The Fulton County Jail continues to deal with the issue of overcrowding, even though jail officials believed a plan to move prisoners to other facilities for incarceration would alleviate the problem.
“It’s about safety first and foremost,” Sheriff Pat Labat said of the plan to ease overcrowding at the Fulton County Jail, last week after 400 prisoners were moved from the severely dilapidated and dangerously overcrowded facility to the City of Atlanta City Detention Center along with facilities in Cobb and Forsythe counties.
But Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee has ruled against moving more than 1,000 prisoners out of state to prisons in Mississippi said Georgia law prohibits the move and only allows transfers due to unsafe conditions to the “nearest county” with a secure jail.
In addition to the overcrowding issues which are in large part due to the extreme lack of processing for inmates and cases, Labat is also requesting $1 billion dollar for the construction of a new jail and another $1 million to keep the ankle monitor program going through the end of the year.
According to public records 1,232 people housed at the jail have not yet had their day in court, with too many waiting a year or even a decade behind bars – for their cases to go to court
According to records obtained from the Fulton County Superior Court Clerk in August, at least 1,232 people inside the jail have not been indicted. About 60 of them have been waiting more than a year.
They are individuals not formally charged with felonies, waiting for Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ office to take the case to a grand jury to determine charges, while they sit behind bars.
The facility has been at the center of an outpouring of concerns regarding concerns about the health and well-being of people being housed at the facility, Even with the current reduction in the jail’s population at 1,125 remaining prisoners the Rice Street…
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