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The American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California has filed a new complaint against the Tulare County Jail for its living conditions during the pandemic, alleging that the jail is failing to adequately test for COVID-19 and that its social distancing policy violates inmates’ constitutional rights. Filed last Thursday in federal court, the supplemental complaint is the latest development in a lawsuit originally brought against the jail last summer.
The initial complaint from July alleged that the jail didn’t provide masks to incarcerated people for months into the pandemic, and that new visitation policies ostensibly prevented inmates from meeting with attorneys. In an interview with FM89 at the time, Sheriff Mike Boudreaux acknowledged that inmates were not given masks until July, but denied that the jail’s legal visitation policy was unnecessarily restrictive.