By ROBERT McCOCKRAN, Times-Herald staff writer
Vallejo Times Herald
SOLANO COUNTY, Calif. — The Solano County grand jury has determined that jail workers’ compensation injury claims have been reduced since the Custody Response Team was created.
The CRT, as it is known, responds when the removal of combative, uncooperative inmates becomes necessary.
After a recent jail tour, the grand jury also concluded that the sheriff’s office has overcome staffing shortages with a successful recruitment program.
Also, an inspection of the Justice Center Detention Facility and court holding cells at 530 Union Ave. in Fairfield revealed that by consolidating policy and procedures into a manual for the operations of the Fairfield and Claybank facilities, the sheriff’s office has standardized the operations, the jury found.
Last year, 19,602 people were booked in to the main jail - 8,864 for misdemeanors and 10,738 for felonies. In that year there was an overall increase in bookings for homicide, assault and sex crimes, the grand jury reported.
The sheriff’s Jail Management Team identifies potential problems and deals with inmate grievances, maintenance issues and policy and legal concerns in its monthly meetings, the report said. The department’s Facilities Inspection Team regularly examines lifesaving and restraint equipment, locks and evacuation plans and conducts searches for weapons, narcotics and other contraband. The grand jury recommended that these two teams continue.
The grand jury also recommended that a contract with Legal Research Associated, to provide inmates with law library services, remain in place.
It also recommended that something be done to ensure that adult and juvenile inmates are not within hearing distance of each other while in the Superior Court holding cells.
Following a tour of the holding facility at the Solano Justice Building in Vallejo, the grand jury recommended that the sheriff continue to monitor the safety and security concerns of judges and other court employees when escorting inmates from the cells to the courtrooms. It also said the facility seems outdated.
Paula Toynbee, the department’s public information officer, said Sheriff Gary Stanton will “be preparing an official response to the report, and until that is made I wouldn’t be able to comment on the report. It would be inappropriate.”
She said she believed the sheriff’s response would be finished in June.
A May 15 grand jury tour of the Benicia Police Department’s holding facility found it to lack a dedicated juvenile holding cell and recommended that an office or room be converted to separate the juveniles from the adults.
The grand jury also determined that the facility seemed cluttered with boxes in the hallways and walkways and suggested that be eliminated.
Benicia police Lt. Steve Mortensen said “the chief of police is preparing a response to the grand jury, along with our city attorney, and they have 60 days from the date we received it to prepare that response.”
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