The U.S. Marshals Service is moving hundreds of pretrial detainees from a facility in Clayton County to a detention center about 190 miles south of the federal courthouse in Atlanta — where the vast majority of the inmates’ cases will be heard.
There is opposition all over the legal community: federal judges, prosecutors and defense attorneys.
Chief U.S. District Judge Leigh Martin May, of the Northern District of Georgia, said in an Aug. 12 letter to a U.S. Department of Justice official that moving about 400 detainees from the Robert A. Deyton Detention Facility in Lovejoy to the Irwin County Detention Center in Ocilla would be a “catastrophe.”
May wrote that the detainees could raise constitutional concerns about their ability to prepare an adequate defense, and the judge attached a letter from the Federal Defender Program saying the distance to Ocilla would interfere with the defendants’ Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel.
The judge added that the plan would waste taxpayer dollars on travel costs and create scheduling difficulties resulting in the delay or cancellation of proceedings, “detrimentally impacting the court’s ability to handle criminal cases quickly and to conduct criminal trials.”
The Federal Defender Program estimates in its letter the added travel will cost the program an extra $1.3 million annually.
May added that Stephen Serrao, U.S. Marshal for the Northern District of Georgia, opposes the move and told him in a letter that she was disappointed in the decision, which was made by agency leadership in Washington, D.C. The judge called the move a “terrible idea” and wrote that she is surprised the Marshals Service has been “so dismissive of our very real concerns.”
The Marshals Service “has chosen to make a sudden decision without having a workable plan in place,” May wrote. “I expected better.”
The transfer plan was first reported by CBS News.
Theodore Hertzberg, the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, also opposes the move, according to the judge.
Officials with the Marshals Service and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District declined to comment on Tuesday, and the specific reasons for moving the detainees to Ocilla remained unclear.
Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC
Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC
In an email to May, Hertzberg and other officials on Friday, Serrao said the Marshals Service has notified the company that operates the Lovejoy facility that it is canceling its contract with the Lovejoy facility, effective Oct. 31. A phased transfer of the detainees is scheduled to begin this week.
Natasha Perdew Silas, executive director of the Federal Defender Program, said about 20 of the 400 detainees were moved Tuesday to Irwin County. A spokesperson for that facility’s operator, Louisiana-based LaSalle Corrections, could not be reached for comment.
Serrao wrote that the added distance “will significantly alter the way we produce prisoners for matters in Atlanta and our sub-offices. We have met with the (Irwin County) facility operators and have developed daily transportation plans that should meet the daily demands of the Courts.”
He also wrote that the Marshals Service plans to use a “robust” video teleconferencing capability to handle some matters, reducing the need to transport prisoners.
Silas said it’s crucial that her attorneys meet their clients in person to gain trust and discuss weighty decisions, like whether to accept a plea offer. The Federal Defender Program represents defendants who cannot afford a lawyer.
“Video conferencing is just not sufficient for a lot of the things that we do,” Silas told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “We’re advising people on decisions that are going to be potentially life-changing, and these are people who did not choose us as their lawyers.
“So you can’t just get on a Zoom and talk to somebody about a decision that might make a difference of between 10 and 20 years of their lives. You’ve got to do that in person.”
The Northern District’s pretrial detainees include people who are deemed a flight risk and face charges including illegal possession of a firearm, fraud, robbery and computer crimes, Silas said. About 30% of the Northern District’s caseload involves allegations of illegal reentry to the U.S. after deportation, she said, adding that many of the district’s pretrial detainees are accused of nonviolent crimes and some have no past criminal record.
The move to Ocilla will be especially hard for detainees who have family members in metro Atlanta, Silas said.
“So now we’re saying to family members, you need to be driving three hours or 190 miles at a time when fuel costs are over $4 a gallon,” she said.
Sandra Mayson, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania who has researched the effects of pretrial detention, agreed that the move could hinder detainees’ ability to prepare their defense.
A 2021 study by the Remote Detention Working Group, which is made up of judges, along with personnel from the U.S. Marshals Service and other federal agencies, found remote detention is a persistent problem.
Additionally, a 2021 report by the U.S. Marshals Service notes that the agency contracts with private detention facilities because it does not own or operate its own detention centers.
“In order to best service the courts and accommodate defendants’ need for access to their legal counsel and personal support system, such as family,” the report states, “the (Marshals Service) makes every effort to house prisoners within 50 miles of the courthouse.”
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