COVID-19 infections hit record high in state prisons
Editor’s note: This is part one of a series focusing on coronavirus cases in the state’s jails. Part two can be read online at recordbee. com and in Wednesday’s print edition.
Inside California’s prisons, coronavirus cases have exploded, reaching 3,861 active cases last week — the highest so far. Yet the state has slowed its early releases of inmates, raising questions about overcrowding as the infections spread through the prisons.
Over the summer, jails and prisons released thousands of inmates through early release programs. The state’s prison population dropped by nearly 20 percent, reaching its lowest in three decades.
But early releases have now slowed to a trickle. Between July 10 and August 9, more than 4,000 prison inmates were released, according to court documents. About three months later, it was fewer than 450.
As result, California’s prison populations are remaining constant at the same time that the virus is surging. Systemwide, the prisons remain overcrowded. Nine prisons that have been hit the hardest by COVID-19 are at least 120% over capacity.
“What should happen is populations in the jails should be reduced, and populations in the prisons should be reduced,” said Aaron Littman, deputy director of COVID-19 Behind Bars Data Project at UCLA School of Law.
In the meantime, county jails are facing their own problem: About 7,000 prison inmates are sitting in county jails awaiting transfers to state prisons. For months, state corrections officials halted the transfers, creating the backlog.
Recently about 3,000 inmates were transferred out of jails to prisons, but then, on Thursday, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation again suspended transfers after coronavirus cases rose.
“It’s kind of a pressure release valve,” said Lieutenant John Bednar, a spokesman for the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Department. “We had a constant build-up.”
Struggling with the backlog at county jails
It was 3 a.m. when inmates climbed into vans and made the hours-long tr ip f rom Mendocino County jail in Ukiah to North Kern County Prison’s inmate reception center.
What was once a frequent, shorter trip to San Quentin was different now. After a coronavirus outbreak over the summer infected thousands of inmates and led to several deaths, San Quentin is no longer an intake center. T he pandemic changed things: There were more inmates, more guards, COVID-19 tests and a multi- day trip with the overtime pay and per diem to match.
In the meantime, county jails are facing their own problem: About 7,000 prison inmates are sitting in county jails awaiting transfers to state prisons. For months, state corrections officials halted the transfers, creating the backlog.
“We had a very small window,” said Bednar of the county’s sheriff’s department. Before moving, inmates had to be tested for COVID-19 within seven days making the trip. “We actually drove (the tests) down to a lab in San Francisco, so that we could get them back in time.”
Since August, the state has accepted 3,000 transfers at their three reception centers: North Kern State Prison, Wasco State Prison and Central California Women’s Facility.
P r e - C OV I D - 1 9, t he transfer machine c ycled about 2,500 inmates from jail into prisons each month. But the pandemic quickly ground things to a halt, and then a slow, unsteady churn. The state picked up the tab, paying counties $93.54 per day for each inmate.