County Sheriff’s Department’s Inner Workings Are None of Your Business
Oceanside resident Zeke Davis is the ninth person to die in sheriff’s custody this year. He was a 43 year old man arrested by Oceanside police on suspicion of violating a temporary restraining order, resisting arrest and battery on a peace officer. During the booking process at the Vista jail, staff came to the conclusion he should be sent to Tri-City Hospital, where he died on July 8.
The Sheriff’s Department’s press release about Davis said that he had an unnamed pre-existing condition. Maybe that’s what killed him. Or maybe the resisting arrest and battery charges were actually code for the O’side cops beating the crap out of him. Or maybe he died for another reason.
At least he didn’t die in jail. A hundred and ninety or so arrestees since 2006 weren’t so lucky. Currently SD jails are on a pace to exceed the jail deaths at Rikers Island, a notorious facility, for a third consecutive year
The California Department of Justice says one inmate a month dies while under the supervision of the County Sheriff’s Office. The kill rate is reportedly higher than other big city California jails.
A lawsuit claiming Sheriff's Department officials failed to protect incarcerated people from contracting COVID-19 was settled at the end of June. Terms of the settlement, like having soap and cleaning supplies available, along with access to COVID 19 tests, weren’t radical by any means.
It took two years to get the Sheriff’s Department to agree to things they should have been doing anyway. Their post-settlement press release implied that things were hunky-dory all along:
"Ensuring the safety, security, health and well-being of individuals in our county jails will always be a priority for the San Diego County Sheriff's Department. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the sheriff's department took proactive steps to ensure our seven detention facilities followed strict guidelines to minimize the spread of COVID-19."
Over the past five years, taxpayers have been dinged with more than $60 million in court cases stemming from negligence by SD Sheriff's Deputies and wrongful deaths..
In 2022, the state auditor issued a report that found the San Diego County Sheriff's Department "failed to prevent and respond to deaths" in county jails.
A 2021-22 countywide study by the San Diego Citizens’ Law Enforcement Review Board considering overall in-custody deaths, found that total deaths in San Diego jails surpass the deaths expected based on the county's mortality rates. Overdoses and suicide are outsized reasons for deaths with an determinable cause.
A scathing report from the California State Auditor’s office a couple of years back called on state legislators to revise laws that appear to have contributed to high numbers of jail deaths in San Diego County.
State Senator Toni Atkins stepped up to the plate in 2023, offering a bill that included many of the reforms, including granting county supervisors authority to assume control of local detention facilities, giving local officials leverage over sheriffs who are unable or unwilling to improve practices and prevent people from dying behind bars..
Sen Atkins, as quoted in the Union-Tribune:
“I would call this a local control option,” she said. “Counties typically like local control. It’s not a mandate that they have to do. It’s a tool in their tool box.”
The legislation, Senate Bill 519, is the latest attempt to reform the San Diego Sheriff’s Department, and other county sheriffs’ agencies, through the statehouse.
…would also require sheriffs across California to release internal records related to in-custody deaths.
Well, surprise, surprise, surprise!
From this weekend’s UT:
New amendments to legislation that Sen. Toni Atkins introduced in April to foist more accountability on elected sheriffs have done away with a key oversight provision that would have allowed county supervisors to assume control of local jails.
The bill would now create a special state monitor to investigate in-custody deaths and audit substandard healthcare practices — only when invited to do so by state officials or county boards of supervisors.
But rather than require sheriffs to better protect people in custody by implementing whatever fixes the state recommends, the monitor could only ask that specific reforms be enacted.
My, my, my. I sort of get how the law enforcement lobby protected their own by eliminating local oversight and otherwise watered down Atkin’s bill.
But the public release of internal findings related to jail deaths -now replaced by a special state monitor who must be invited to investigate each case– seems to be a trigger for County Officials.
Our last sheriff, Bill Gore, retired a year early to spend more time with his wife in 2022. His departure came just as the aforementioned State Auditor’s report was issued.
Elections for County Sheriff have been inward-looking affairs in recent years, where an associate of the outgoing office holder was preordained to take the job. In 2022, the interim sheriff was appointed under the condition that they not run for the position.
This gave cover for Kelly Martinez to say she had differences with Gore without triggering an internal department feud. One of those differences was a promise to release internal findings related to jail deaths.
Once she was elected Martinez wasted no time in reversing course. The “new” policy was to be the release of summaries of the review board findings — not the actual review findings. And the idea of past reports being released shrunk from 15 years to just last year.
The Union-Tribune and other media outlets sued to get internal records relating to a dozen deaths to be publicly released. The Sheriff’s Department fought back.
From the Union-Tribune’s article about a settlement being reached in that case:
Lawyers for San Diego County argued that the records should be withheld under the attorney-client privilege and that disclosing them would undermine the sheriff’s department’s ability to examine missteps and misconduct by staff.
“These communications were made in private meetings between 2011 and 2017,” attorney Carrie Mitchell told Ohta. “People felt free to express their opinion openly and honestly without being judged 10 years later.”
Hold on a second.
The written decision also would address a request by county lawyers to stay her ruling so they could appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, she said.
They’ve taken a page from the Donald Trump school of lawsuit management here, namely delaying a case long enough so the plaintiffs lose interest (or die). If the County loses at the Appeals Court (chances are they will) then it will go to the Supreme Court, which will be glad to affirm the absolute power of law enforcement to avoid oversight.
