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Tensions
running high
says jail administrator
By
Fred Mramor
of the Desert Journal
Sierra
County’s jail is always overcrowded but has been worse than usual since
Memorial Day, according to Roy Bagwell, County Detention Center
Administrator.
Bagwell
this week said the county lockup is equipped with only 39 bunks but
currently houses 51 inmates. He said 56 prisoners were held at the
detention center immediately after Memorial Day.
“With
that many people in the jail and that close together, tensions sometimes
run high,” Bagwell said. But Bagwell said the situation isn’t
dangerous, until something happens. “There have been verbal altercations
between inmates but nothing serious so far, cross my fingers,” Bagwell
said.
Bagwell
said he goes through the jail everyday to talk with inmates and to try to
tone things down when things seem to be getting tense.
One
problem, he said, is the lack of activity for the inmates and the lack of
jailers to supervise them. Bagwell said that if he had the supervisory
manpower, he would allow inmates outside in the fenced yard more often.
Bagwell
said the jail is badly understaffed and that there are often only two
detention officers on duty during a shift, which, he said, is only enough
to maintain the facility and keep its doors locked. Security risks
naturally are greater in an overcrowded jail, Bagwell said.
The
jail contains a mix of one, four, six and eight-bunk cells. But with more
inmates than bunks, two inmates may be housed in the one-bunk cells, six
in the four-bunk cells and eight in the six-bunk cells, Bagwell said. He
said no more than eight inmates are held in the eight-bunk cells because
there just isn’t room for more.
Surplus
inmates sleep on folding mattresses on the jail’s concrete floor,
Bagwell said. Some inmates sleep on army-type, canvass cots and some
inmates combine cots with mattresses. Bagwell said sleeping arrangements
are assigned on a first come, first serve basis.
Bagwell
said the county’s old jailhouse is overtaxed by holding so many inmates.
He said the jail has had consistent plumbing problems that are exacerbated
by being used by too many prisoners at one time. To make matters worse,
Bagwell said some inmates stuff objects into toilets that the toilets are
not designed to accept. Bagwell attributes these deliberate acts of
vandalism to inmates’ frustration.
Bagwell
said it’s hard to say why the jail is so crowded now. He said there
haven’t been more arrests than usual nor an increase in any particular
type of crime in the area.
“It’s
just that nobody’s moving,” Bagwell said.
Only
four of the county’s 51 inmates (55 including four being held in other
facilities around the state) have been convicted and are serving their
sentences in jail. The rest, including a number of probation violators,
are in adjudicatory limbo and waiting for their day in court, Bagwell
said.
To alleviate the jail’s overcrowded condition, Bagwell said that just
before Memorial Day he requested through the county manager that the
district attorney and the courts allow some prisoners to be released from
the facility.
Bagwell
said it would be up to the courts to determine which inmates might be
released.
Fifty
inmates were housed in the county jail immediately before Memorial Day,
Bagwell said, and with a holiday weekend coming he knew he would soon have
more guests to accommodate.
“When
the lake fills up to 100,000 people, some of them just insist on coming to
jail,” Bagwell said.
Bagwell
said he hasn’t seen any results from his request to allow some prisoners
to be released from custody.
Bagwell
apparently isn’t worried about lawsuits resulting from the jail being
overcrowded. Bagwell said inmates always complain and threaten to sue for
one thing or another. But he said he has heard no threats of lawsuits
because of overcrowding that he takes seriously.
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Not
at riot stage
says county manager
By
Bill Johnson of the Desert Journal
Overcrowding
of the Sierra County Detention Center hasn’t peaked to the point of
sounding off alarms for riot conditions, the county manager said
Wednesday.
The
prisoner population as of late has been exceeding the capacity of the jail
by 25 to 35 percent. On Wednesday, for example, the SCDC was housing 51
inmates, 12 more than the jail is supposed to handle.
“Not
everyone is sleeping on a bunk but they do have a mattress,” said Sierra
County Manager Adam Polley.
