Alternatives to Prison to Be Restored

A federal judge Thursday ordered California’s top corrections official to reverse a recent decision abolishing drug treatment and other rehabilitation programs as possible sanctions for parole violators.

In a victory for critics of California’s widely maligned parole system, U.S. District Judge Lawrence Karlton said that by failing to provide alternatives to a prison cell for parolees who slip up, state officials had violated a lawsuit settlement they reached in 2003.

“We’re pleased,” said Ernest Galvan, an attorney in the lawsuit filed on behalf of parolees. “California has had a one-size-fits-all approach to parole violators, with reincarceration the only hammer in the toolbox. That’s fine when there’s a public safety risk. But for other parole violators, there are better options.”

Corrections officials said that they would not appeal, and that they would soon resume diverting certain parolees to the alternative programs.

“Our intent all along was not to terminate the use of these sanctions permanently, but to take a hard look and roll them out again in a way that was sure to protect public safety,” said J.P. Tremblay, a spokesman for the California Youth and Adult Correctional Agency. “That’s what we’ll do.”

The dispute centers on which punishment options the state uses for ex-convicts who violate conditions of their release.

A few years ago, California began allowing some low-level parole violators to avoid prison and instead enter jail-based drug treatment, halfway house programs or home detention with electronic monitoring.

That approach, mirroring trends in other states, was designed to reduce California’s sky-high recidivism rate by allowing struggling parolees to get help with addictions and avoid the job and family disruptions that occur when they are sent back to prison. It also was billed as a way to reduce the inmate population and save money.

Though the change was initiated under former Gov. Gray Davis, the programs were expanded a year ago in line with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s pledge to remake California’s penal system into one that rehabilitates -- rather than merely imprisons -- convicts.

In April, however, Corrections Secretary Roderick Q. Hickman abruptly changed course and suspended use of the alternative parolee programs. He said that the programs had been plagued by a variety of snafus and setbacks, and that there was no evidence they were helping parolees turn around their lives.

Critics accused Hickman of succumbing to political pressure.

They noted that his decision to scrap the diversion strategy came soon after a television ad, sponsored by a victim rights group, attacked the governor and said the new parole policies were endangering the public.

Hickman denied such a motivation. But in shelving the alternative programs, he ran afoul of the state’s settlement of a lawsuit over the due process rights of parolees.

Filed in 1994, the decade-long class-action suit alleged that state officials were improperly jailing parolees -- sometimes for many months -- before granting them a hearing on whether they had, in fact, violated terms of their release.

After Karlton, who was hearing the case, made an initial ruling in 2002 that the hearing delays violated parolees’ constitutional rights, Schwarzenegger decided to settle.

As part of that settlement, the state agreed to provide parolees with lawyers and speedy hearings on the violations. Also required was a variety of alternatives to prison for those found guilty of violations.

When Hickman scrapped the programs, lawyers for the parolees cried foul, and asked Karlton to find the secretary in contempt of court for violating the settlement.

On Thursday, Karlton declined to find Hickman in contempt, saying that although it was erroneous, the secretary’s decision was “arguably reasonable” and had not been made “in bad faith.”

But the judge made clear that alternatives to incarceration -- specifically, jail-based drug treatment and electronic monitoring -- must be provided under terms of the settlement.

Karlton’s order does not mean all parole violators will avoid prison, said Galvan, the lawyer for parolees.

“It just means that hearing officers and parole agents now have options to reincarceration when they think it’s appropriate and not a public safety risk,” he said.

A spokesman for the union representing parole agents, the California Correctional Peace Officers’ Assn., could not be reached for comment. The union’s leaders had voiced concern that some parole violators who were allowed to avoid prison and enter alternative programs had gone on to commit serious crimes.