BY BRADEN CARTWRIGHT
Daily Post Staff Writer
Ten men died in Santa Clara County jails last year — the most deaths in custody in two decades, according to a report from a police auditor.
The president of the union for jail guards says they’re overworked, which is compromising safety.
Last year’s deaths were followed by a brutal attack in the jail on Jan. 27 that left one man dead.
Five of the deaths last year were from cancer or heart disease, said the report by police auditor Julie Ruhlin.
Three of the deaths were hanging suicides, and two of the deaths were drug overdoses, Ruhlin said. The men who died last year were between the ages of 22 and 75. Six men were assigned to the Elmwood Jail in Milpitas, and four men were at the Main Jail in San Jose.
Ruhlin said she was impressed with the sheriff’s reviews of the deaths, which include interviews withbdeputies, doctors and attorneys to get to the root cause.
“They pick apart their medical records. They pick apart the work that people have done,” Ruhlin told the Community Correction and Law Enforcement Monitoring Committee on Monday.
Reason for spike unclear
Ruhlin said she didn’t know why jails had the most deaths since 2005.
“Each one of these is so individualized … It wasn’t as if there was one thing that we could look to as a cause for why there were 10,” she said.
Ruhlin also said she didn’t evaluate the quality of medical care in the jails.
“It’s not really my place to speak to that,” she told the committee.
Ruhlin and her company OIR Group are hired by the county to review incidents at the Sheriff’s Office.
Concern over ‘medical neglect’
San Jose resident Paul Soto said he was concerned about “medical neglect,” or chronic conditions that aren’t treated until they’re in advanced stages.
“Just because someone died of natural causes, that doesn’t necessarily absolve any kind of accountability for that death,” Soto told the committee.
Oscar Umul Xicay, 23, of Mountain View, was allegedly attacked by three inmates at the Elmwood Jail in Milpitas on Jan. 27.
11-minute attack
Over the course of 11 minutes, two inmates beat, kicked and stomped Umul Xicay while a third inmate kept watch in the showers and around bunk beds.
Umul Xicay was in jail for allegedly vandalizing a keypad at the Mountain View police headquarters 12 hours earlier, court records show. Umul Xicay, who didn’t fight back, died at the hospital on Feb. 4.
Sheriff Bob Jonsen said the incident is a “stark reminder” of how important it is to improve safety in the jail.
Overtime for eight years
Jamey Hummer, president of the Santa Clara County Correctional Peace Officers Association, a union for jailers, said jail guards have been required to work overtime for eight of the last 13 years.
That means jail guards are working 12-hour shifts for nine of every 14 days, and they usually have to come in on weekends, Hummer said in an interview on March 12.
Jail guards have long commutes, spend less time with their family and are more likely to take other jobs, Hummer said.
Hummer said the custody bureau is like the Oakland Athletics of Bay Area law enforcement. Employees build up skills until they leave for somewhere else, leaving a vacuum of institutional knowledge and experience, Hummer said.
“You have a constant turnover where you never really develop a deep, cohesive staffing that is very effective at doing the job,” Hummer said. “You’re spread thinner than ever.”
Changes with Jonsen
Hummer said former Sheriff Laurie Smith treated the custody bureau like the “red-headed stepchild” during her tenure from 1998 to 2022, and enforcement always came first.
That has “completely changed” since Jonsen took office, Hummer said.
Jonsen has increased training, supervision and recruiting in the custody bureau while spearheading wellness initiatives, like allowing deputies to exercise while on duty, Hummer said.
And when the Board of Supervisors offered to buy Jonsen a limited number of tasers, Jonsen chose the custody bureau to receive them.
“That was pretty shocking, because most of department understood enforcement came first,” Hummer said.
You left out the part where the jailers are gassing inmates in their cells if they don’t follow orders. That ought to be illegal; it would be against the Geneva Convention.