Inmates sit in crowded conditions at California State Prison in Los Angeles in this undated file photo. The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday, Aug. 2, 2013 paved the way for the early release of nearly 10,000 prisoners by year’s end despite warnings by Gov. Jerry Brown and other state officials that a public safety crisis looms if they’re forced to open the prison gates.SAN FRANCISCO – The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday paved the way for the early release of nearly 10,000 California inmates by year’s end despite warnings by Gov. Jerry Brown and other state officials that a public safety crisis looms if they’re forced to open the prison gates.
A majority of justices refused Brown’s emergency request to halt a lower court’s directive for the early release of the prisoners to ease severe overcrowding at California’s 33 adult prisons.
A panel of three federal judges previously ordered the state to cut its prison population by nearly 8 percent to roughly 110,000 inmates by Dec. 31 to avoid conditions amounting to cruel and unusual punishment.
The panel, responding to decades of lawsuits filed by inmates, repeatedly ordered early releases after finding inmates were needlessly dying and suffering because of inadequate medical and mental health care caused by overcrowding.
Court-appointed experts reported that the prison system had a suicide rate that worsened last year to 24 per 100,000 inmates, far exceeding the national average of 16 suicides per 100,000 inmates in state prisons.