Civilian Oversight at Essex County Jail Public Comment 07/26/2019
My comments to the Essex County Board of Chosen Freeholders about a civilian oversight committee for Essex County Jail like the one set forth by ACLU of New Jersey. This is basically what I said at public comment and then emailed to the Freeholders and Essex County Executive Joseph N. DiVincenzo, Jr.
Thank you for establishing funding for representation of the ICE detainees. But I wanted to raise a slightly different point than just ICE detainees. ICE detainees are only a portion of the population housed at the jail. Like the ICE detainees, pre-trial detainees, have not have even been convicted of crime. And then there are the portion who have been convicted of a crime.
But whatever their status, they’re all being subjected to what can only be called, inhumane treatment. But when the day comes and the last ICE detainee is removed, those remaining prisoners, Joe D’s prisoners, your prisoners, our prisoners, my prisoners, will remain.
The County Exec thought that telling us that everything was fixed, some things in only a few hours before the inspectors left, makes everything better. But that makes it worse. That means the problems where not systemic.They were fixed in a few hours. They could have been fixed at any time.
How long did these conditions exist before the ICE inspection? How long would they have continued without the ICE inspection? These issues represent a complete and abject failure of the jail leadership and the oversight of that leadership.That leadership should have been removed, immediately. The failure to do so indicates that nothing has actually changed and nothing will change. The jail leadership allowed these conditions to occur. They did nothing to remedy them on their own.
The only possible path forward from where this leaves us today is to establish a fully independent, empowered citizen oversight committee to oversee the operations and leadership of the jail.It must not be filled with Joe D supporters, people from political top 50 lists, County employees, or residents who look like me. It needs to reflect the jail population, speak their languages, and understand their context. This committee needs to be allowed to drop in to check conditions at the jail. They need to be able to speak with prisoners. They need to be able to review incident reports and camera footage without restrictions.
They need to have legally enshrined powers including but not limited to
* Involvement in disciplinary proceedings for staff and prisoners
* Review of staff personal files
* Review of prisoner complaints
* Removal of jail leadership
The committee needs to continue to exist forever, not just while ICE detainees are there. And in the meantime every dollar coming in from ICE needs to be reinvested in the jail and services for those detainees and prisoners to ensure that all prisoners and staff have safe and healthy living and working conditions.
Thank you.
