AB 280: Segregated confinement.

Existing law establishes the state prisons under the jurisdiction of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Existing law places county jails under the jurisdiction of the sheriff for the confinement of persons sentenced to imprisonment for the conviction of a crime.

This bill would require every jail, prison, public or privately operated detention facility, and a facility in which individuals are subject to confinement or involuntary detention to develop and follow written procedures governing the management of segregated confinement, as specified, and to make those written procedures publicly available. The bill would require those facilities to document the use of segregated confinement by, among other things, providing written orders of that confinement to the individual confined, as specified. The bill would prohibit those facilities from involuntarily placing an individual in segregated confinement if the individual belongs to a designated population, including, among others, that the individual has a mental or physical disability or that the individual is under 26 years of age or over 59 years of age. The bill would require the facility to periodically check on the individual and have a medical or mental health professional periodically assess the individual. This bill would require a facility to offer out-of-cell programming to individuals in segregated confinement for at least 4 hours per day, not including time spent on an unpaid work assignment or in paid employment. The bill would require a facility to maximize the amount of time that an incarcerated person held in segregated confinement spends outside of their cell by providing outdoor and indoor recreation, education, clinically appropriate treatment therapies, and skill-building activities, as specified, and would require facilities to develop and provide appropriate programming to individuals that pose a significant safety risk to themselves or others, as specified. The bill would also authorize a facility to use segregated confinement to help treat and protect against the spread of communicable disease, under certain circumstances.

This bill would prohibit a facility from holding an individual in segregated confinement for more than 15 consecutive days and no more than 45 days in a 180-day period, as specified. This bill would also prohibit a facility from imposing limitations on services, treatment, or basic needs; conducting out-of-cell programming opportunities in a smaller cage or therapy module; placing an individual in segregated confinement on the basis of confidential information, as specified; using specified restraints when an individual is in segregated confinement; and using segregated confinement as a means of protecting an individual. This bill would require a facility administrator or chief physician to conduct a secondary review of a person in segregated confinements dispute regarding qualification in the designated populations category. This bill would require facilities to create and publish monthly, semiannual, and annual reports, as specified. The bill would require the Office of the Inspector General and the Board of State and Community Corrections to assess each facilitys compliance with the act, as specified. This bill would require local and state authorities to promulgate regulations or directives to implement the act, where applicable. The bill would declare these provisions to be severable. By imposing additional duties on county jails, this bill would create a state-mandated local program.

The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement.

This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to the statutory provisions noted above.