Court Rejects Schwarzenegger's Prison Plan

Oct. 22--A federal court today rejected Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's plan to solve California's prison overcrowding problem, ordering the state to come up with an alternative within three weeks or risk having judges order their own solution.

In a 7-page ruling, the three-judge panel deemed the plan offered last month by the governor and prison officials inadequate because it falls far short of the judges' August order that would require California to slash more than 40,000 inmates from the state's prisons within two years. The court has determined that the state prison system is so overcrowded that cannot provide adequate medical and mental health care to inmates, violating their constitutional rights.

For now, the federal judges rejected the call from prisoner rights lawyers to find Schwarzenegger in contempt. Instead, they are asking for the state to present a plan that would meet the original demand for the state to reduce its prison population to 137 percent of capacity, which would cut the number of inmates by roughly one quarter.

The plan submitted by the governor called for reducing the number of inmates by about half that amount over the next few years. Among other things, the three-judge panel noted that Schwarzenegger already backed a plan this summer that came close to the court's goal by cutting about 37,000 inmates, but that plan was rejected by the Legislature.

Contact Howard Mintz at 408-286-0236

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