The Cuyahoga County Jail no longer allows in-person visits from friends or family members, one of many jails in the state that ended the practice with little public discussion. 

This shift to video-only visitation strips people accused – but not convicted – of criminal charges of the opportunity to openly communicate with loved ones about evidence in their cases or to weigh important decisions about plea deals, according to a report by Wren Collective, a criminal justice reform policy group. 

The county promotes video visits as a convenient and affordable way to connect with someone in jail from a device at home at a cost of about $4 for a 25-minute visit. For free, people can schedule a visit using a video kiosk in the downtown Justice Center. People have completed more than 141,000 video visits since 2020, according to the county.

The county has a multimillion-dollar contract with Securus Technologies to provide video visits, phone calls, electronic messages and to scan mail.

Those communications, according to the report, are available to county prosecutors, essentially allowing “blanket communications surveillance” of people who are presumed innocent and turn what is supposed to be a security tool into an investigative tool for prosecutors. 

“With the ban on in-person visitation and physical mail, the Cuyahoga County Jail has funneled all conversations with loved ones into Securus’s database,” Nikki Baszynski, report’s lead author, told Signal Cleveland. “By giving prosecutors access to that database, the county has stacked the deck against people accused of crimes who have to wait for their day in court in the jail.”

This new reality hurts the ability of people to assist in their own defense and get guidance and support from loved ones as they work with their defense attorneys to resolve their case, Baszynski, a former public defender, said.

The report argues that virtual communication is not an acceptable replacement for in-person visits. It says officials should:

• Restore in-person jail visitation for loved ones at the Cuyahoga County Jail 
• Terminate the unregulated access county prosecutors have to communications recorded by Securus
• Set state standards that require an in-person visitation option

Cuyahoga County Deputy Public Defender Ashley Stebbins told Wren Collective that people facing criminal charges need to be able to discuss with family members  something as “important and life-changing” as a criminal conviction or a potential prison sentence. They should also be able to ask family members for help identifying witnesses or to collect information that could help them during a sentencing hearing.

Russell Tye, chief trial counsel in the public defender’s office and a veteran criminal defense attorney, recalled in the report many instances where a client would not accept a plea deal until they could talk it over with family. 

At this point, there’s no definitive legal agreement about what access to jail communications prosecutors in Ohio should have, particularly as platforms like the one offered by Securus evolve and allow for broad searches of scanned mail and recorded conversation. 

In Cuyahoga County, the public defender’s office has raised the issue, according to the report. In a court case last year, they asked a Common Pleas judge to bar prosecutors from using evidence from jail phone calls in a domestic violence case, arguing that it violated their client’s rights.

Prosecutors argued that the recordings were essentially public records, and that people in the jail do not have the same expectation of privacy as people who are not in jail. That’s why there are warnings ahead of calls and videos that they are monitored and recorded. 

Defense attorneys noted there’s no warning that prosecutors listen to the calls and could use them in court. 

The judge in the case denied the request without giving a reason and the case was eventually dismissed. During the hearing, the judge raised questions about whether the practice harmed the ability of jailed defendants to help with their own defense, in contrast those who can afford bail and can communicate privately with friends and family, absent a search warrant. 

Costly to communicate, scheduled visits canceled 

Cuyahoga County officials faced a backlash in early 2020 when the sheriff’s department first cut off in-person visits in favor of video visitation, a move the county planned to profit from. The county quickly reversed course and said it would reinstate in-person visits, but that move was paused with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Since then, the state has lifted its order that prohibited in-person visits in jails, though many of Ohio’s largest jails have not restarted in-person visits. State corrections institutions allow in-person visits. Parents and caregivers can make in-person visits to the Cuyahoga County Juvenile Detention Center. 

Video visits can add up for family members like Asia Johnson, who was trying to keep in contact with her brother, Traveon Hughes, 20, while he was in the county jail for about two years awaiting trial for the death of his daughter. She estimated she spent about $3,000 to communicate with him. 

“I would rather have visited him in person … It’s more intimate to see him in the flesh,” Johnson told Signal Cleveland. “I know you can’t hug or, like, touch hands, but it’s like, it’s my baby brother.” 

The report notes that not all people in the Cleveland area have adequate broadband to participate in video calls and if they do the visits get canceled or cut off with little to no notice. That was frustrating for Johnson, who said she would schedule a visit and sit at her computer waiting 20 to 25 minutes. Oftentimes, her brother never joined the call. He’d later tell her the jail had been on lockdown during the scheduled visit, so he wasn’t allowed to join. And she still had to pay. 

Hughes was convicted by a jury in May. His family maintains he was innocent and he is appealing. 

The county says family members should get a credit if the cancellation is not due to behavior. The website for Securus says it is not responsible for disconnected or canceled visits caused by the jail. 

‘Calls become evidence’ 

Most of the report focuses on the fallout of the loss of in-person visits with loved ones. But it notes that mass recording also can hinder clear communication between attorneys and people held in the jail. The county also allows in-person visits by attorneys and they can schedule free Zoom calls. Attorney calls are not supposed to be recorded or listened to, except for in rare circumstances.

Attorneys often tell clients not to talk about their cases because they are aware communications are recorded. Clients don’t always take that advice. Facing charges while locked in jail is isolating, the report notes, and people can struggle with not having support and guidance from loved ones they can’t communicate with any other way. 

In 2023, the county prosecutor’s office signed an agreement with the sheriff’s office outlining access to the calls, videos and electronic messages. According to a policy updated in May, county prosecutors and investigators are supposed to avoid listening to communications with attorneys and tell a supervisor if they inadvertently do. 

Michael Nelson, a retired Cleveland Municipal Court judge who is now a practicing defense attorney, told Signal Cleveland it’s important for people in jail to see and talk to their family in-person before a trial. It can help a person understand the consequences of their charges — and it can help calm them down, Nelson said.

But he warns clients not to discuss details of their case, and to be careful if they are using any jail device, whether it’s a phone, tablet or a Securus kiosk, while talking with family and friends.

“I’ve heard many cases where jail calls become evidence,” Nelson said. 

Attorneys constantly have to weigh that possibility against their duty to keep their jailed clients informed — a problem they do not have when the person has been released pending trial.

Nelson points out that most of the people in jail have not yet been convicted, but they’re treated as if they are guilty. People who can afford to post bail can avoid these complications, he said. 

When he wants to prepare a client for an upcoming court proceeding, he schedules an in-person visit because video visits are recorded, he said. 

But in-person visitation for attorneys is also limited by the amount of available visitation rooms at the jail and by a staffing shortage, which he has seen happen especially on weekends, Nelson said. 

“It impacts their constitutional rights to a fair trial because of the limitation placed,” he said. “The limitation of not getting to talk to their defense counsel [in person].”

“Gideon at Sixty: How the Cuyahoga County Jail Stifles the Right to Counsel” is part of a series of reports Wren Collective is publishing across the country to mark the 60th anniversary of Gideon V. Wainwright, the  landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that extended the right to counsel to people facing criminal charges. Read the full report below.