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A new state office has been tasked to review local jail deaths throughout California and make recommendations for potential changes in practices or policies involving inmate custody.
“The ultimate goal here is through our reviews understand why deaths are occurring and work to prevent and (reduce) custody deaths,” said Allison Ganter, director of the newly created state In-Custody Death Review (ICDR) Division.
During a community presentation via Zoom Tuesday night, May 6, Ganter talked about the division, its responsibilities, and what it expects from local jurisdictions statewide. The session comes amid scrutiny over the deaths of six inmates in San Mateo County over the past two years.
The latest case occurred on March 15 when Kyle Harrison, convicted in connection with a fatal street-race collision in 2022, was found dead in a jail cell at the Maple Street Correctional Center in Redwood City.
Ganter’s talk was sponsored by civilian watchdog organizations Fixin’ San Mateo County, California Coalition for Sheriff Oversight and Community for Law Enforcement Accountability Now.
Ganter’s office and its efforts are “one step toward a stronger, safer (and) more just San Mateo County and California at large,” said Jim Lawrence, chair of Fixin’ San Mateo County. “Our speaker this evening will walk us through what that one step looks like. It’s a critical piece, though, in a larger movement to reform our institutions and restore trust.”
Ganter told the Zoom audience that her office was born out of Senate Bill 519, which was authored by then state Sen. Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, and signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2023.
Senate Bill 519 took effect in July 2024 and applies to inmate deaths at local detention centers after that point.
The legislation establishes ICDR within the Board of State and Community Corrections (BSCC) to review investigations of jail deaths, give recommendations to local sheriffs and departments of correction on improving inmate safety, and make the information public. The ICDR review occurs after a local jurisdiction finishes its investigation of an in-custody death.
“We’ll be looking to see if an agency followed their own policy and procedures,” Ganter said. “Was there any policy or practice that could be modified, that could be changed (or) that could prevent death in the future? And is there a need for training? Is there a need for facility modification? Did somebody die because of a structural problem in the facility? So those are the types of things that we’ll be looking at and recommendations that we’ll be making.”
SB 519 requires local agencies to respond to ICDR within 90 days regarding how they would or would not address recommendations, she said. “There is transparency included in the legislation. All of our reports, recommendations, and the responses of the sheriffs and other administrators will be made public once they are complete.”
However, Ganter acknowledged that her office doesn’t have the power to enforce recommendations.
“We can’t compel an agency to change practices,” she said. “We cannot force them to take the recommendations, which can be frustrating.”
But she pointed out that the public nature of the process could help spur agencies to action.
“My hope is that we’ll be able to work with agencies and see some meaningful change,” Ganter said. Although local authorities are not mandated to follow through on recommendations, “much of this work is transparent and public, and it’ll be available for all to see.”
BSCC spokesperson Jana Sanford-Miller told the Redwood City Pulse in an email that ICDR hasn’t made recommendations to San Mateo County as it has “not yet received the final, completed local investigation” into the Harrison death.
Of the six local inmate deaths, the Harrison case is the only one to fall under ICDR purview. The others happened before SB 519 went into effect.
Last month, County District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe reported that Harrison’s autopsy was determined to be inconclusive, with no definitive cause of death.
“The Sheriff’s Office is awaiting the independent investigation reports from the San Mateo County Coroner’s Office and the San Mateo County District Attorney’s Office in the death of Kyle Harrison,” Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Gretchen Spiker told this publication in an email. “The Sheriff’s Office will share findings publicly once the independent investigations are complete.”
But the Sheriff’s Office has already made inmate safety and welfare a top focus, Spiker said.
“This office has bolstered health and wellness programs to improve the overall well-being of incarcerated persons in San Mateo County,” she said.
Those efforts include expanding services to help those incarcerated with substance-abuse addiction through the detoxification process, the Sheriff’s Office said. The department also connects inmates struggling with mental illness with a behavioral-health provider and transitions them into a treatment program.
“In addition to the expansion of programs in its correctional facilities since January of 2023,” Spiker said, “the Sheriff’s Office has made transparency of in-custody deaths a priority – including sharing news releases on each in-custody death as well as findings of the independent investigations when they become available.”
Those interested can view the Zoom community presentation here and the slide deck here.
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