The
population has increased in recent years at the local facility and during
the Memorial Day holiday weekend, the start of the summer tourist season
here, its 39-bed capacity was exceeded by 16 inmates, for a total of 55
prisoners, Jail Administrator Roy Bagwell reported.
Bagwell
said that besides the 51 inmates in SCDC’s custody Wednesday, the county
also was keeping four other inmates in outside facilities, such as
Socorro’s.
“Every
prisoner today (June 20) has at least a mattress to sleep on, but not a
bunk,” Bagwell said. However, there have been times in the recent past,
such as the Memorial Day holiday, that some inmates had to do without a
mattress and had to sleep on the floor, he added.
Polley
said Sierra and Socorro Counties have a mutual agreement to house each
other’s inmates when convenient to alleviate overcrowded conditions.
Despite
these conditions, Polley said, “I see no indication of problems at the
jail. There has been no fighting. It is calm and quiet. There are no other
problems because of overcrowding,” he said.
As
such, there has been no reason for the courts to order the jail to free
the excessive prisoner load as they had to do in Bernalillo County with
their jail facility, Polley said, adding, “Bagwell is doing a good job.
I believe the county and jail administration are doing a good job and we
must handle it.”
The
county commission is ultimately responsible over the jail and its
conditions although Polley, who began his job only three months ago, said
he doesn’t know when the commissioners last inspected the jail.
“They’re
supposed to do it twice a year,” Polley said, adding that his policy is
to schedule the state statute mandated jail inspections in either June or
July, and then again in December.
“The
county commission is supposed to check the jail to see if it’s clean and
working properly. And we’re supposed to supply the judges (of the
district court) with the names of all of the prisoners and the dates of
their scheduled releases,” Polley said. “To my knowledge, this has
been done.”
District
Court Clerk Kathy McClean couldn’t immediately verify when the last time
was that the county commission submitted its report on the condition of
the jail. She said the last jail report was in “storage” in the
district court clerk’s office files.
An
informed, confidential source said it was about two years ago when the
county commissioners last toured the jail facility.
Commissioner
Ralph Gooding, when asked in a phone interview Wednesday, said, “We did
do one (inspection) last year. We’re due for one soon.”
Polley
said the county has been sitting on a Preliminary Facility Study for
building a new and bigger jail facility because the county can’t afford
it.
The
county did the study to determine the cost of building a 52-bed facility,
which is $2 million, Polley said. The study includes 44 beds for male
prisoners and eight beds for female inmates.
“However,
this study has not been presented to the county commission or to the
public,” the county manager said. Polley said there are a lot of other
questions to be answered, such as finding a site and identifying funding
sources.
“Bagwell
and I are trying to alleviate conditions. We’re looking for answers.
This isn’t uncommon in other counties (which also have overcrowded
jails),” Polley said.
“We
first need to get the budget out, then lay out draft plans to present to
the county commission,” Polley said.
“We
got ‘plans,’ but we don’t have the money to push them through,”
Commissioner Gooding said.
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Man
sues county after being
terrorized by Dep. Clark’s killer
By
Fred Mramor
of the Desert Journal
Mark
Kliewer, a former New Mexico resident now living in California, has filed
a civil suit against the Sierra County Sheriff’s Department, Sheriff
Terry Byers and the Sierra County Board of Commissioners.
Kliewer
in a complaint filed March 1 in District Court claims to have suffered
personal damages and injuries after the defendants, according to the
complaint, breached their duty to exercise reasonable care in transporting
and maintaining custody of a prisoner.
That
prisoner was Michael Archuleta who on March 4, 1999, overpowered and
killed Sierra County Sheriff’s Deputy Kelly Clark while she was
transporting Archuleta from the Sierra County Jail to state prison in
Grants.
After
killing Clark, Archuleta escaped from the deputy’s car and with her gun
forced Kliewer, a traveler on Interstate 40, to drive him some distance
before ordering Kliewer from his car.
Archuleta
was later captured by State Police at a gas station on Nine Mile Hill west
of Albuquerque.
