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Federal oversight for mentally ill inmates

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The Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department this week agreed to implement sweeping reforms in its jail system in hopes of, at best, eliminating recurring mistreatment of mentally ill inmates at the hands of deputies.

The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Sheriff’s Department have agreed to a system of court oversight of the county jails that would spell out the widespread changes the department must make. Federal officials said the deal was “… designed to prevent and respond more effectively to suicides and self-inflicted injuries.” The agreement will direct that Sheriff’s deputies who work in the jails, for example, undergo “significant new training on crisis intervention and interacting with prisoners with mental illness.”

Supervision of mentally ill prisoners will reportedly increase, and the two sides will address long-standing problems with abuse of inmates by deputies who frequently have been accused of unjustified beatings and other excessive force.

Under terms of the deal, the Sheriff’s Department agreed to make “significant revisions” in policies on using force; federal officials said these changes should “significantly reduce the use of excessive force, with added protections for use of force against prisoners with mental illness.”

The County Board of Supervisors this week discussed the agreement in closed session but did not publicly announce its findings. In June 2014, the DOJ accused jail officials of doing little to address the problem even after suicides more than doubled from four in 2012 to 10 in 2013. The DOJ said jail cells were reportedly “dimly lit, vermin-infested, unsanitary, cramped and crowded,” thereby exacerbating prisoners’ mental distress.

The Sheriff’s Department is also operating under a court-enforceable settlement with the federal government over its street patrol operations in the Antelope Valley, where deputies allegedly targeted African Americans and Latinos for harsh treatment, particularly those living in Section 8 housing.

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