Santa Barbara County Grand Jury
• 2018-2019
• Agency Response
Response to:
Contraband in the Main Jail
Santa Barbera County Billbrown Stations Sheriff - Coroner Headquarters Buellton*
⚠️ Translation Notice: This content has been automatically translated. The original English text is the official version. Translation may contain errors.
⚠️ Este contenido ha sido traducido automáticamente. El texto original en inglés es la versión oficial. La traducción puede contener errores.
Findings and Recommendations 3 findings
F1
"Pat-down searches of arrestees have proven to be inadequate to intercept all of the contraband introduced into the Jail." The Sheriff agrees with the finding.
Related Recommendations (1)
R1
"That the Sheriff require all custody officers be trained specifically to pat-down arrestees more effectively at intake." This recommendation will be implemented. The Sheriff's Training Bureau has been instructed to develop and implement a lesson plan covering pat-searches at the next Quarterly Training for the Custody Operations Branch. The training will be delivered to all Branch members between 07/01/2019 and 09/30/2019. It should be noted, however, that not all contraband smuggled into the Jail is discoverable via pat-search.
F2
"Currently there are no full-body x-ray scanners in use at the Main Jail to detect contraband secreted on the person of arrestees, inmates or visitors, and only one is planned to be purchased for use at the Northern Branch Jail to be opened later this year." The Sheriff agrees with the finding. One full-body x-ray scanner is currently funded for installation at the Northern Branch Jail. Sheriff's Office members have been actively pursuing funding an additional unit for the Main Jail, but, due to budget restraints, the funding for this item has not been available.
No recommendations for this finding
F3
"There is only one drug-sniffing dog and he is used only periodically at the Main Jail to detect contraband." The Sheriff agrees with the finding. Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Office Response to the of 2
Related Recommendations (1)
R3
"That the Sheriff purchase one or more full body x-ray scanners to be used at the Main Jail, and one more full body x-ray scanner to be used at the Northern Branch Jail, in order to scan all arrestees and visitors." This recommendation will not be implemented. The full body x-ray scanners that are mentioned by the Grand Jury are not intended to screen every inmate and visitor that enters the facility. There are legal issues that preclude such a blanket policy. Furthermore, the fiscal impact of purchasing additional full body x-ray scanners would be prohibitive. Each unit costs between $150K and $300K depending on which manufacturer is selected. There are additional costs for installation, retrofitting existing space, training, and on-going maintenance and inspection costs. Thus, the recommendation is not warranted and is not reasonable, at this time. Nevertheless, the Sheriff is committed to reducing the amount of contraband in the Main Jail and will continue to explore funding opportunities that would allow for the purchase of a full body x-ray scanner at the Main Jail.
* This report's PDF did not contain easily extractable text and required Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for analysis. There may be minor errors in the extracted findings and recommendations due to OCR limitations with scanned documents.