What Albers gets wrong by investigating the Fulton Jail.
A corrections officer looks in a jail cell during a tour of the Fulton County Jail on Monday, December 9, 2019, in Atlanta. (Elijah Nouvelage/Special to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
In just the first nine months of this year, ten inmates died at Fulton’s overcrowded Rice Street Jail—some of whom hadn’t even had bond hearings or arraignments.
Sadly, these terrible conditions aren’t unique to Fulton’s notorious jail. Just two weeks ago, a corrections officer was killed inside Smith State Prison. In fact, half a dozen inmates or employees have died there this year and the prison’s former warden has been charged with a host of crimes including bribery, conspiracy, false statements, and violating his oath. Further, hundreds of Department of Corrections employees have been arrested in connection to contraband and corruption issues.
So, with this crisis stretched across Georgia’s whole penal system, it was a surprise when state senators Albers and Robertson announced they’re investigating only Fulton County. What about other county jails? Or the state prisons over which the senate has jurisdiction?
I mean, it couldn’t just be optics, could it? 😇
The crisis at the Fulton jail is hardly new and has been much publicized since Trump’s surrender in August. And conditions in the jail must be addressed. But the state senate investigation was announced only days after the Smith State Prison murder and is contemporary with other GOP efforts to disrupt district attorney Fani Willis, leading many observers to question a political motive.
But I think there’s an even bigger oversight in their decision to focus their investigation on Fulton.
As an interactive product designer, I’ve learned that large-scale problems rarely enjoy simple solutions. The work of repairing a system is often the work of many additive corrections across many touchpoints with many stakeholders.
So, this week I’d like to chat about the prisoner journey: from local PD, to county jail, to state prison, and eventually to release. Because no matter how much we want to simplify the challenge to one domain, complicated problems typically warrant complex solutions. And those solutions require a more holistic review than the chairman of our state senate Public Safety Committee has demonstrated an aptitude for.
Reducing arrests by being smart on crime.
Photo by Scott Rodgerson on Unsplash.
Many legislators and candidates talk about the importance of being tough on crime. I’d rather be smart on crime.
If we really want to address the overcrowding, officer shortages, and runaway costs at the Fulton Jail—and not just make a political statement—we need to start by examining an incarcerated-person’s entry point into our penal system: Their local arrest.
Ellie and I spent the last several weeks in The Roswell PD’s Citizen Police Academy and more than one patrol officer told me, they’d rather take subjects to the North Fulton facility in Alpharetta if they thought they were likely to post bail or to be otherwise released. The Fulton Jail is so dangerous, some officers disliked taking non-violent offenders there if they could help it. For the subject’s safety.
Reducing overcrowding in our county jails involves implementing a combination of strategies. Thankfully, there are a number of tested methods we can consider:
ELIMINATE CASH BAIL
The decision to jail someone pretrial should be based on public safety concerns, not a defendant’s wealth. You shouldn’t lose your job, home, or children because you’re unnecessarily detained for a non-violent crime—that’s pre-trial punishment.INVEST IN DIVERSION PROGRAMS
Individuals with mental-health issues, substance-abuse problems, or low-level offenses can be diverted into treatment or support programs. Such programs also offer an alternative for offenders who are the primary caretakers of children.EXPAND THE USE OF CITATIONS IN LIEU OF ARREST
For minor offenses, issuing citations instead of making arrests can reduce the number of people entering the jail system. This is an option for handling the gradual decriminalizing marijuana.
Almost three-quarters of people held in Cherokee, Cobb, and Fulton jails are being held, pre-trial. Imagine the difference a diversified and more just approach to arrests and bail could make on the flow of people into the jail system.
Overcrowding & officer shortages & runaway costs, oh my.
Photo by “60 Days In” on A&E.
Ten inmates have died at Rice Street this year. And last year was no better: 11 fires, 534 fights, 114 stabbings, and two homicides. The 35-year-old Fulton Jail houses almost three-times the people it was designed for, is understaffed, and has “spiraled into a squalid den of disrepair, drugs and death … the poster child of jailhouse justice gone terribly wrong.”
These are just some of the reasons why the Justice Department launched an investigation into the jail last summer. And why state senator Albers is correct when he said, “We can’t stand idly by while people are dying and justice is not being adjudicated.”
But how do we fix the jail without simply repeating the errors that got us here?
Fulton County Sheriff Pat Lebat’s solution is to build a new jail. Because of course it is. But unless we cut the jail population, remedy its inhumane conditions, and expedite the backlog in prosecutions, Lebat’s solution simply moves the problem to a more expensive facility. And in the meantime, it also moves defendants to other facilities—even to other states!—at an enormous cost to the county and to those individuals.
