Texas Attorney General's Office to help get Harris County Jail back into compliance

HARRIS COUNTY, Texas (KTRK) -- The Texas Attorney General's Office will now take action to ensure the Harris County Jail gets into compliance.

13 Investigates first reported on the jail's compliance issues in September 2022. Months later, the jail was put under a remedial order. It got back into compliance in fall 2024, but according to the Texas Commission on Jail Standards, it fell out of compliance again in December.

During TCJS's first meeting of 2025, Phillip Bosquez, Harris County Sheriff's Office assistant chief of detention operations command, updated the commissioners.

Immediately following, without further discussion, a vote was initiated to involve the attorney general's office for enforcement. It passed unanimously.

"There was this loud cheer that went up from all the community members that had come from Harris County, all the moms who have lost their loved ones in jail," Krish Gundu with the Texas Jail Project said.

ABC13 contacted the AG's Office, asking what action they planned to take and a timeline. They have not responded.

Under state administrative code, the state office has the ability to file suit against the jail.

Since the initial out-of-compliance report in September 2022, there have been at least 55 deaths in custody deaths at the jail.

The non-compliance notices include not having enough staff, a gun making it inside an inmate's wheelchair, not giving inmates their proper medication, issues surrounding inmate deaths, and more.

Harris County is housing inmates out of state, which is costing taxpayers more than $50 million every year.

"We've seen with the county... added six district courts, we have done pay raises for detention officers to retain them, we have done sign-on bonuses," Gundu said. "We've done all sorts of things and still don't have any movement."

The decision to involve the attorney general's office with Harris County Jail was discussed just prior to the decision to escalate action against the Liberty County Jail and potentially shut it down.

"I really hope that Harris County doesn't think that, 'Yeah, we're too big too, you know? We're too big for them to do this,'" Gundu said. "I hope they don't think that way. I hope they really take this as the message that it is meant to be and work on solutions."

The Harris County Sheriff's Office has not responded to a request for comment.

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