Multnomah County’s adult jail population has dropped about 30% in the last month due to fewer arrests, early releases of sentenced inmates and stepped-up pretrial releases in the age of coronavirus, county officials said Tuesday.

The juvenile detention population also has fallen -- at the start of this week, the Donald E. Long Juvenile Detention Center held 34 youths -- 53% of its capacity. Most of the youths are instead being monitored through county community supervision.

The county’s two adult jails are now about 62% full compared to 92% in early March when the outbreak was just taking hold in Oregon. The jails have 1,192 beds combined.

Local police and sheriff’s deputies are issuing citations for nearly all misdemeanor crimes, giving people future dates to appear in court instead of making arrests and taking them to jail, said Sheriff Mike Reese. Officers still arrest people for misdemeanor allegations related to domestic violence or other life-threatening crimes.

Public defenders have worked to identify inmates for release who are awaiting trial if they have health conditions that put them at particular risk for contracting the disease.

The District Attorney’s Office also agreed to allow offenders who had two weeks or less left on their sentences to be released right away, said Abbey Stamp of the Local Public Safety Coordinating Council.

In addition, the DA’s Office is identifying and supporting the early release of inmates older than 65 with underlying health conditions. The office tries to notify crime victims of any such releases, according to its spokesman.

In the first two weeks after the governor declared a state of emergency, roughly 10 to 15 inmates a day were released pretrial from Multnomah County jails without court hearings, according to Carl Macpherson, executive director of the Metropolitan Public Defenders Office.

These included people identified by public defenders as being of high risk of contracting COVID-19 due to personal characteristics such as age or health conditions, those who face non-violent charges, those who remained in custody because they couldn’t afford to post bail, and those with ties to the community and a place to go. They were let out of jail if the district attorney’s office didn’t object and a judge signed off without a hearing under what’s called a stipulated release.

“Pre-trial releases are continuing, but it’s not happening as frequently now,’’ Macpherson said.

About 30 people are being booked into the Multnomah County Detention Center a day.

Though the jail is screening new inmates daily for two weeks -- taking their temperatures and checking for any COVID-19-related symptoms – it has tested only three inmates in custody.

Those tests, processed by the Oregon Health Authority, came back negative, said Dr. Michael M. Seale, director of corrections health for the county.

The jails have test kits on site and will test people who have exposure to a known case of COVID-19 or if they show symptoms of the virus, Seale said. Any inmate who becomes severely ill would be taken to a hospital, he said.

People identified with any respiratory illnesses may be placed in one of two units -- one in the downtown Portland jail and one in Inverness Jail, which each have “negative air flow capacity, ’’ Seale said.

Commissioner Sharon Meieran, who is an emergency room doctor, asked Seale if all inmates can receive coronavirus testing.

“Have we considered testing everyone so we can really potentially isolate people who have the virus and may be asymptomatic from those who don’t?’’ Meieran asked. Such steps could help prevent rapid spread of the virus that has occurred in other jails around the country, she said.

Seale said expanding testing would be challenging because of the number of inmates still being booked daily.

All jail staff also must affirm at the start of their shifts that they haven’t had any coronavirus symptoms for 24 hours and haven’t had any contact for 14 days with a person known to have contracted COVID-19.

While more inmates are being released, county probation and parole officers have suspended all nonessential home visits, relying instead on check-ins with people via phone or skype, said Erika Preuitt, director of the county’s Department of Community Justice.

The county’s probation officers also have sent fewer people to jail for violating probation. Prior to COVID-19, the department averaged 35 detainers a week for probation violators. Detainers could send a probation violator back to jail for three to five days. This week, the department is averaging 18 detainers per week, Preuitt said.

Some Inverness Jail inmates, in recent phone interviews, said they’ve received little education about the importance of social distancing.

Justin Ray Jones, 28, said he has asthma and shares an Inverness dormitory with 35 people. They sleep two feet from one another. Fellow inmate John Logan, 58, said he suffers from chronic pulmonary disease and said guards aren’t wearing masks and inmates are still having meals together.

“I shouldn’t have to worry if I live or die here for a DUII,’’ said Logan, who expects to complete his sentence next February. “There are a lot of us in here who are scared to death.’’

Macpherson, of Metropolitan Public Defenders, said he appreciates the efforts the county jails are making to try to safeguard staff and inmates.

“But the problem is you cannot do so adequately in a jail setting,’’ he said.

He cited inadequate social distancing in dormitory-like spaces, a lack of personal protective equipment and not enough tests to determine who actually has the coronavirus. He said his office is also concerned about the racial and ethnic disparities of people in jail and in the criminal justice system generally, particularly given national statistics that indicate African-American communities have disproportionately higher rates of fatalities from COVID-19. In Oregon, the coronavirus appears to be hitting the Latino population hard, according to a state report released last week.

“Our clients are fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, sons, daughters,’’ Macpherson said. “They are often the most vulnerable members of our community. It is unjust if we do not protect them during an unprecedented pandemic.

-- Maxine Bernstein

Email at mbernstein@oregonian.com; 503-221-8212

Follow on Twitter @maxoregonian

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