes
County officials want to give the Sacramento sheriff responsibility for medical and mental health services in the jail after a rash of inmate suicides.
The overhaul would give Sheriff Lou Blanas control of all medical care in the jail. Coroner E. Paul Smith, who now oversees medical care, supports the plan.
Blanas backed the plan after seven suicides and eight other reported attempts at the downtown jail this year.
Blanas is a defendant in a lawsuit against the county filed by the family of a Carmichael man who hanged himself in his cell in March.
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