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Flat tire on Salvation Mountain

Sunday, December 25, 2011

Blind Justice

The Los Angeles Times ran an incredible story today about the large number of people that are falsely imprisoned in the County Jail  because of mistaken identity. The times research staff figures about 1480 people have been locked up on bogus charges during the last five years. In some years it was as many as five people wrongly locked up per day. The Times reports that the Sheriff spent very little time investigating any of the false incarcerations.

Now I am sure that mistakes are always going to happen but what was startling in this case was how the deputies really sounded like they didn't give a shit. They point out that the number of people wrongly identified as wanted criminals makes up a tiny fraction of the 15,000 inmates in the county's jails at any given time. Well I am sure that is a lot of consolation.
"Sheriff's officials said they are bombarded with false innocence claims from inmates. It would be impossible to check every claim, they said, and jailers' authority to release an inmate ordered detained by a judge is limited.
"People lie to us about who they are all the time," said sheriff's Cmdr. David Fender. Sheriff's officials maintain that their top priority is to hold people awaiting court hearings rather than questioning the validity of the arrests.
"It's not our position or authority to check the work of every police agency in the county," said sheriff's Capt. Mike Parker."

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

When I worked at the Orange County Jail I saw all of this nice and close. The system isn't as random as this article might lead you to believe but errors are made and people caught up by mistake have a tough time extracting themselves. Once one is sucked into the system it sticks to you like tar and nearly never forgets anyone. Best to not get pulled in.

Blue Heron said...

Unless you happen to get sucked in for the crime of say, having the wrong hispanic last name, like this poor guy.