Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/10pdf/09-1233.pdf
Page Number: 10

4 

BROWN v. PLATA 

Opinion of the Court 

through  grossly  inadequate  provision  of  medical  and 
mental health care. 

This Court now holds that the PLRA does authorize the 
relief  afforded  in  this  case  and  that  the  court-mandated 
population  limit  is  necessary  to  remedy  the  violation  of
prisoners’  constitutional  rights.  The  order  of  the  three-
judge  court,  subject  to  the  right  of  the  State  to  seek 
its  modification  in  appropriate  circumstances,  must  be 
affirmed. 

I 

A 

The  degree  of  overcrowding  in  California’s  prisons  is 
exceptional.  California’s  prisons  are  designed  to  house  a
population just under 80,000, but at the time of the three-
judge  court’s  decision  the  population  was  almost  double
that.  The State’s prisons had operated at around 200% of 
design  capacity  for  at  least  11  years.  Prisoners  are 
crammed  into  spaces  neither  designed  nor  intended  to
house  inmates.    As  many  as  200  prisoners  may  live  in  a 
gymnasium,  monitored  by  as  few  as  two  or  three  correc-
tional  officers.    App.  1337–1338,  1350;  see  Appendix  B, 
infra.  As many as 54 prisoners may share a single toilet.
App. 1337.

The  Corrections  Independent  Review  Panel,  a  body 
appointed  by  the  Governor  and  composed  of  correctional
consultants  and  representatives  from  state  agencies,
concluded  that  California’s  prisons  are  “ ‘severely  over-
crowded,  imperiling  the  safety  of  both  correctional  em-
ployees and inmates.’ ”1  Juris. Statement App., O. T. 2009, 

—————— 

1 A similar conclusion was reached by the Little Hoover Commission, 
a  bipartisan  and 
independent  state  body,  which  stated  that 
“[o]vercrowded conditions inside the prison walls are unsafe for inmates 
and staff,” Solving California’s Corrections Crisis: Time is Running Out 
17  (Jan.  2007),  and  that  “California’s  correctional  system  is  in  a  tail-
spin,” id., at i.