Opinion ID: 422091
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: March 22 Release Order

Text: 7 The County defendants contend that they have carefully shaped a remedy for the overcrowding conditions through the proposed new construction and limited emergency double-bunking. They submit that they have submitted a reasonable constitutional remedy which directly addresses the issue of overcrowding and does not interfere with decisions of the state court system. The County officials argue that the district court's release order is an unwarranted intrusion into the County's authority. 8 The issue before this Court is whether the district court's choice of remedies for the overcrowded conditions and enforcement of the Consent Decree was an abuse of its discretion. As the Supreme Court held in Lemon v. Kurtzman, 411 U.S. 192, 200, 93 S.Ct. 1463, 1469, 36 L.Ed.2d 151 (1973) when shaping equity decrees, the trial court is vested with broad discretionary power; appellate review is correspondingly narrow. See also United States v. City of Chicago, 631 F.2d 469 (7th Cir.1980). An abuse of discretion occurs when no reasonable person could take the view adopted by the trial court. If reasonable persons could differ, no abuse of discretion can be found. Harrington v. DeVito, 656 F.2d 264, 269 (7th Cir.1981), cert. denied, 455 U.S. 993, 102 S.Ct. 1621, 71 L.Ed.2d 854 (1982). 9 The March 22 Opinion and Order clearly indicated that the district court was aware of, and sensitive to, the need to strike a proper balance between the integrity of the Consent Decree and the principles of federalism. R. 31, p. 2. The implementation of a population ceiling was recommended by the Monitor. The figure of 4500 reached after hearings and recommendations by counsel reflected the capacity of the facility, minus a numerical factor as a buffer for repairs, etc. The district court, when it set the cap, clearly left to the appropriate state and county agencies the determination of the means to reach the population cap. While the appropriate agencies in early 1983 began to consider remedial measures, it was Judge Shadur's determination that the problem will not go away and that a means must be selected to assure effective compliance with the ceiling set by the Order. Id. at p. 4. (The district court had previously set a date of February 11, 1983 but that date had been postponed pending the recommendations of the parties). These appropriate agencies have failed to come up with a proposal within the principles of the Decree. 10 The Release Order called for the reduction of the inmate population through the release, on their own recognizance, of low-bond pretrial detainees as necessary to reach the cap. These releases would occur after April 15, 1983 if no Illinois state court of competent jurisdiction has then specified a different method of selecting. Id. at p. 5. As Judge Shadur pointed out, the March 22 Order placed the primary and direct responsibility on the state court judiciary to meet the problems in the prisons and begin corrective methods. Id. The district court fashioned a remedy placing the responsibility for the jail on the appropriate parties and not in the federal court. 11 It should be noted that the persons eligible for possible release on their own recognizance are low-bond pretrial detainees. These individuals have not been convicted of the crime for which they are being detained, but are in the preliminary stages of a criminal proceeding and are unable to make bail. Low-bond detainees ($500 or less) averaged over 800 inmates in the County facilities from August-November 1982. R. 22, Ex. 3, p. 8. These detainees represented 60% of the increase in the jail population in 1982. Id. In November 1982, approximately 200 jail inmates required bonds of less than $100 and another 200 required bonds up to $200. Plaintiffs' Sur-Reply filed December 13, 1982, Ex. B, Appellants' Appendix, p. A-145. Thus, the possible beneficiaries of the Release Order are not convicts nor are they subject to serious state bail requirements. 12 The district court, when it entered the March 22 Opinion and Order was confronted with a nearly year-old Consent Decree and substantial noncompliance with that Decree by the County defendants. These officials had been invited to develop a workable remedy and their only suggestion was to modify the bargained-for Consent Decree. The district court did not act precipitously but rather acted fairly and reasonably to ease a critical problem. As Judge Shadur pointed out in his Opinion, State and County agencies must address this problem. 13 From a longer range point of view, the Cook County Board has just authorized construction of supplemental facilities with a capacity of housing 500 inmates--a step that can be taken much more expeditiously than a more ambitious building project. That too is a means that should have been addressed before the situation reached its current crisis proportions, but once in place it will obviously ease (though not solve) the situation. This entire matter of overcrowding needs constant monitoring to prevent recurrence, and one of the real dangers of a solution that involves simply increasing the number of available spaces is that it might create a tendency for the various responsible state agencies to ease up and let the problem get out of hand again--not intentionally, but because the matter might no longer be viewed as a pressing immediate need. Unfortunately correctional institution population tends to operate somewhat like the law of physics in which a gas always expands to fill the available space. 14 R. 31, p. 4 n. 5. 15 This Court is under the impression that the County defendants are attempting to avoid compliance with the Consent Decree by rewriting the terms which they have difficulty meeting. It was reasonable for the district court to enter what it considered the best remedy to the overcrowding in the County jail facilities.