The Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General (OIG) announced today the release of a Procedural Reform Recommendation (PRR) for the U.S. Marshals Service (USMS), Superior Court of the District of Columbia. The Department of Justice OIG releases PRRs when, through its investigative work, it identifies systemic weaknesses in Justice Department programs, policies, procedures, or practices that made the commission of an offense easier, and when our work has identified a potential solution to the weakness.
Today’s PRR arose out of an OIG investigation concerning the USMS’s adherence to applicable prisoner supervision policies immediately prior to an inmate on inmate sexual assault in the District of Columbia Superior Court cell block. During the investigation, the OIG determined that while the USMS had a policy requiring all prisoners in the cellblock to be observed at least every 30 minutes, either physically or by closed circuit television, the USMS had no corresponding national or local policy specifying who was responsible for ensuring the observations occurred, or
requiring the documentation of the observations. The OIG has therefore recommended that the USMS amend its policies to address these issues.
As noted in today’s PRR, in 2014 the OIG identified several systemic deficiencies in the operation of a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) detention area that caused the improper detention of Daniel Chong, resulting in a multi-million dollar settlement. The deficiencies that we identified in the USMS policies are similar to issues we found with the operation of DEA’s detention area. More information about the DEA matter is available here.
Today’s PRR is available under “Recent Reports” the OIG’s website and at the following link: https://oig.justice.gov/reports/2017/i17001881.pdf.