By C1 Staff
TULSA COUNTY, Okla. — A letter penned by the Tulsa County Jail sheriff has ten cities in an uproar.
Tulsa World reports that attorneys for the cities are firing back, saying that they won’t be dealing with the sheriff when it comes to who’s incarcerated at the Tulsa County Jail and at what cost.
This all comes from a letter penned by Sheriff Stanley Glanz, who said he would no longer be accepting prisoners without formal charges. If the prisoners were to be housed at the jail, it would be on the city’s dime until charges were filed.
Attorneys further explained that Glanz has no authority to define which prisoners can be kept in the jail or how much the county can charge to hold them.
One attorney stated that Glanz didn’t even have the authority to send out the initial letter without the permission of the Tulsa County Criminal Justice Authority.
The city of Tulsa is currently one of two local municipalities that have agreements with the CJA to house their municipal inmates in the Tulsa Jail. Tulsa contracts to hold its municipal inmates there because it has no city jail.
Glanz’s proposal would require each local municipality to sign an agreement and would expand the definition of “municipal inmate” to include prisoners held on city charges “whether or not [they are] also held on state charges.”
In response, Glanz points to a state attorney general’s opinion to support his claim that municipalities are responsible for holding inmates until charges are filed. He also added that the CJA trust indenture states clearly that county commissioners have the right to charge municipalities for holding their inmates.
Attorneys claim Glanz is misreading the attorney general’s opinion and the trust indenture. They note that the opinion states that who is responsible for holding state violators prior to charges being filed “is a matter to be resolved between municipal and county authorities” and that it is the peace officers’ duty to “secure the arrestee until the authorities resolve the matter.”
Another attorney maintains the issue was resolved when voters passed the jail tax in the mid-90s to fund construction, maintenance and operation of the jail.
“That is why the regional authority was created – so there would be regional cooperation among municipalities and the county,” he said. “So citizens of Collinsville (and other local communities) have already paid for this service that now they are being charged for without legal authority or actual authority.”
The CJA trust indenture gives county commissioners the authority to set the rate for holding a municipal prisoner in the Tulsa Jail, which is not the definition of a municipal inmate that Glanz has proposed, according to the attorneys.
They say this flies in the face of common practice since the trust indenture was signed.