Controlling the flow of contraband in the Santa Barbara County Main Jail remains a challenge despite efforts to keep prohibited items out of the Goleta facility, a Santa Barbara County grand jury has determined.
In a four-page report released Tuesday, the grand jury — a 19-member panel of volunteers who oversee the more than 70 government entities in Santa Barbara County — urged the Sheriff's Office to purchase full-body X-ray scanners, acquire an additional drug detection dog and improve their pat-down procedures to ensure illicit goods stay out of the hands of inmates.
"Dealing with contraband in a jail environment is very challenging," the report notes, referencing a July 2009 response from the Sheriff's Office. "Now, over nine years later, this challenging situation has remained the same."
The Sheriff's Office has until early August to respond to the report.
In issuing its report, the grand jury sought to determine how effective the Sheriff's Office is at intercepting contraband — from drugs and alcohol to currency and cellular phones, and even knives, guns and other items that can weaponized — before it enters the Main Jail, and discovering and confiscating material found inside the facility.
Public employee pension plans in Santa Barbara County face potentially serious liquidity and solvency risks that may require the county and it…
Jurors, the report notes, believe many Main Jail inmates and re-entrants "are addicted to drugs and/or alcohol" and that the proliferation of contraband "creates a built-in, captive marketplace" for suppliers.
There is no single way for contraband to enter the jail.
Although it is typically stashed in an undetectable location on an inmate or a visitor, contraband is sometimes mailed to inmates — one postcard intercepted during screening was doused in methamphetamine — brought in by outside vendors and their employees, or even smuggled by custody staff.
Although none of the senior Sheriff's Office officials interviewed by jurors could recall an incident in recent memory where individuals other than inmates or their visitors attempted to bring illicit items into the Main Jail, one custody deputy claimed the contraband challenge has "actually worsened" over the last few years.
Two hundred fourteen drug-related incidents — where alcohol or other controlled substances were discovered in the Main Jail or intercepted on their way in — were reported in 2018, according to logs maintained by the Sheriff's Office.
Deputies confiscated up to $20,000 in heroin, methamphetamine and other prescription drugs from a housing unit that August, and earlier that year, heroin and methamphetamine hidden in a plastic bag were found on a woman in a Lompoc holding cell.
"Clearly, but not unexpectedly, these incidents demonstrate that there is a continuing contraband problem which obviously commands constant law enforcement vigilance," the report states.
In addition to mail screenings, contraband is often found during unannounced cell searches, perimeter checks, observation, odor detection and by information provided by other inmates.
Although no fatal overdose has occurred since 2009, two were reported in January 2019.
June 13, 2019
Santa Maria Times
By Mathew Burciaga
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