A Marin County judge could begin ordering the release or transfer of hundreds of men incarcerated at San Quentin State Prison as early as Monday.
More than 400 elderly and medically vulnerable incarcerated people petitioned the superior court for release during and after a massive COVID-19 outbreak at the prison this summer that infected 2,200 people and resulted in the deaths of 28 men.
Many of the men who’ve asked the court for relief are age 60 and over, or have chronic medical conditions that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has determined put them at greater risk of becoming seriously ill or dying from COVID-19.
The incarcerated men allege in court filings that prison officials violated their Eighth Amendment right against cruel and unusual punishment by exposing them to the virus.
The Marin County Public Defender’s office represents 249 of the men who’ve petitioned for release. Deputy Public Defender Christine O’Hanlon says some of them were locked up with cellmates who had the virus.
“We had numerous pairs where one person was negative, one was positive and [the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation] did nothing to separate them, and then they end up getting sick,” O’Hanlon said. “They were rolling the dice with those people’s lives.”
Marin County Superior Court Judge Geoffrey Howard plans to soon start ruling on cases — according to a Dec. 9 court order — beginning with older and sicker incarcerated people.
But Howard made clear he won’t order release from prison as the only remedy for the risk and suffering to incarcerated people. Prison officials may also transfer at-risk people to prisons with safer housing, the judge ruled.
That came as a blow to the men's attorneys, who’ve warned that any transfer of a medically vulnerable incarcerated people heightens the risk of transmission, especially with COVID-19 infections surging again in prisons across the state.