Attorneys urged the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department to evacuate nearly 5,000 inmates at the county’s northernmost jail after a fast-moving fire near the Castaic jail complex set off alarms Wednesday morning.
The Hughes Fire broke out shortly before 11 a.m. about 5 miles north of Peaches Detention Center.
“An evacuation order has not been issued,” the department said at 10:58 a.m., minutes after the fire broke out. “These facilities are aware of this and will take appropriate action as needed.”
But the fire quickly grew to more than 3,000 acres, and by midday, attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California began contacting county officials to urge action.
At 11:53 a.m., Melissa Camacho, senior staff attorney for the ACLU of Southern California, emailed Superintendent Kathryn Barger’s deputy, Sandra Sandra Croxton expressed her concerns.
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“I would like you and Supervisor Barger to immediately pressure the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department to begin evacuating the four jails immediately,” Camacho wrote. “I would imagine there are approximately 1,000 LASD employees there as well, but that is just speculation. But you’re definitely looking at over 5,000 people needing to evacuate, that’s just too many people to wait for an evacuation order or even a warning to evacuate, especially since there are only about 20 buses that may be spread out across the county.
The Sheriff’s Department has faced a shortage of prisoner transport buses for years as its fleet ages and maintenance becomes increasingly difficult. As of late last year, officials told The Times that only 20 of the company’s 82 buses were operating.
Although the county approved funding for 20 new buses in September 2023, the first buses did not arrive until December. The remaining buses are expected to arrive every few weeks until the order is expected to be completed in August, officials said.
It’s unclear how the evacuations will be conducted, but department officials said they may use state and other local resources.
At 12:20 a.m. Wednesday, the department said it had not yet evacuated the jail building, but had asked day-shift officers and jailers to stay late to assist in the event of an evacuation at the jail and to assist in the evacuation of parts of Santa Clarita affected by the fire.
As of late last year, department data showed that the Castaic prison complex housed about 4,700 people, at least 1,200 of whom had been diagnosed with mental health issues.
“This is the most densely populated area in the area,” Camacho told The Times. “They don’t have enough buses to take people to court – and they certainly don’t have enough buses to move them all at once for evacuation.”
