Skip to Content
News

ACLU Wants L.A. County Fined Over Conditions at Downtown’s Twin Towers Correctional Facility

photo: Raquelqueenofbail/Instagram

The American Civil Liberties Union today demanded that a federal judge hold Los Angeles County, the Board of Supervisors and Sheriff Robert Luna in contempt of court for ``failures to comply'' with court orders to address "abysmal" conditions at the jail system's booking center.

In a filing in federal court in Los Angeles, ACLU attorneys alleged that mentally ill detainees were shackled to chairs for days at a time and others were crammed together, sleeping head-to-foot on concrete floors.

The motion is the latest action in the long history of federal oversight of the county jail system, the largest in the nation. ACLU attorneys who visited the center at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility in downtown Los Angeles late last year reported unhygienic conditions, including floors littered with trash, overflowing sinks and toilets, no access to showers or clean clothes for days and lack of adequate access to drinking water and food at the center.

The civil rights group also claims the facility is negligent in providing adequate health care, including failure to provide people with serious mental illness or chronic medical conditions their medications and fails to provide care to people dangerously detoxing from drugs and alcohol.

The L.A. County Sheriff's Department runs the jail system. A representative said the department cannot comment due to the pending litigation.

In September, the court granted a permanent injunction designed to help move mentally ill inmates and others out of the inmate reception center and into secure housing within 24 hours.  

"Yet the evidence indisputably shows the IRC yet again has long delays in processing and intake of detainees, and people continue to suffer serious deprivations while in appalling conditions,'' the ACLU alleges in Monday's court filing.

Further, the ACLU says it has learned of new ``IRC overflow'' units sprinkled throughout the jail, "where conditions are nearly as dismal as in the IRC, but people languishing there do not show up in data reports" required by the injunction.

"The bottom line is that Defendants are massively out of compliance with the (injunction) and previous orders,'' the ACLU filing states.

The civil rights group is asking that U.S. District Judge Dean Pregerson, who is overseeing the case, hold the county, the sheriff and the Board of Supervisors in civil contempt and fine them for any continued failure to comply with the court's orders.

A March 20 hearing is set in Los Angeles federal court to discuss the
matter.

Conditions at L.A. County jails have been the subject of court oversight since 1978, when a federal court judge ruled in the ACLU SoCal case Rutherford v. Pitchess, finding numerous conditions that violate the constitutional rights of people incarcerated.

"The L.A. County Jail system is a national disgrace," Corene Kendrick, deputy director of the ACLU National Prison Project, said in a statement previously.

"For almost 50 years, the jail has been under court oversight to provide the most basic minimum standards of sanitation, health care and human decency to people detained there. Enough is enough."

Law enforcement agencies arrest and take people to the reception center, where they are meant to get booked and transferred to another facility within 24 hours. Many of the people detained there are unhoused, have serious mental illnesses, or both, according to the ACLU.

Copyright 2023, City News Service, Inc.

Stay in touch

Sign up for our free newsletter

More from L.A. TACO

Everything Wrong with Tesla’s $500 ‘Mezcal’

"Mezcal has become a commodity for many, without any regard for the earth, [or] for Indigenous people's land rights," says Odilia Romero, an Indigenous migrants rights advocate from Oaxaca and the executive director for CIELO. "Oaxaca is also having a water access issue.

December 20, 2024

This Weekend: Sonoran Caramelos, Brisket Tteokbokki, Mex-Italian Fusion, and Country-Fried Tofu

Plus, Malay-style wings, a collaboration pizza-topped with Philippe The Original's French-dipped beef and hot mustard, and more in this week's roundup.

December 20, 2024

More Than 70 People Reported Feeling Ill After Eating Oysters At L.A. Times ‘101 Restaurants’ Food Event

Ragusano is disappointed that the L.A. Times didn’t publicly disclose that there was an outbreak at their event. “Obviously they’re not going to print it in their paper,” Ragusano said. “But they‘re a newspaper and newspapers are supposed to share the news. This is how people usually find out about something like this,” she added. “It's ironic because it happened to them.”

December 19, 2024

The 38 Best Books of 2024

Like listening to music, reading is an activity that recharges the spirit. It offers a chance to unplug for an hour to fill your soul and slow down. Here are 38 ways to free your attention span from doom scrolling and algorithms.

December 18, 2024

A Trucker’s Oasis For Peruvian Chicharrón Sandwiches, Leche de Tigre, and Camote Donuts In Vernon

Their chicharrón sandwich is the best $10 you can spend in the beautiful city of Vernon. This mom-and-pop shop opened by a couple of retired truck drivers is a bonafide strip mall gem in Los Angeles, overlooking the L.A. River, too.

December 17, 2024
See all posts