Leon Casiquito. Michelle Morgan. Jolene Nez. They are some of the 15 people who we know have died in the custody of New Mexico’s largest jail since April 2020. While the causes of death differ — homicide, suicide and medical neglect — they have one thing in common: Their deaths were avoidable.

Casiquito, Morgan and Nez, as well as a majority of the other deaths, can be attributed to severe over-incarceration and poor medical care at the Bernalillo County Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC), located a few miles outside of Albuquerque. Simply put, there are far too many people detained for no real public safety reason at MDC, which is in turn incapable of taking appropriate care of them.

Time and time again, we have watched and read news reports that provide a glimpse into the deplorable conditions behind the walls of MDC. A January Albuquerque Journal article shed some much-needed light on deadly deficiencies in medical care at MDC, which is run by private contractor Centurion. That article helps explain why most of the recent deaths at MDC were related to treatable medical conditions. 

There have been other warnings. On October 21, 2021, MDC Sargent Robert Mason sent a letter to the Bernalillo County Commission and the Detention Facility Oversight Board warning county leaders of the horrifying conditions at the jail, only to be ignored. Five days later, Casiquito’s cellmate beat him to death in an attack that went unnoticed for several minutes, despite the efforts of many other men in the pod who frantically pressed the call buttons in their cells hoping to attract the attention of  jail guards who would stop the brutal attack. 

An additional risk are the frequent lockdowns at MDC, which can last for days at a time. When lockdowns occur, people detained there cannot shower or make phone calls, and are often alone without any staff available to assist in case of a medical crisis or other emergency. That means people are not getting access to appropriate medical care, including life-saving medications and treatment for chronic conditions. 

It’s so bad, MDC has had to declare a state of emergency on several recent occasions, reporting that there were simply not enough staff members to operate the jail without endangering the safety of both the large in-custody community and MDC employees.

Media reports and jail officials have falsely characterized the crises as a problem with understaffing as the primary reason conditions at MDC have become so acutely inhumane. It seems that recruiting and retaining people to fill the 50% of staff positions currently vacant has proven to be an insurmountable task, which is not surprising considering the conditions in which those staff are expected to work. 

In truth, the conditions at MDC represent an over-incarceration crisis – one which is not new, but is newly drawing attention because of the current, extremely dangerous conditions at MDC. 

MDC holds individuals who have been charged with but not convicted of a crime, as well as individuals who have been sentenced to less than one year in detention. Some people in MDC are detained simply because they were unable to pay court-imposed fines and fees, which is nothing more than a criminalization of poverty.

Over the past year, individuals have been booked into MDC because they failed to appear in court for minor charges like not getting their pet vaccinated, not providing an ID to law enforcement, and driving a car with an outdated registration. In most cases, individuals booked into the jail for these sorts of offenses spend only a night or two behind bars. But this steady stream of unnecessary arrests contributes to the overpopulation at MDC. Common sense tells us that these arrests do not make any of us safer. 

Even more people are shoved into MDC because of minor technical parole or probation violations, like a positive drug test or missing an appointment with their parole officer. 

The current conditions at MDC demonstrate with horrifying clarity what we already knew: It is long past time to reevaluate our approach to public safety and address our dependence on mass incarceration to solve every public safety problem. Mass incarceration does not improve public safety, and actually has the opposite effect as it reinforces cycles of poverty, addiction, and violence within our communities.

Law enforcement professionals and the New Mexico judiciary have an obligation to help ease the suffering at MDC by halting unnecessary arrests and detentions that contribute to over-incarceration. These measures would not be unprecedented in response to an emergency. For example, during the height of the COVID-19 crisis, the courts, prosecutors and law enforcement agencies throughout the state took steps to mitigate the spread of deadly virus by reducing unnecessary incarcerations. 

State of New Mexico and Bernalillo County officials cannot create safe and humane conditions for our community members detained in MDC. It is for that reason they are obligated to reduce the number of incarcerated people held there. It is unconscionable that a member of our community could die in jail due to lack of medical care, let alone for the simple mistake of failing to register their vehicle or vaccinate their pet.

We’ve said it over and over, and we’ll never stop saying it: mass incarceration is an unmitigated disaster and we must end its use in New Mexico. Public safety and our public conscience demand better. 

For more than half a century, nearly every American with a television has been able to recite the words that, under the Constitution, protect their right not to incriminate themselves under government interrogation. “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can (and will) be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to the presence of an attorney, and if you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you prior to any questioning.” These Miranda warnings, mandated by the U.S. Supreme Court in that eponymous 1966 case litigated by the ACLU, form part of the very fabric of law enforcement’s relationship with the public.

Today, in Vega v. Tekoh, the court backtracked substantially on its Miranda promise. In Vega, the court held 6-3 (over an excellent dissent by Justice Elena Kagan) that an individual who is denied Miranda warnings and whose compelled statements are introduced against them in a criminal trial cannot sue the police officer who violated their rights, even where a criminal jury finds them not guilty of any crime. By denying people whose rights are violated the ability to seek redress under our country’s most important civil rights statute, the court has further widened the gap between the guarantees found in the Bill of Rights and the people’s ability to hold government officials accountable for violating them.

Last April, the ACLU and the Cato Institute filed an amicus brief in support of Terence Tekoh, who had been subjected to an illegal interrogation. At trial, Tekoh testified that he was simply doing his job as a Certified Nursing Assistant when Carlos Vega, a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy, isolated him in a small, windowless room and refused others’ entry. Vega then proceeded to interrogate Tekoh, alleging that he had molested a patient while transporting her. Vega threatened Tekoh with violence, flashing his gun. He threatened Tekoh, an immigrant, that he and his family members would face deportation to the country they had fled in fear of persecution, and called him a racial slur.

Again, according to Tekoh, Vega would not permit him to leave the room, and ignored Tekoh’s pleas to see a lawyer or talk to his coworkers and supervisors. Tekoh ultimately extracted a false letter of apology from Vega that he dictated to him.

These facts are shocking — and the ACLU’s brief urged the Supreme Court to hold that, at least where an officer so blatantly violates an individual’s Miranda rights and the statements are introduced in a criminal trial, the officer can be sued under federal law. But the court’s decision today says that these facts, or any others, don’t matter at all. Even though the court has previously said that the introduction of an un-Mirandized statement at trial is a constitutional violation, in Vega it has announced that a Miranda violation is not a violation of a constitutional right, but only of a prophylactic constitutional rule that does not give rise to damages — no matter what.

In closing her dissent, joined by Justices Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor, Justice Kagan lays out the consequences of the court’s decision:

“Today, the Court strips individuals of the ability to seek a remedy for violations of the right recognized in Miranda. The majority observes that defendants may still seek ‘the suppression at trial of statements obtained’ in violation of Miranda’s procedures. But sometimes, such a statement will not be suppressed. And sometimes, as a result, a defendant will be wrongly convicted and spend years in prison. He may succeed, on appeal or in habeas, in getting the conviction reversed. But then, what remedy does he have for all the harm he has suffered? The point of § 1983 is to provide such redress—because a remedy ‘is a vital component of any scheme for vindicating cherished constitutional guarantees.’ The majority here, as elsewhere, injures the right by denying the remedy.”

The dissent has it exactly right. While the court’s decision does not as a formal matter reduce the police officer’s obligation to issue Miranda warnings — or what individuals in police custody should do or say (or not do and not say) — it cuts off a critical means by which people whose rights have been violated can actually vindicate the promise of those rights. In that sense, it’s a sad day for Miranda, the Bill of Rights, and the most basic conception of accountability.