The state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation also will make sure that inmates released as part of the expedited parole have a place to quarantine away from their families, Willis said.
“In this new process with the early release,” Willis said, “their plan is to have transportation for every inmate that is released to be brought to their home or hotel room.”
As of Monday there were 2,419 inmates with COVID-19 in California prisons and 1,381 of them were at San Quentin. The virus is suspected in at least six inmate deaths at San Quentin. There had been 165 confirmed cases among San Quentin staff; 13 have returned to work.
On Monday, there were 67 San Quentin inmates hospitalized with COVID-19, 12 in Marin hospitals. Willis said the prison is averaging about 10 new hospitalizations a day.
Eligible inmates have 180 days or less to serve on their sentences and are not serving time for domestic violence, a serious crime as defined by law, or a sex offense. Willis said about 100 inmates will be released from San Quentin as part of the expedited parole process.
Asked last week to describe how releases at San Quentin work, Terry Thornton, a state prisons spokeswoman, wrote in an email that released inmates may be picked up at the prison by family or friends, by a community residential treatment facility where they are planning on living, or by their parole agent.
If an offender has a hold, detainer or warrant from any law enforcement agency — including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement — that agency might also arrange for pickup.
“If none of those factors exist,” Thornton wrote, “that person may be taken to a bus station.”
Willis said inmates will be tested seven days prior to their release date. He said inmates who test positive will be provided with a hotel room in which to quarantine through a Federal Emergency Management Agency-funded program called Project Hope.
Willis said inmates who test negative and have no place to go after release will be housed through Project Roomkey, a statewide initiative to secure hotel and motel rooms for the homelessness to stem transmission of the virus.
“Our recommendation,” Willis said, “is that all inmates from San Quentin should be treated as if they’ve been exposed and should be quarantined prior to returning to their homes.”
When inmates are released, they are required by law to return to the county in which they resided when they were incarcerated.
Mike Daly, the chief probation officer in Marin County, said he knew of one San Quentin inmate who recently returned to Marin after testing positive who is living with relatives. Daly said he is expecting seven other inmates to return to Marin from prisons around the state as part of the early release program.
Last week, J. Clark Kelso, the court-appointed federal receiver for the state’s prison medical care system, responded to calls from Marin supervisors and others to establish an incident command to manage San Quentin’s response to the massive outbreak and boost the prison’s capacity to treat inmates on-site.
Willis, who is advising the incident command, said that by Wednesday, an alternate care facility, something short of a field hospital that will include more doctors and nurses, should be operational at the prison.
During an oversight hearing on the spread of COVID-19 in state prisons held by the state Senate’s public safety committee on Thursday, Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, objected to the Department of Corrections allowing ICE to pick up inmates at the prison after they have completed their sentences. According to Wiener’s office, ICE picked up some 575 inmates at San Quentin between January and May.
“When we transfer to ICE we’re sending people who may be vulnerable themselves to private prison ICE detention facilities, where we believe one in three of the detainees are COVID positive,” Wiener said. “That needs to end immediately.”
Ralph Diaz, secretary for the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, responded, “They’re picked up by ICE just like any other law enforcement agency that might have a hold on an individual.
“If there is a hold in place, Senator,” he said, “we will continue to enforce that.”
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