By Dan McKay
Albuquerque Journal
ALBUQUERQUE, NM — Attorneys representing local inmates say now isn’t the right time for a trial on whether conditions inside the Bernalillo County jail violate inmates’ constitutional rights.
A trial would interfere with court-guided efforts to improve the jail, they said.
It would undo “the entire history of this litigation, including all of the court’s orders,” the inmate attorneys say in a court filing.
Their comments came in a formal response to the county’s request for a trial in the case, which centers on jail overcrowding.
Furthermore, the inmate attorneys say, the county’s push for a trial comes amid proceedings to determine whether the county should be held in contempt of court for failing to provide a proper plan to improve conditions inside the jail.
The inmate attorneys asked Senior U.S. District Judge James A. Parker to deny the county’s motion for a trial on the merits.
The argument over a trial comes as the lawsuit over jail conditions passes its 19th anniversary. The suit was filed in 1995.
The county contends that years of settlement negotiations and other legal maneuvering failed to resolve the litigation. A trial would be a logical way to end the case, the county said, and it asked Parker to order one.
The jail population has fallen in recent months after the county started shipping inmates to other jails – one as far away as eastern Texas – and moved more inmates into a house arrest-like program. The Metropolitan Detention Center was designed for 2,236 inmates, but the population has climbed above 2,900 at times over the years. The population was down to about 2,050 inmates earlier this month.
Inmate attorneys, in their response, say the county’s motion would nullify the court’s recent work to improve jail conditions.
Judge Parker last year ordered the county to develop a plan to address overcrowding and warned that the county might face “substantial” daily fines.
The work of the court and others “during 2013 to ameliorate the problematic conditions of confinement within the MDC, and thereby achieve resolution of the litigation, would be swept away by setting aside the Judgment, and starting the entire case over,” inmate attorneys wrote.
The county spends about $1 million a year on attorney fees and for monitoring jail conditions.