Continued Oversight of Death Row Urged

SAN FRANCISCO —  In a setback for prison officials, a federal monitor called for continued court oversight of San Quentin’s Death Row, even though conditions for California’s 250-plus condemned men are constitutional, a report distributed Friday says.

The state Department of Corrections had taken the position that the rules on Death Row should be the sole province of the prison administrators, as long as they met minimal constitutional standards.

Robert R. Riggs made the recommendation in a 57-page report to Senior U.S. District Judge Stanley Weigel, who appointed Riggs to oversee conditions on Death Row and enforce terms of a 1980 settlement of a suit over treatment of condemned inmates.

Weigel can endorse or reject the report, but in the past has generally sided with Riggs, his former clerk.

Consent Decree

The report grew out of hearings early this year on Death Row conditions. Attorneys for the inmates had asked that the state be held in contempt for failing to comply with several provisions of the settlement, called a consent decree.

Riggs agreed with the key claim of attorneys for the condemned prisoners: that they should be treated as much like prisoners in the general population as possible.

To that end, he ruled that the prison should give them more time out of their cells, showers on exercise yards that have both hot and cold water and shelves and cabinets in their cells.

Riggs recommended that Weigel order the prison to provide condemned inmates with dental floss, baby oil, shoe polish, plastic spoons, toothpicks and creamer. The prison had denied condemned prisoners such items, contending that they could be misused as weapons or in escape attempts.

Because of space and security concerns, condemned inmates cannot use the football field or tennis courts available to the general population. But as an alternative, Riggs recommended that San Quentin provide them with a table tennis table.

Noting that the condemned have “significant” legal problems, Riggs found that the prison does not provide adequate access to law books and recommended that the prison improve its system of getting legal material to the inmates.

Deadline Set

Riggs gave the prison until September to comply with his recommendations. If San Quentin fails to do so, the report calls on Weigel to hold the state in contempt of court.

San Quentin officials have justified denial of items ranging from dental floss to table tennis tables by arguing that Death Row inmates have become more of a threat now that the state Supreme Court regularly affirms sentences and executions are more likely.

“The evidence is not there that a condemned inmate is more dangerous than a mainline inmate,” said Jeffrey D. Wohl, an attorney for the prisoners.

Wohl lauded Riggs for leaving most of the settlement intact and calling for continued court oversight. Without oversight, conditions would worsen and prisoners would file new suits over conditions--and “that would be a long, drawn-out process,” Wohl said.

“Even though prison officials have great discretion, they can’t do things that are . . . fundamentally unfair,” said Wohl, a lawyer from the San Francisco law firm of Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliff.

Deputy Atty. Gen. John Donhoff Jr., representing San Quentin in the decade-old litigation, said he was “pleased” with Riggs’ finding that conditions do not violate the Eighth Amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.

He vowed, however, to press San Quentin’s claim that since conditions are constitutional, the settlement should be scrapped and the court should relinquish oversight.

“The federal courts should defer to the prison and state of California on the day-to-day handling of the condemned,” Donhoff said.

Riggs rejected the prisoners’ request that they be allowed to spend time out of their cells inside East Block, the cellblock where the bulk of them are housed.

The state had contended that it would have been required to undertake a building project costing as much as $100 million to make the necessary modifications. Riggs said, however, that San Quentin should build a cover for about $180,000 over the exercise yards used by condemned inmates and let them spend more time in the yards.

Riggs also sided with San Quentin by finding that problem inmates on Death Row can be denied exercise equipment, hobby crafts, cigarette lighters, access to telephones and other items deemed privileges in prison.