Judge Denies Pretrial Release to Defendant Who Raised 'Heightened Risk' of COVID-19 Due to Health, Jail Conditions

A federal magistrate judge in San Jose has denied a request from a criminal defendant who claimed his preexisting medical conditions put him at risk of contracting COVID-19 while in custody pretrial.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Susan van Keulen of the Northern District of California denied a motion brought by lawyers for Armando Trujillo, who argued his diabetes and congestive heart failure coupled with living conditions at the Santa Rita jail made him especially susceptible to the virus. Van Keulen, who had ordered Trujillo detained on gun charges last month before the virus was declared a global pandemic, said she still found that the danger to the community presented by his release outweigh the risks to his health.

“He’s at risk being incarcerated. He’s also at risk out here in the community, as we all are,” Van Keulen said during a telephonic hearing Wednesday before announcing her decision.

The hearing was held by telephone with only van Keulen, her staff, and a pretrial services officers present in the courtroom on account of the “shelter in place” advisories in place across the Bay Area to address the public health concerns. Van Keulen noted for the record that everyone within the courtroom was “an appropriate distant apart.”

Assistant Federal Public Defender Dejan Gantar, appearing by telephone, said the government’s position that his client should remain in custody at the Santa Rita jail was “radically detached from reality.”

“We can’t have this hearing in a vacuum,” said Gantar, noting that the virus has been declared a global pandemic since van Keulen made her initial detention decision. Gantar said it was “not speculation, not conjecture” to say that his client’s medical conditions put him at a heightened risk should he be infected with the virus. Further, Gantar argued that the conditions in Santa Rita, where prisoners are housed in dormitory-style facilities with dozens of people housed in one large room, put his client further at risk.

“Social distancing like I said is basically impossible in facilities where people are housed in large groups,” he said. 

Under questioning from the judge, Gantar conceded there are no reported cases or positive tests for the virus thus far at the jail, and that the jail is screening visitors and taking their temperature to prohibit anyone exhibiting possible symptoms of an infection from entering.

“That’s very different from testing. We know that,” said Gantar, citing the lack of tests available to the jail and the public more broadly. “That’s part of the problem.”

“Just because there’s not confirmed cases right now doesn’t mean that there are no cases,” he said.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Marissa Harris, arguing for the government said the Santa Rita jail provided her office with an 80-page manual outlining protocols for dealing with outbreaks in the facility, and that jail officials had implemented plans to isolate and quarantine certain individuals recently to deal with seasonal flu viruses.

“This risk exists everywhere, not just the jail, but everywhere,” Harris said. “The risk of exposure may be lower in the facility because the access to that facility is tightly controlled and he has access to almost immediate medical care,” she said.

Harris also raised the defendant’s 25-year rap sheet, which includes prison time for multiple violent felonies, and the fact that he was arrested with a loaded semi-automatic handgun and a meth pipe in his car.

“The existence of this pandemic doesn’t change the reasons that the court detained him in the first place,” she said. 

“The community really is in a dangerous situation now,” Harris said. “This is really not the time when we need to be releasing dangerous individuals based on a panic response.”

Added Harris: “At bottom, the defense is essentially asserting that in times of crisis we can’t have jails, that jails can’t operate.”