SACRAMENTO – California is poised to start shipping inmates to other states as a way to relieve its overcrowded prisons after federal and state judges yesterday rejected efforts to block the transfers.
A federal judge in Oakland and a Sacramento County judge ruled separately against requests for temporary restraining orders barring the transfers.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger last month ordered the moves, which would send 2,260 inmates to privately run prisons in Arizona, Indiana, Oklahoma and Tennessee.
The California Correctional Peace Officers Association and the Service Employees International Union challenged the policy in state court, asking for a temporary halt to the transfers. They said the transfers violated the state constitution because they sidestepped California's civil service system and usual contracting procedures.
Schwarzenegger's declaration let the state sign no-bid contracts to send inmates to prisons run by GEO Group Inc. of Florida and Tennessee-based Correctional Corp. of America.
If the transfers were prohibited, prison overcrowding could force the early release of some inmates, said Deputy Attorney General Vickie Whitney, arguing on behalf of the Schwarzenegger administration.
“We don't want inmates out in the general population simply because our prisons are overcrowded,” Whitney told Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Patrick Marlette.
Marlette decided that the state's 45,000 prison guards and other employees would suffer no irreversible harm if the inmates were moved. He set a Nov. 22 hearing to consider arguments over whether the administration is acting illegally.
The San Francisco-based Prison Law Office filed a separate lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Oakland. It argued that the transfers violated the Americans With Disabilities Act because the terms of the private prison contracts prohibit California from sending disabled inmates.
Judge Claudia Wilken rejected that argument yesterday but allowed the organization to pursue its case at a later hearing, said Don Specter, director of the law office.
A third challenge to the transfers was filed in U.S. District Court in Sacramento.
San Francisco attorney Michael Bien said that the transfers violate the rights of mentally ill inmates because they might not receive appropriate care in the private prisons.
The governor's administration is confident it is acting legally and that the transfers will survive the upcoming legal challenges, said Bill Sessa, a spokesman for Schwarzenegger's Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
“We have every intention of continuing with our plan,” Sessa said. “We do think it's in the best interest of public safety.”
The inmates transferred out of state will be replaced by other inmates coming into the California prison system. The projected cost to the state is $51 million a year.
Court documents filed in federal court in Sacramento indicate that the first 80 inmates are scheduled to be flown to Tennessee today.
Sessa said he could not confirm the details for security reasons.
