Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Criminal Law Blogs -> Grits for Breakfast

Criminal Law

: Grits for Breakfast

Needless pretrial detention main cause of Harris jail overcrowding

In the Houston Chronicle today, Lise Olsen has a story ("Thousands languish in crowded jail") focused on the overuse of pretrial detention for petty defendants. Here's how the story opens:More than half of the 11,500 inmates crammed into the Harris County Jail have not yet been found guilty of a crime but await their day in court confined with convicted criminals in conditions that repeatedly flunk state and federal safety inspections.The most common accusation against them: possession of a crack pipe or minuscule amount of drugs. Though the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right to a speedy trial, at least 500 county inmates have been locked up for more than a year as they wait to be judged, according to an analysis of inmate data by the Houston Chronicle...continue to full post

Full post as published by Grits for Breakfast on August 23, 2009 (boomark / email).