Page:United States Reports 502 OCT. TERM 1991.pdf/544

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RUFO v. INMATES OF SUFFOLK COUNTY JAIL Opinion of the Court

population would decrease in subsequent years.9 Significantly, when the District Court modified the consent decree in 1985, the court found that the “modifications are necessary to meet the unanticipated increase in jail population and the delay in completing the jail.” Inmates of Suffolk County Jail v. Kearney, Civ. Action No. 71–162–G (Mass., Apr. 11, 1985), App. 110 (emphasis added). Petitioners assert that it was only in July 1988, 10 months after construction began, that the number of pretrial detainees exceeded 400 and began to approach the number of cells in the new jail. Brief for Petitioner Rufo in No. 90–954, p. 9. It strikes us as somewhat strange, if a rapidly increasing jail population had been contemplated, that respondents would have settled for a new jail that would not have been adequate to house pretrial detainees.10 There is no doubt 9

The architectural program included the following projections: Year Population Projections 1979 245 1980 243 1981 241 1982 239 1983 238 1984 236 1985–1989 232 1990–1994 226 1995–1999 216 App. 69. 10 Respondents and the District Court have been provided with daily prison population data during this litigation. See Tr. 82 (Mar. 30, 1990). The fact that none of the parties showed alarm over fluctuations in these data undermines the dissent’s argument that the ongoing population increase was “reasonably foreseeable.” See post, at 406. We note that the dissent’s “reasonably foreseeable” standard differs significantly from that adopted by the Court today. By invoking this standard and focusing exclusively on developments following modification of the decree in 1985, see post, at 405, the dissent jumps to the conclusion that petitioners assumed full responsibility for responding to any increase in detainee numbers by increasing the capacity of the jail, potentially infinitely. But we do not think that, in the absence of a clear agreement and