Thankfully, there are a number of tested methods we can consider for our jails:
REDUCE THE PRISON POPULATION BY BEING SMART ON CRIME
Many pre-trial defendants can’t afford to post bail and remain “functionally trapped in that jail … not because they're dangerous, but because they're poor.” By eliminating cash bail, investing in diversion programs, and expanding the use of citations, we can slash the number of low-threat defendants entering our jail system.PAY COPS AND CORRECTIONS OFFICERS COMPETITIVELY
To tackle officer shortages in our local PDs, jails, and prisons, we must raise the base salary of officers to be competitive. And we should offer direct grants to local agencies to help finance pay hikes and defray housing costs.ELIMINATE IMPRISONMENT FOR LOW-LEVEL CRIMES
Incarcerations—be they jail or prison—are very expensive. Sentencing laws should be revised to provide default sentences proportional to the specific crime and in line with social-science research.
The Smith State Redemption.
Photo by Oscar Ivan Esquivel Arteaga on Unsplash.
As bad as things are at the Fulton County Jail, law and order are hard to find inside Georgia’s state prisons, too.
In fact, just two days before state senators Albers and Robertson announced they’re investigating the Fulton Jail, a correctional officer at Smith State Prison was killed by an inmate using a “homemade weapon.” But when reporters asked Albers why he wasn’t focusing on the prisons under state jurisdiction, he told them he was letting the Georgia Department of Corrections investigate.
Any why not. They’ve been doing a bang-up job.
According to AJC, state prisoners have run drug-trafficking networks, cybercrime schemes, extortion, and other criminal enterprises with the help of dirty guards, nurses, cooks and high-ranking officers—even a warden. This widespread corruption has fueled violence and gang activity inside our prisons, enabled crimes victimizing people on the outside, and led to the arrests of at least 360 prison employees over the last five years!
Additionally, crowding at the Fulton County Jail has been connected to the state prison system. Convicted criminals linger in the jail, awaiting transfer to state prisons alongside pre-trial detainees still considered innocent.
We’ve discussed reducing the prison population by being smart on crime, paying police and corrections officer best-in-class wages to drive recruitment and improve retention, and even how to lighten the load on the court system. But there are two other well-tested ideas we might consider to reduce the number of non-violent offenders in our prisons:
REFORM MARIJUANA LAWS & EXPUNGE LOW-LEVEL OFFENDERS
Prison space is expensive and should be reserved for high-risk prisoners, not low-level marijuana offenders. And with marijuana on the verge of decriminalization, we should offer explicit pathways to expunge low-level marijuana convictions.MAKE STATE SENTENCES PROPORTIONAL TO THE CRIMES
State prison sentences are excessively long, despite little or no relationship between the length of incarceration and recidivism. Especially in a state with no legal right to parole.
The obstacle becomes the way.
Photo by Tingey Injury Law Firm on Unsplash.
The crisis in our jails and prisons is awful. But it might also be the opportunity we need to finally reform how we dole out justice in Georgia. A palingenesis, of sorts.
And if we can find new, just ways to keep people out of the prison system in the first place, how can we expand that thinking to include the end of our prisoner journey? And how can we keep people from re-entering it?
The tough on crime approach in Georgia is perhaps best exemplified by our Three Strikes Law—a provision adopted to keep habitual felony offenders off the street. But a smart on crime approach might best be illustrated by making our justice system more personalized and less cruel:
REFORM PROSECUTOR INCENTIVES
Incentivize local prosecutors to be smart on crime by providing bonus dollars if they reduce incarceration while keeping recidivism rates low.CALIBRATE FINES TO A DEFENDANTS’ ABILITY TO PAY
Currently, our courts levy fees and fines without considering a convict’s ability to pay, leading to never-ending criminal-justice debt and modern-day debtors prisons. But if we calibrate criminal fines to a defendant’s proven income—and eliminate flat court fees—we can create a non-incarcerating penalty system that works at all income levels. A proven model, fines would be calculated by considering the number of days of income a person must forego to pay them—so-called “day fines.”
According to the Brennan Center for Justice, adopting some or all of the recommendations we’ve discussed this week could bring down the jail and prison population by as much as 40%.
Georgia’s recidivism rate—the rate at which a released convict is re-arrested—stands around 26%. If we could bring that number down as well, we’d be on our way to managing overcrowding in our penal system.
Given that the Fulton County Jail is under Fulton County’s jurisdiction, it’s unclear what influence the state senate investigation will have. But I suspect we’ll start to see on November 2, at 10am, in room 450 at the Capitol when the newly-formed subcommittee meets for the first time.
Hope to see you there.
JD JORDAN FOR GEORGIA STATE SENATE DISTRICT 56
For anyone in East Cobb, Roswell, or Woodstock alarmed by the state’s escalating attacks on our bodies, our families, our doctors’ offices, our classrooms and libraries, even our polling places, I’m running for state senate district 56 to fight for our freedoms and to deliver a better future for everyone in Georgia.
And unlike my opponent who’s spent 14 years rolling back our freedoms, failing to safeguard our kids, and gerrymandered his district to stay in office, I promise to bring everyone in the 56—regardless of ideology—the best possible constituent experience so you feel heard, valued, and supported. As we all deserve to be.
I’m running for the 56. Let’s make a better Georgia for all of us.
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FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT
Jordan For Georgia, LLC
10800 Alpharetta Hwy Ste 208 #629
Roswell, GA 30076-1467
jdjordan@forthe56.com
706.804.0456
