HRRJ to stay open with corrective plan in place
State board rejects recommendation to decertify facility
The Hampton Roads Regional Jail can stay open after a state oversight board rejected a 7-month-old recommendation to transfer inmates for their own safety and decertify the facility.
The state Board of Local and Regional Jails is requiring a corrective action plan for the facility, the regional jail authority’s board chairman, Brian DeProfio, said.
“We believe it will provide a pathway forward,” he said.
The plan is expected to address continued problems meeting state standards for mental health care, for managing the pharmacy and for making regular security rounds.
The state board came to its decision after a closed-door meeting.
The board will release a copy of the plan once it is formally signed, in the next day or two, executive director Ryan McCord said.
In April, the board’s jail review committee reported HRRJ has shown “wanton disregard for the Board’s minimum standards.” It made that finding after investigating four inmate deaths in 2018 and 2019.
That finding prompted the recommendation to transfer inmates for their own safety. The committee said the jail’s lack of sufficiently trained staff created a significant threat to public safety, to inmates and guards.
Violations of state standards for 24-hour emergency medical and mental health care, supervision of inmates, management of medication and security rounds “demonstrate an egregious lack of concern for the health and safety of all who enter Hampton Roads Regional Jail,” the committee said.
The jail has been under scrutiny since the death of inmate
Jamycheal Mitchell in 2015 who stole about $5 worth of snacks from a Portsmouth convenience store. Mitchell, who had a mental illness, lost 40 pounds while incarcerated and died of probable cardiac arrhythmia accompanying wasting syndrome of unknown etiology, according to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner.
The jail, where more than 50 people have died since 2008, has been operating under a federal consent decree which requires it to hire more medical, mental health care and security staff and reduce its use of solitary confinement for inmates with serious mental illness.
Earlier this year, the state board decided against decertifying Riverside Regional Jail, which serves seven cities and counties from Surry to Petersburg and which has also seen several inmate deaths. Riverside is now operating under a two-year corrective action plan.