High Noon for Texas Prisons

• NCJ Number: 90429
• Journal: Student Lawyer Volume: 11 Issue: 3 Dated: (1982) Pages: 27-32
• Author(s): D Holder
• Date Published: 1982
• Length: 6 pages
• Publication Format: Article
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This article reviews the findings in the Texas class action suit of Ruiz v. Estelle, which involved extensive condemnation of conditions in Texas prisons, and describes efforts by the State government to comply with the court decision.

Abstract

After a 159-day trial that involved 349 witnesses and 1,565 exhibits, the U.S. district court judge hearing the class action suit of Ruiz v. Estelle declared in December 1980 that nearly every aspect of the Texas Department of Corrections' operation was unconstitutional. The findings of fact documented dangerous overcrowding, inmate violence, primitive medical care, fire and safety hazards, and a myriad of other conditions considered to constitute cruel and unusual punishment. Examples of violence inflicted on inmates by prison officials were documented at the trial. To remedy overcrowding, the judge ordered an immediate end to the practice of housing all convicted felons in maximum security institutions by ordering the increased use of work furloughs, community corrections facilities, and medium and minimum security prisons. It was ordered that future prisons should serve no more than 500 inmates and should be built no farther than 50 miles from a city of 200,000 or more population. These latter provisions were overruled by an appeals court, however, on the grounds that a Federal court cannot dictate penal philosophy or the management approach to be used in State institutions. Some of the responses to the court's decision include the use of tents in prison yards to house inmates, the appropriation of $85 million to build an additional prison, increase staff to one guard for every seven prisoners, add dormitories for employees at three units, and help pay for planning and utilities. The use of halfway houses and community corrections facilities has also increased, and State officials are working with the American Medical Association to improve health care.