By Marilyn Miller
Akron Beacon Journal
AKRON, Ohio — The Summit County sheriff, short on funds for county jail operations, expects to start tapping inmates in January, telling them they can go free, and turning others away.
The question is: Which ones?
The answer will affect law enforcement, from the courts to patrol officers watching area highways.
“I don’t want my officers going through the motion of making arrests if the jail isn’t going to take them, so we have to find out how this affects us,” Akron police Chief James Nice said.
“Let’s say you have a DUI, if a driver under the influence would be jailed in the past but not now, then the troops need to know that. And then we need to have a plan for that. I just need to know that when they shut down that wing how does that affect who we are bringing in.”
Akron pays for 100 beds at the jail, so it has priority.
Stow Municipal Court judges want to know how to handle low-level repeat offenders who deserve time in jail, but under the rules would be released.
“The judges there said they know of a man who has been arrested 26 times and knows the law so well that he never steals anything that adds up to over $500 and makes sure he never puts his hands on a security [guard], because those factors would escalate the theft charge from a misdemeanor to a felony,” said Summit Sheriff Steve Barry.
“It’s not an overcrowding issue. We are actually under capacity — but severely understaffed,” Barry said. Because there is no money to add staff, he has “no choice but to take that other side down, and that’s our jail population.”
Voters in November rejected a county sales tax increase that would have generated about $20 million a year for 10 years.
Starting Jan. 4, Barry will shut down the jail’s west wing and reduce the capacity from 671 to 522, for a loss of 149 beds.
“Some likely nonviolent candidates for release would be people charged with passing bad checks or credit-card fraud for small amounts, and possibly low-level felonies such as drug users, as opposed to those charged with trafficking in drugs, who would not be released,” the sheriff said.
If additional releases are needed but all that remain are high-level felons, the county will move inmates to other jails — but will have to pay for their housing.
There are old rules in place.
Before an expansion in the mid-’90s, the jail was overcrowded and under a common pleas court order that established which inmates should be released first. That order remains active, but Barry has had meetings with judges for additional input.
Greg Macko, chief of corrections at the jail and legal counsel to the sheriff, said the sheriff has no choice.
“We had a state jail inspector who said we need more staff. We had 20 some violations but nine of them were directly or indirectly related to staffing,” according to Macko.
He said a national expert examined the situation and said: “Your staffing is inadequate and if you don’t get the personnel, you have to shut down two units.”
“The voters left the sheriff with no choice when Issue 12 did not pass,” Macko said. “He went to the county and officially asked for more money and the county told him they didn’t have it.”
County and municipal judges have different concerns. County judges deal with felons.
Administrative Common Pleas Court Judge Tammy O’Brien said the sheriff’s office is recommending lower bonds for some low-level felonies, allowing more to go free but at a personal cost if they fail to show up in court.
“They are less of a flight risk and less of a risk to the community,” O’Brien said. “The sheriff’s department is going to start flagging those cases and asking the judges to reduce the bond or give them a signature bond because the jail just doesn’t have the capacity to hold them.”
Maj. Dale Soltis, commander of the jail, said about 60 percent of the 600-some inmates are there awaiting sentencing.
In addition, O’Brien said the sheriff is urging jail alternatives, such as halfway programs and house arrest.
“The judges will be looking at less controlled sanctions before just releasing inmates to the street with no monitoring,” O’Brien said. “We also have to reconsider some inmates who may not be a threat to the community but a threat to themselves, like the heroin addicts. They are jailed for their own protection.”
“There are tools in place to assess the risk to the community but human behavior is not always predictable, so we do our best not to put the safety of the community in any danger, but we don’t have crystal balls either,” O’Brien said.
“We’re not trying to scare people,” Sheriff Barry said. “We’re just trying to lay out the facts and what the reality is, and the reality is we have no choice but to start releasing inmates.”