The defendants’ negligence caused the plaintiff to be subjected to
kidnapping, assault, false imprisonment and the violation of his property
rights and caused the plaintiff to suffer personal injury and damages
related to loss of property, Kliewer’s complaint alleges.
Kliewer
is seeking judgment and relief for compensatory damages for: emotional
injury and distress; medical expenses; lost wages and property damages in
an amount to be proved at trial; legal costs; prejudgment and
post-judgment interest, and; for such further relief as the court deems
appropriate.
Kliewer’s
charges of negligence are based on his assertions that Archuleta was
transported in his own clothes rather than in a prisoner’s jumpsuit or
other clothing that would identify him as a prisoner; that Clark, a female
officer, with the knowledge and at the direction of her superiors in the
Sheriff’s Department, was the only officer in the car with Archuleta
during the transport, and; Sheriff Byers maintained a policy under which a
single deputy can transport one or two prisoners if the destination is
less than four hours away.
Possibly
the crux of the plaintiff’s case is that the window in the barricade
between the front and back seats of Clark’s car was open during the
transport. “Due to inadequate control, restraint and precaution by the
Sheriff’s Department, Archuleta was able to reach through a window -
which is supposed to remain locked and closed during transport - in the
Plexiglas divider, gain control of Clark’s weapon and shoot her,” the
complaint said.
The
complaint further states that the deputy’s car collided with another
vehicle (a tractor trailer) causing motorists including Kliewer to come to
a stop and that following the collision, Archuleta exited Clark’s car
with her weapon and commandeered Kliewer’s car.
The complaint alleges:
·
The Sheriff’s Department knew or
should have known that Archuleta would pose a threat to others if
permitted to escape;
·
The Sheriff’s Department owed a duty
to the plaintiff and the general public to develop a policy sufficient to
maintain security over the prisoner and prevent his release into the
community;
·
The Sheriff’s Department’s
policies, procedures, actions and conduct were inadequate and unreasonable
under the circumstance and allowed Archuleta’s escape, and;
·
The Sheriff’s Department’s breach
of duty constitutes negligence in an assault on and the false imprisonment
of the plaintiff and a violation of his property rights through the
forceful and unlawful taking of his vehicle by Archuleta.
As
a result of these events, Kliewer was diagnosed as suffering from chronic
post-traumatic stress disorder with diagnostic features including intense
anxiety, fear and horror, exaggerated startle response, recurrent and
intrusive recollections of the abduction, sleep disturbances and
nightmares, difficulty in concentrating and in focusing on his work due to
frequent recollections of and reliving the traumatic event and, overall,
clinically significant distress and impairment of his social life, the
complaint says.
In
answer to the complaint, the defendants deny they breached any duty to the
plaintiff, deny that they were negligent and deny that the alleged
negligence proximately caused the plaintiff’s injuries or the
deprivation of his rights.
Instead,
the defendants assert, and the crux of their case may be, that the
proximate cause of damages, if any, was the criminal acts of Michael
Archuleta. The defense further asserts that Deputy Kelly Clark and Sierra
County officials exercised ordinary care in Archuleta’s transport.
In
further legal parrying, the defendants state they lack sufficient
information with which to determine the truth or falsity of Kliewer’s
allegations; deny that the Board of County Commissioners is the properly
named governmental entity for the purpose of the New Mexico Tort Claims
Act; state that the plaintiff has misconstrued and misstated statutes
relevant to the suit and that his statement describing the sheriff’s
transport policy is incomplete; Terry Byers is immune from suit and
liability in his capacity as sheriff; the defendants owed Kliewer no duty
of care under the facts and circumstances of this case, and; the
Sheriff’s Department acted as an agent for the Seventh Judicial District
of the State of New Mexico and is therefore entitled to all privileges and
immunities from the suit enjoyed by the court.
The
defendants prayed to the court that the plaintiff’s complaint and claims
be dismissed with prejudice. A trial date has not yet been set in the
case.
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