Local news media, dating back to the days at the alt-weekly City Beat, have done an outstanding job in reporting on the Sheriff’s department. As evidence of mismanagement continues to mount, it’s appropriate for the public to start asking why this crap continues.
I’ll tell you why. Because the Sheriff’s Office is headed by an elected official, policies exist at the will of the official. They will sweet talk the media and other politicians with assurances of reforms, and then do whatever they please.
The best example of this FU to the public is the SD Sheriff’s refusal to allow drug screening of officers reporting to work at jails. There is a serious issue with inmates dying from overdoses. The reasons given for the availability of drugs in jail may or may not be (partially) true, but the most obvious and direct path to distribution is via the people with the most contact with inmates. And the excuses for not doing screening should only be acceptable to conspiracy theorists, QAnon, and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr
Earlier this year, Deputy Allen Wereski was arrested after cocaine was found in his car on jail property. A month earlier the department arrested a sheriff’s deputy for taking drugs from drop boxes maintained so the public can safely dispose of prescriptions. The point is that deputies are not saints.
The fundamental problem with the Sheriff's Department (and other agencies) is a cultural one. Many people with badges operate under the false belief that the world is made up of us and them. And anything happening to them in furtherance of protecting us is morally justifiable.
It’s important come election time to look at how law enforcement cultural clans use their money. The $75,000 the San Diego Police Officers Association anti-Monica Montgomery-Steppe expenditures are actually a quid pro quo with the Deputy Sheriffs Association. While the city police are not under the authority of the County, the funding for salacious ads opposing the councilmember is “getting even” money for her attempts at oversight in the City of San Diego.
Incarceration is the pinnacle of the mythology defining keeping order. And, no, I’m not advocating for abolishing anything. But I am saying we ought to be working toward a society where actual corrective measures have at least an equal chance with acts of punishment.
We keep doing the same thing over and over again and the result is that the US has the fifth highest rate of incarceration vs population in the world, below American Samoa, Turkmenistan, Rwanda, Cuba and El Salvador.
It just drives me crazy that otherwise educated people say the “fentanyl crisis” will be resolved or even reduced by law enforcement.
How’s the rest of the war on drugs doing? The “kingpins” are laughing at us.
From Drug Policy Facts:
…of the 1,155,610 arrests for drug law violations in 2020, 86.7% (1,001,914) were for mere possession of a controlled substance. Only 13.3% (153,696) were for the sale or manufacturing of a drug. Further, 30.3% of drug arrests in 2020 were for marijuana offenses -- a total of 350,150. Of those, an estimated 317,793 arrests (27.5% of all drug arrests) were for marijuana possession alone. By contrast in 2000, a total of 734,497 Americans were arrested for marijuana offenses, of which 646,042 (40.9%) were for possession alone.
The issues existing with the Sheriff’s Department are systemic. Incremental reforms are sabotaged or ignored. Fundamental changes will only come in the wake of public interest and understanding of what’s going on. So pay attention; that’s what they don’t want you to do.
Weekend News Ticker - Whiffs of GOP “Freedom”
Florida announces restrictions on Vermont licenses via My Champlain Valley. I guess this is what freedom looks like in the Sunshine State these days.
As of July 1, in addition to Vermont, four other states’ IDs will face extra scrutiny from police, as they may provide forms of identification to applicants who do not give proof of citizenship or legal status:
Delaware, Connecticut, Hawaii, Rhode Island
The law directs Florida police officers to write a ticket to anyone they pull over who has what is now recognized as an invalid license.
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GOP declares war on ... Barbie Via Politico. A child-drawn map in the movie is said to take China’s side in the South China Sea territorial dispute.
Among the first U.S. lawmakers to lodge geopolitical complaints about “Barbie” were Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), who spoke out earlier this week against the decision to draw the map with what they say is the nine-dash line.
A spokesperson for Cruz told the Daily Mail on Tuesday that the film’s trying to “appease the Chinese Communist Party.”
“Senator Cruz has been fighting for years to prevent American companies, especially Hollywood studios, from altering and censoring their content to appease the Chinese Communist Party,” the spokesperson said. Blackburn, in a tweet, said “‘Barbie’ is bending to Beijing to make a quick buck.”
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Pride and prejudice Via Public Information on Substack. More Freedumb
Last week, seven Republican state attorneys general sent a letter to Target CEO Brian Cornell warning that selling LGBTQ-themed merchandise "to families and young children" may be illegal…
Although off-topic, the letter also accuses Target of "products with anti-Christian designs, such as pentagrams, horned skulls, and other Satanic products." This is also a lie. The attorneys general cite a Reuters article as the source of this claim. But the Reuters article notes that these allegedly "Satanic products" were "not sold at Target." According to the Associated Press, "[w]hile some items made by the brand Abprallen were among those featured by the big box retailer as part of its Pride month collection, none of the items bore satanic imagery." Rather, "[t]he three items featured had images of UFOs and planets."
Even if all these false claims were true, it is unclear what laws Target would be violating. Swimsuits, drag queen t-shirts, and anti-Christian merchandise are not obscene or illegal. Just because these Republican politicians don't approve of these items does not make them unlawful.