No Evacuations for Los Angeles Prisoners in Wildfire’s Path
As the Hughes fire exploded over more than 10,000 acres of Los Angeles County on January 23, 2025, Sheriff Robert Luna issued evacuation orders to some 31,000 residents in and around the town of Castaic. But no such orders were issued for nearly 4,700 prisoners held there at the county’s Pitchess Detention Center. They were ordered to shelter in place.
The LA County Sheriff’s Department (LASD) issued a statement with pictures of buses apparently waiting to transport detainees, promising that staff “stands poised and ready to keep them safe from the Hughes Fire.” However, the Los Angeles Times reported that it was a lack of operational buses that prompted LASD to issue its shelter-in-place order for the lockup.
Fortunately for Pitchess prisoners, the fire was 92% contained by January 26, 2025, after burning 10,396 acres. It was one of five wildfires that by month’s end scorched over 55,500 acres of the county—some 868 square miles, or an area more than half as large as Rhode Island. The blazes were largely contained, thanks to the efforts of 2,000 CalFire firefighters, plus 800 prisoners held in “firefighting camps” by the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. The prisoners, however, were paid only a fraction of what the state fire-fighters earned, as PLN reported. [See: PLN, Feb. 2025, p.60.]
Source: Los Angeles Times
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