Los Angeles (AP) 鈥� ‘s prison system has systematically failed to protect incarcerated women from sexual abuse and harassment by guards, the U.S. Department of Justice said Thursday.
The federal investigation also found that California’s corrections department failed to provide victims with a safe way to report without retaliation. On top of that, staff who were tasked with investigating the misconduct were often themselves accused of sexual abuse or harassment.
The investigation, which began , focused on two state prisons: the Central California Women鈥檚 Facility in Chowchilla and the California Institution for Women in Chino. It uncovered numerous instances where guards regularly sexually abused incarcerated women. In at least one instance, a guard was convicted of rampant abuse over roughly a decade and sentenced to .
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation did not respond to an email seeking comment.
Women were told to report misconduct on an online system that wasn鈥檛 confidential and that the accused officers had access to, according to Harmeet K. Dhillon, assistant attorney general for the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.
Dhillon said that women are 鈥渇ully aware of this gap in confidentiality, and this serves as a deterrent from women reporting this misconduct.鈥� She named at least one sergeant whose job it was to investigate misconduct who was himself sentenced to 15 years in prison after pleading guilty to receiving child sexual abuse images on the job.
鈥淭he upshot of our investigation is that California鈥檚 prison system, when it comes to women, has inadequate systems in place to deter, detect, and hold accountable rampant sexual misconduct and assault on female prisoners,鈥� Dhillon said at a news conference held in Los Angeles on Thursday.
The Associated Press in previous years of rampant abuse by federal prison staff against women held in Dublin, California, a facility that at the time was nicknamed the 鈥渞ape club.鈥� The prison was .
The federal government on Thursday gave California’s prison system 49 days to remediate the conditions that enabled the rampant abuse, warning that a failure to do so could result in civil litigation.
The measures include expanded camera coverage, enhanced confidential reporting channels and strengthened investigative protocol.
U.S. Attorney , who was appointed by President Donald Trump as the top federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, said California has to take action.
鈥淭he State must confront the persistent failure of its own employees to prevent and address sexual abuse at these facilities,鈥� Essayli wrote in a statement, 鈥渁nd the systemic breakdowns that have permitted these conditions to persist.鈥�
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