Settlement to be approved 2 years after jail closure

Two years after Gloucester County became the first county in New Jersey to close its jail, a legal objection by public defenders is set to be formally settled under an agreement that guarantees certain accommodations for inmates.

The proposed settlement, expected to be voted on by Gloucester County freeholders Wednesday, includes provisions to address issues that remained after the jail was shuttered and public opposition waned, such as when to use shackles.

Filed by Public Defender Joseph E. Krakora's office and three county inmates at the time, the 2013 lawsuit tried to block the closing, arguing it would harm attorneys' ability to counsel clients, who are now housed in jails in several other counties. Attempts to temporarily halt the closing were unsuccessful in court, but the lawsuit remained active.

"We wanted to stop the closing of that jail, because we thought it would . . . burden access to counsel," said Justin Loughry, a former public defender who represented Krakora's office in the suit against Gloucester and four other counties that now receive inmates. Though that failed, Loughry said, the county "came up with a plan" to address access to inmates.

Under the agreement, the county must provide videoconference hardware and software for public defenders to conduct remote meetings with inmates, in addition to continuing to transport clients to Woodbury for attorney meetings. The county already provides those services, County Administrator Chad Bruner said Monday.

"It's not a major change in operations," he said. "There were commonsense requests, and these were commonsense measures we could easily accommodate."

Among those is that when there are fewer than five inmates in the holding area of the Gloucester County jail - its four holding cells are used when clients are brought for meetings with lawyers - the prisoners will not be shackled unless the warden finds that an inmate or inmates "pose a security risk." They are, however, to be shackled during the meetings with attorneys, according to the settlement. The previous policy was to leave shackles on at all times.

Bruner and Loughry said the settlement was worked out months ago, but one of the inmate plaintiffs would not agree to the deal. Loughry said he eventually filed a motion to withdraw his representation of that inmate, Timothy Harvey, because Harvey would not settle and was seeking financial compensation. The withdrawal was approved, and Harvey's claims were separately dismissed in a summary judgment, Loughry said.

While he said he would not call the agreement a "victory," Loughry said the settlement process brought about changes, such as the shackling practice, which marked "a humane improvement." He said the court and the county appeared optimistic that the system to provide inmates access to attorneys "would safeguard that constitutional right over the long term. And we hope it does."

When the county closed its jail, there were 240 adult male inmates (female inmates and juveniles had already been housed in other counties). The county has about 330 inmates total, with the majority held in Salem and Cumberland Counties; others are in Burlington, Essex, and Camden Counties.

Gloucester has negotiated a daily rate of $83 per inmate in all counties except Essex, where the charge is $108, Bruner said. The county has six inmates at that North Jersey jail, which Bruner said the county uses mostly for inmates with medical issues because of its convenient access to secure medical facilities.

Officials say the closing of the jail - which cost about $28 million yearly to operate - will save the county about $18 million by the end of 2015. Beginning next year, the county expects to save more than $10 million annually, Bruner said.

Although no other counties have followed Gloucester's lead in closing a jail, some have been eyeing similar opportunities. Burlington County has commissioned a study to examine the possibility of a regional jail system; four other counties are participating.