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Living with COVID in prison
Guys are staring to test positive in my cell house. Thus far I have no symptoms. I am so glad I am vaccinated. It’s so sad around here. There is no movement. Only a few of us work, and if you don’t work there is no place for a person to go. It seems like this pandemic is never-ending, and it makes it even harder for us on the inside. It’s like all of our liberties have been stripped from us. All we have to look forward to is waking up in the morning. And I know the younger guys are not thankful for that, either. Plus, guys in here are still having to deal with their trauma. Three guys around me have had family members murdered. It’s so hard to grieve when you don’t have space to be alone and don’t have the proper people to talk to. You just have to deal with it. There are no extra phone calls to make to speak to loved ones. It’s really hard that there is no platform to tell your story, that people only see us as the crime we committed decades ago, not the human beings we are today. We are people buried alive with no voice and little hope. Maybe being conscious of that is why I can’t sleep right now. Lonnie Smith, Stateville Correctional Center -- Live from Stateville, Lonnie Smith B00708 1/18/2022 Chicago Tonight (PBS) did a segment on how bad the supply chain is in here, like I reported before but now it is coming out that there are some vender contact disputes as the reason we're not receiving the basic items we depend on in here from the commissary. They spoke briefly on how we're suffering from the rise in COVID-19 cases and not having basic things to keep clean, but they didn't touch on that. During this period you are also locked into a small cell with another person. It also comes down to a lot of resentment and hostility with cell mates if one has more than the other. Some people are ants and others are grasshoppers. Where like me I ration and store food the best I can, I've lived with people who eat all of their stuff rather quickly and when they don't have some later they feel like people should share their items this leads to a lot of conflict as you might imagine. And when your not getting along with your cellie its hard to get the staff to move you or one of you. This is what has lead too a bunch of fights and stabbings during this pandemic. We're struggling in here and our emotional well-being is not good. As far as I see it the way the IDOC has handled the this last virus outbreak, we should just be running under normal operation. Because they're not keeping us safe they're just keeping us lockdown. Without the virus, the condition we're under are seen as cruel and unusual punishment by the courts, but now we're expected to endure this crisis like we're some type of trained pandemic survivalist mentally and physically. Coping with all this ambiguous loss in a time of this pandemic makes it hard to look in the future with hope and possibility. We are the forgotten people on the out's of society fending for ourselves. To view the Chicago Tonight Segment, visit here.
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 The omicron virus is running wild in Stateville and the I.D.O.C. has done little to protect people in custody of not getting the virus. The Stateville staff Christmas party was a super spreader event sending the prison into its second full quarantine. Everybody in the prison was tested but the results were hidden from the people who tested positive. However this week the staff went on the long galleries and told individuals that they tested positive for the virus two weeks ago, (This was done on Jan. 9, 2022) and were asked if they still had symptoms? If they answered no they were taken of the isolation list, however they were so called isolated with their cell mate who tested negative, this is a first hand account because it happen to the writer this article I was negative but my cellie was positive. This shows that the medical staff here knew people were positive but they left them in the cell with their cell mates and other people around them that were negative. Therefore exposing them with people who are positive. Not separating the people with the virus put everybody lives in jeopardy.
It is apparent that people in prisoners lives don't matter and that all the criminal justice reform talk was just political rhetoric. The Black Caucus passed a bill that didn't answer any of the real measures to reduce the civil rights issue of our time mass incarceration. All it dealt with was the usual low hanging fruit, non-violent offenders that have the highest rates of recidivism. There was no reform in the Safe- Acts bill passing for the people that have the lowest recidivism rates, the long term offenders that have outgrown their crime years. By the lack of precaution used during this highly infectious variant, can only make you imagine the outcome when a more lethal variant enters into the prison. It could lower the prison population by death. Most of us are growing old in prison and are leaving here in caskets from death by incarceration. If the I.D.O.C., can't protect us from these variants it should sincerely consider letting some of us go, so we can protect ourselves. We need people to continue to build media outreach programs. So they can write letters to newspapers, magazines and get articles out there on positive stories of returning citizens who are successfully reintegrating, who are developing family lives, who are involved in doing service in their community, doing mentoring. The only way for true criminal justice reform to work is if "you," get involved and bring others in. If not a lot of people with great human potential will die behind bars, because politicians keep getting into office with the same formula of "lock em up and throw away the key," rhetoric. Because good people like you stood by and did nothing. Lonnie Smith B00708 Stateville Correctional Center About the author: Lonnie Smith B00708, he's 56 years old and has been incarcerated for 33 long years and suffers from high blood pressure. The people in custody inside of Stateville cannot infect themselves with the virus. It can only be brought into the insitution by the the staff. The staff used reckless abandonment when they hosted a Christmas party for its employees, knowing the omicron virus was spreading rapidly. They chose fun over the safety over the people they oversee. The silence of the heavily infected staff only came out when there was a shortage of staff at the prison this how we found out it was an outbreak in the prison guards. From then each week a list comes out with infected (inmate) workers, I work among twenty guys daily and sixteen of them came up positive and I am the oldest among them and in poorer health due to age and weight. The new term around here is a person with the virus is "hot," so and so tested "hot." I don't want to be on the hot sheet but it looks like its enviable, because none of the people that have tested positive have been moved away from us that came up negative. Their gambling with our lives and I pray that I can escape death when the virus will no doubtly be passed to me because I can't run from, protect myself from it and the people who have control over my body show lack of concern of me getting. We feel like we're apart of an social experiment and we're the live guinea pigs that are aware of whats going on but can't control our fate it is in someone else's band and we can only hope for the best. I've never been around a group of men that are so afraid and scared, we're making peace with loves ones , friends, family and victims of our crimes. We feel death is right around the corner, 2020 is haunting us again and we wonder what the death toll will be this time. We need help from the outside because we have no voice and no support in here. We need people to raise up like they did for George Floyd, because our protest is muzzled like his last breath.
