Jail conditions raise settlement concerns

Elise Kaplan, Albuquerque Journal, N.M.
·2 min read

Jun. 13—The Metropolitan Detention Center is subject to a settlement agreement, reached in 2015, in response to a decades-old lawsuit about the conditions at the facility, particularly for those suffering from mental illness.

The agreement, colloquially known as "McClendon" after the plaintiff Jimmy McClendon, lays out more than 250 requirements Bernalillo County has to follow regarding mental health services, medical services and confinement at the jail.

In November, the attorneys representing the plaintiffs filed a motion alleging the county is violating the constitutional right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment and for officers to provide humane conditions. Attorney Ryan Villa said the parties to the lawsuit have been working to resolve the emergency motion regarding staffing, and while an agreement has been reached in principle it still has to be approved.

Villa stressed that the facility has an obligation to ensure it is safely run, and without adequate staff it cannot do so. He also represents clients in other jails and prisons and said in his experience MDC has been one of the worst in terms of being chronically understaffed.

"The normal jail life is you're out of the pod, you're in the day room, you get to go outside every day. If you're eligible, you get to go to work, and you're only locked in your cell at nighttime, or when they're doing counts," Villa said. "At MDC, unlike any other jail that I know about in the state, every single weekend from Friday to Monday, our clients are locked in (a cell) the entire time. They do not get out, they're stuck in there. It's all because of staff."

Villa wondered if more people would want to work at the remote facility if the county drastically increased their hourly wage.

"You've got to drive way out to the West Side and have a very difficult job," he said. "If you can get a job for $20 or $25 an hour in town where you don't have to deal with that, you're going to do it. But if they raise the pay high enough, there's got to be a price point."