‘Living in absolute squalor’: Mental health group homes go unregulated in Santa Clara County

When Daniel Costa left prison a decade ago, he may have regained his freedom, but his new housing arrangements made it difficult to escape the life he led on the inside.

For years after his release, a county parole program placed Costa in a series of unregulated and unsupervised group homes scattered across San Jose. The food was bad, parolees found themselves crammed into closet-sized rooms and the lack of an on-site monitor left residents in constant fear “of people taking what’s yours,” Costa said.