ACLU files suit over California jail waits for defendants found incompetent to stand trial
The suit, filed on July 29, 2015, was brought on behalf of relatives of people with serious mental illness or intellectual disabilities. It names the Department of State Hospitals and the Department of Developmental Services and argues that people declared incompetent to stand trial wait months, and sometimes more than a year, in county jails before they are moved to a treatment facility. The plaintiffs said the delays violate state and federal law and the right to due process, and asked that transfers happen within a week of the paperwork reaching the state.
Two families anchor the complaint. One woman's intellectually disabled son waited about eight months in the Los Angeles County jail after a 2012 incompetency finding and was sexually assaulted there. The daughters of Rodney Bock said their father, found incompetent because of severe mental illness, deteriorated in the Sutter County jail and died by suicide while waiting for a state hospital bed.
The filing is the starting point of the litigation that, in 2019, led a trial court to require admission within 28 days, and that remained under court supervision for years afterward. It is the foundational document for California's jail-waitlist fight.
Source: ACLU Sues State Hospital System for Failing Criminal Defendants with Psychiatric & Intellectual Disabilities — ACLU of Northern California
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