McLennan County Jail Inspection by Texas Commission on Jail Standards

The Texas Commission on Jail Standards (“TCJS”) recently inspected the Jack Harwell Detention Center in McLennan County. The inspection occurred on August 13, 2018.

TCJS noted that a jail facility must have an established procedure for documented, face-to-face observation of all inmates by jailers, occurring no less than once every 60 minutes. Jailers at the jail exceeded this 60-minute observation interval, and found at least one observation that occurred after an observation occurring 1 hour and 35 minutes before. Further, the TCJS noted that observation logs indicated that certain observations were completed, even though video recordings showed that they were not completed. Thus, jailers were not complying with Texas minimum jail standards.

Moreover, and even more important, jailers exceeded the required 30-minute face-to-face observations in areas in which inmates were known to be potentially suicidal, assaultive, mentally ill, or who had demonstrated bizarre behavior. In fact, the most lengthy time between such observations in such an area was almost 2 hours. Further, once again, even though observation logs indicated that observations were completed as required, the video evidence proved that the observation logs were false.

Finally, the TCJS reviewed video related to whether jailers were in their assigned wings. After such review, the TCJS noted that jailers had not remained in their assigned wings, thus violating a staffing agreement submitted by facility administration on April 10, 2018.

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