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THREAD on the horrifying conditions in Florida's jails and who's responsibile for these conditions. 1/x
There have been documented outbreaks at jails in Broward County, Miami-Dade County, Palm Beach County, and Orange County (Orlando) to name a few. Recently @hannahwinston of the @pbpost reported on conditions in the main jail here in Palm Beach County. https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/news/local/2021/01/26/coronavirus-more-than-100-test-positive-county-jail-last-two-weeks/4259940001/
The craziest revelation of @hannahwinston's reporting wasn't the sky-high 34% positivity rate at the jail in late Jan. The craziest thing was that the Sheriff administered just 179 tests (total!) at the main jail from the start of the pandemic *last year* to Jan. 11th this year.
The jail was holding almost 1,300 people in late January. 179 tests over a nearly 12-month period represents a fraction *of a fraction* of the detainees that have been in and out of that facility since the pandemic began. But there's more!
More than 1/3 of the detainees were in "medical quarantine" as of late January. Hard tell though what medical quarantine means given that defense attys I talk to say that they're clients are in there in groups and that there's obviously not much social distancing going on.
Btw, last year, lots of people (including me) warned our sheriff about how rapidly COVID-19 could spread in our jails. A full jail is not a good thing during a pandemic, we said. He blew us off. He'd continue jailing people on minor stuff. https://theappeal.org/palm-beach-county-sheriff-opposes-prisoner-release-amid-coronavirus-outbreak/
But recent reporting got me to thinking...
Shouldn't there be standards for how jails operate during this pandemic?
Who's responsibile for providing oversight of these jails?
ANSWER: an obscure entity known as the Florida Model Jail Standards Committee. https://www.flsheriffs.org/law-enforcement-programs/training/florida-model-jail-standards
Shouldn't there be standards for how jails operate during this pandemic?
Who's responsibile for providing oversight of these jails?
ANSWER: an obscure entity known as the Florida Model Jail Standards Committee. https://www.flsheriffs.org/law-enforcement-programs/training/florida-model-jail-standards
Long story short - the FL Dept. of Corrections used to provide oversight of locally run jails. But the sheriffs didn't like that. So in the mid-90s, they convinced to legislature to let them police themselves with respect to their jails.
https://www.flsheriffs.org/florida-model-jail-standards/timeline-of-the-fmjs-process
https://www.flsheriffs.org/florida-model-jail-standards/timeline-of-the-fmjs-process
The legislature created this five-member committee to create standards that all the locally run jails have to follow. THREE of the five members are chosen by the sheriffs. (I kid you not) and two are chosen by the FL Assoc. of Counties.
So right now, three of the members are actual elected sheriffs. One member is a corrections director in Volusia County. This is the fox guarding the henhouse. https://flsheriffs.org/law-enforcement-programs/training/florida-model-jail-standards/current-committee-members
Okay, so what has this committee done to guide jail administrators in Florida since this pandemic started? What have they done to ensure that jails are being operated as safely as possible during this pandemic?
ANSWER: less than nothing.
Details...
ANSWER: less than nothing.
Details...
Florida Model Jail Standard 2.4 requires annual inspections by independent & certified inspectors at all 93 locally operated jails in FL.
But in July, the Chair of the FMJS Committee - Sumter County Sheriff William O. "Bill" Farmer, Jr. - suspended the inspection requirement.
But in July, the Chair of the FMJS Committee - Sumter County Sheriff William O. "Bill" Farmer, Jr. - suspended the inspection requirement.
In lieu of inspections, the FMJS Chair allowed jail administrators - i.e., his sheriff colleagues - to essentially self-report their compliance with the standards.
I call this "pinky-promise oversight." It's trust, without verification.
I call this "pinky-promise oversight." It's trust, without verification.
You guys, of the 93 locally run jails in Florida, only 14 completed their required inspections in 2020. The rest submitted "COVID memos" in this they pinky-promised that they were compliant with the standards.
The problem is that there's a daggone global pandemic, there have documented outbreaks in multiple jails across Florida. See this story by @caitielee0917, from @WLRN, our local @NPR affiliate. https://www.wlrn.org/2020-10-30/covid-19-in-jails-one-broward-inmates-experience-with-the-virus
Also, see this story from the @orlandosentinel by @katievrice, @monivettec, and @Stephen_Hudak. https://www.orlandosentinel.com/coronavirus/os-ne-coronavirus-orange-jail-case-spike-20210209-6xaxl2ys7zbmvgof72nv4edzyi-story.html
Call me naive, but shouldn't there be more inspections of jails and their medical facilities during this pandemic, not less? Shouldn't their be more independent of oversight of jails, not less?
The FMJS Committee not only suspended the inspection requirement for jails in 2020, they didn't have any meetings whatsoever about COVID-19 last year.
They were supposed to meet in October 2020, and instead they cancelled the meeting. They rescheduled it for "sometime in March."
They were supposed to meet in October 2020, and instead they cancelled the meeting. They rescheduled it for "sometime in March."
So we're twelve months into a pandemic. Outbreaks at multiple jails. The one entity responsible for overseeing these jails has decided that they don't want to do any oversight. There have been no inspections at most facilities in at least a year. Okay. But that's not all...
So I wrote the Chair of the FMJS committee a letter today calling him to:
1.) Convene a meeting and create COVID-specific standards for jails.
2.) Resume inspections at all jails no later than March 31st.
3.) Ask Governor DeSantis to make jail staff eligible for the vaccine.
1.) Convene a meeting and create COVID-specific standards for jails.
2.) Resume inspections at all jails no later than March 31st.
3.) Ask Governor DeSantis to make jail staff eligible for the vaccine.
And this morning, the committee responded w/ this memo. The memo basically says that, as of February, if sheriffs want their jails inspected, then that's cool. But if they don't want their jails inspected then they can just continue to self-report their compliance. *sigh*
You guys, real oversight is not voluntary. The #COVID19 outbreaks in jails across the state is a budding human and moral catastrophe. The one entity who has the power to compel jails administrators to do better has decided that it doesn't want to do it's job right now.
This has real consequences for real people. Not just detainees and just staff either.
If COVID is in a jail, the staff and the detainees are likely to be exposed to it. But when the staff go home and the detainees are the released, the public is exposed to them.
If COVID is in a jail, the staff and the detainees are likely to be exposed to it. But when the staff go home and the detainees are the released, the public is exposed to them.
It's naive & dangerous to assume that a #COVID19 outbreak in a jail will be contained to the jail. Everyone who wants to treat as afterthoughts the human beings in our jails are really just playing themselves. MLK said that we're all woven together in a single garment of destiny.
The pandemic is proving MLK right.
