Publications

This report contains our assessment of the medical care provided to incarcerated people at California State Prison, Sacramento between December 2023 and May 2024. We rated the case review component of the overall health care quality inadequate and the compliance component of the overall health care quality inadequate.

During August 2025, the OIG’s Centralized Screening Monitoring Team randomly selected 1,608 grievances for monitoring. This document presents nine notable cases monitored and closed by the OIG during August 2025.

During July 2025, the OIG’s Centralized Screening Monitoring Team randomly selected 1,484 grievances for monitoring. This document presents five notable cases monitored and closed by the OIG during July 2025.

In this audit, we assessed the department’s effectiveness in managing extreme temperatures that occur in California’s prisons. We reviewed departmental policies and procedures relative to the management of temperatures in prisons including the department’s heat plan, which requires prison staff to document temperatures in housing units daily to determine whether staff must take protective measures for incarcerated people taking medications that may make them sensitive to the heat and cause heat-related illnesses, including death. We also examined some contributing factors impacting the prisons’ ability to maintain temperatures in housing units within the departmental guidelines, such as aging heating and cooling systems and maintenance challenges.

The Office of the Inspector General’s (the OIG) Intake Processing Unit receives complaints from the incarcerated population and the public. To assist with the review of complaints, Intake staff actively work to gain knowledge of local and departmentwide issues through attending periodic meetings with inmate advisory councils (IACs) at California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (the department) prisons. This report presents some of the common issues raised by the IACs regarding departmental processes, along with the OIG’s actions and recommendations pertaining to those issues.

This report contains our assessment of the medical care provided to incarcerated people at Pleasant Valley State Prison between January 2024 to June 2024. We rated the case review component of the overall health care quality at PVSP adequate, and the compliance component of the overall health care quality at PVSP adequate.

This report contains our assessment of the medical care provided to incarcerated people at Calipatria State Prison between December 2023 and May 2024. We rated the case review component of the overall health care quality adequate and the compliance component of the overall health care quality inadequate.

During June 2025, the OIG’s Centralized Screening Monitoring Team randomly selected 1,277 grievances for monitoring. This document presents seven notable cases monitored and closed by the OIG during June 2025.

Between March 2024 and August 2024, the department completed 288 investigations into complaints incarcerated people made against other incarcerated people that alleged violations of the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA). In this special review, we assessed departmental responses to 74 of these 288 (26 percent) investigations, finding that investigators did not perform one or more investigative procedures in 91 percent (67 of 74) of the cases we reviewed. We identified several other concerning issues in the department’s response to the PREA allegations we reviewed and poor oversight by the institutional committees that review the completed investigations for completeness and adequacy.