Near full capacity The Mahoning County main and misdemeanor jails have both fully reopened, sheriff says.

By ED RUNYAN

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

YOUNGSTOWN — The Mahoning County Jail took in about 20 more federal inmates over the weekend, filling the last spaces allotted for them and fully reopening the main jail, Sheriff Randall Wellington said.

Meanwhile, the county’s misdemeanor jail is now fully staffed and therefore fully reopened. It has 21 prisoners now but is likely to be filled — with 96 prisoners — sometime this week, mostly with inmates who need to serve sentences for driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol, he said.

Many of the people sentenced to mandatory jail terms for DUI had to be furloughed in the past because there was nowhere for them to serve their sentences, he noted.

The 20 prisoners bring the jail population to 527, which is close to capacity, Wellington said.

The city and county reached an agreement in March allowing the city to house 71 inmates there for free.

Class-action suit

The city-county deal was a key component that ended a lawsuit won by inmates in March 2005 regarding understaffing and overcrowding at the jail that violated their civil rights.

The May 2007 settlement of the federal class-action lawsuit required the county to fully reopen the main jail by July 1 and the misdemeanor jail by Aug. 1. Both reopenings were set back because the first set of federal inmates did not arrive at the expected time in May, reducing the amount of funding that was available to reopen the facilities, Wellington said.

After a two-year absence, federal inmates began arriving at the Mahoning County Jail from the Northeast Ohio Correctional Center on Hubbard Road in May. The misdemeanor jail closed in March 2005 over lack of funding.

The 20 newest federal inmates are illegal aliens awaiting trial, Wellington said.

runyan@vindy.com