A federal judge has ruled that the risk of COVID-19 exposure in Shelby County’s main jail does not warrant the immediate release of medically-vulnerable detainees awaiting trial, as a lawsuit has asked. Still, the court encouraged jail administrators to do more to protect the health of the incarcerated.
U.S. District Court Judge Sheryl Lipman found improvements at the jail since the American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit was filed in May. Video teleconferening has cut some in-person court appearances and more social distancing measures have been put in place. In her ruling, Lipman called other changes such as better cleaning protocols “signs of progress.”
As a result of these corrective measures and because safety shortcomings at the jail found by an independent inspector "can likely be fixed," she decided not to rule on whether keeping medically at-risk people in jail during the pandemic violated their constitutional rights, which the lawsuit alleges.
Still, she identified areas for jail administrators to reconsider, such as finding alternatives to confinement for medically vulnerable pre-trial detainees, and further reducing their exposure to other inmates while in cells or standing in line to receive medicine.
Josh Spickler with the criminal justice reform nonprofit, Just City, remains particularly concerned with Lipman’s finding that individuals' medical conditions aren’t being considered when judges set bail.
“Everyone needs to come together and start being creative about solutions to keep that jail population lower and to not have people in that jail who are there only because they’re poor,” he says.
During the first three months of the pandemic, officials reduced the jail population by about 15 percent, to slightly over 1,800 people. Since then, that number has grown by about 100 as of last week.
A spokesperson for the Shelby County Sheriff's office, which manages 201 Poplar, did not specify which of the shortcomings that the judge pointed out are under consideration at the jail, but that the office will “do whatever we can within our capabilities to make appropriate adjustments.”