No Coronavirus In Will County Jail Yet, But Concerns Remain

WILL COUNTY, IL — While the National Guard is responding to an outbreak of the new coronavirus at Stateville Correctional Center in Crest Hill, there were no confirmed cases of coronavirus infection among the inmates of the Will County Adult Detention Facility in Joliet, the Will County Sheriff's Office told Patch on Friday. However, some concerns remain.

Kathy Hoffmeyer, the sheriff's office media affairs representative, told Patch that county deputies are attempting to limit the number of people brought to the jail and that plans are in place to prepare for an eventual outbreak.

"The sheriff and the administrators at the jail have a plan in place," Hoffmeyer said, "in case things get more fluid than they are."

According to Hoffmeyer, the first step the county is taking to try to prevent a coronavirus outbreak in the jail is to curtail the number of arrests being made. Sheriffs deputies have ceased arresting most low-level and nonviolent offenders, she said. Instead, Hoffmeyer said, these persons are being issued personal recognizance bonds — basically having them promise to appear in court on a given day or face more serious consequences if they fail to do so.

"Our patrol officers are under directive now in relations to arrest ... if someone has just has a misdemeanor, they're issuing the I-bonds and releasing them on-site, with just a promise to appear," Hoffmeyer said.

However, Hoffmeyer said, there are still people the county is legally obliged to arrest and bring in to the facility. These include people accused of felonies and those with prior warrants from outside the county. Some efforts are being taken by the sheriff's office in tandem with the state's attorney's office to quash warrants for low-level offenders.

"As far as felonies, all the departments have to follow normal procedures," she said. "They have to bring those people into the jail."

For those persons and for inmates who had already been in the facility before the coronavirus crisis, Hoffmeyer said, efforts are being made as much as possible in a jail to practice social distancing.

She said one inmate with a fever was being kept in medical isolation as of Friday but that he had not tested positive for the coronavirus.

Patch asked Hoffmeyer for documents confirming that inmate's status, along with any documents that outlined the jail's plans for coronavirus response, via a Freedom of Information Act request Thursday. On Wednesday morning, Patch received an email from Will County Sheriff's Office FOIA administrator Shannon Wahl.

It stated that no documents existed regarding the jail's confirmed coronavirus cases or plans to address the coronavirus.

Hoffmeyer also said she did not know how many coronavirus test kits had been given to the jail's medical staff, who are employees of Wellpath, a for-profit health care company owned by private equity firm H.I.G. Capital. Besides the test kits, Hoffmeyer said, medical staff were relying on questionnaires and basic medical checkups to screen new inmates.

"We contract out our medical professionals within the jail; they are screening all intake," she said. "They've increased their questions, their questionnaires. You know, as far as traveling, where they've been. Also, [new inmates'] temperatures are being taken, and they're asked about any other symptoms."

As the coronavirus continues, many critics have begun to point out that U.S. institutions, jails included, were unprepared for a pandemic of this scale. The U.S. currently has more confirmed coronavirus cases than any other country on the planet and despite efforts to "flatten the curve," some medical experts believe that the crisis could continue into the summer.

Many medical facilities are already becoming overwhelmed with cases, many more are struggling to acquire even basic equipment for health care workers and patients. Jails and prisons in particular are struggling with the problem that, with so many people locked away in facilities that limit space and movement, the potential for disease to quickly spread can be high.

Illinois ACLU representative Ed Yohnka said that there are not only biological concerns exacerbating the crisis in detention facilities, but social ones. The U.S. currently has the largest incarcerated population in the world, disproportionately composed of non-white people. To slow the spread of the disease, Yonkha said that prisons should do everything in their power to lower that population by releasing as many people as they can.

"There's no doubt that the transmission of the coronavirus is a particular threat for those that are detained ... one of the things we know is these are just locations where social distancing can't be a reality," he said. "I think [prisons and jails] should think about all the tools that they have to reduce the population of the facility …. Expedited release, not holding people who simply are there because they can't afford a bail."

Hoffmeyer said the Will County Adult Detention Facility is attempting to reduce its population, with minor success.

"We have like 579 inmates," Hoffmeyer said. "Last week, we had something like 603 total …. We're trying to get those numbers down the best that we can."

However, Hoffmeyer also said that the jail has not yet conducted any early releases of nonviolent or low-level-offense inmates.

Besides releasing nonviolent inmates, Yohnka said, the state should make efforts to ensure any and all detention facilities are adequately equipped with medical equipment - like coronavirus test kits - and hygiene products.

Yohnka also said the coronavirus crisis should teach American leaders, if they haven't learned it already, that having such a large prison population is not just an adverse social issue but also one of public health.

"The time to have this conversation was not during the middle of a pandemic," he said. "[That time] was years ago."

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