Live from Stateville and praying these are not my last words. Lonnie Smith B00708 About the author: Lonnie Smith B00708, he's 56 years old and has been incarcerated for 33 long years and suffers from high blood pressure. Lawmakers and leaders have been silent when it comes to the spike in infection at Stateville Correctional Center. The staff annual Christmas party quickly became a super spreader event of the ultra contagious omicron variant. Leading to the prison second full quarantine whereas there is no movement inside the prison. Human being are confine to their cells twenty four hours a day with a cellmate. People in here are completely broken psychologically and physically. Inside Stateville you have to deal with bad air, bad water, and bad food.
Stateville is one of the oldest maximum security prisons in Illinois which gives it a medieval look and feel once you step foot inside of it. Its dark, damp and dirty with depressing gray walls and a mildew smell thats thick and lingering to your nose. Its infested with cock roaches, mice and birds. There's no pest control that can contain these three carriers of infectious disease in there droppings. The outdated design of these old buildings have no modern ventilation system. We breath in all the thick dust from the dirty windows sills, bars, and pipes that run through each and every building. That is the reality of this prison for years and now we have to deal with living alongside the coronavirus. In 2020 Stateville grabbed headlines by residents of the the prison taking up most of the ICU beds at the near by hospital. Thirteen human beings from here died alone in this foreign place away from family and love ones. The governor did an excellent job of rising to the occasion to provide us with the proper healthcare for the moment. However, after awhile it all started coming apart at the seams. The daily life of prison is hard enough but to have to be confine with another person in a cell measuring less than 50 square feet of gross space twenty four hours a day is an extra burden to your prison sentence. At times in the summer temperatures reach 100 degrees. During this pandemic guys in these cells have not had any where to grieve their losses, the losses of close friends that they did years behind bars with that are suddenly gone from this invisible enemy. There is no where to grieve the losses of our family members that have died from the virus, there is no where to grieve the losses of family members that fell to gun violence to the streets. Three guys have had family members murdered in the last month. You can't even get any support from calling friends and family on the phone because there isn't enough phones to go around, a person is lucky to get one twenty minute phone call per day. Lawmakers and leaders have to look at realistic ways to reduce the prison population. Everybody that studies the criminal justice system knows it is broken. Michel Foucault, a French man, wrote a book called Discipline and Punishment: The Birth of the Prison who confirmed what I am talking about-- that prisons do something very unique by their architecture and by their programming. What they do that no prisons have done before is that they imprison the soul. Never been before. It's been the modern, post-industrial era in which prisons imprison the soul. Prisons now are the main manufacturers of mental illness. About the author: Lonnie Smith B00708, he's 56 years old and has been incarcerated for 33 long years and suffers from high blood pressure. The pandemic is wreaking havoc on the elderly in prison once again. Illinois prisons across the state are having to ration food to people in custody. The institution can no longer supply the proper dietary requirements to the people they house. The elderly in prison are suffering the most because of the ailments that come from old age.
Recent reports like the one from the Center for Constitutional Rights ( 2021, February 8) have shown people age much faster while incarcerated. Due to poor diet, stress, lack of adequate recreation, etc.Now with the supply chain dilemma it has exacerbated the poor conditions we live in. Due to these unforeseen events, IL prisons’ kitchen supplies are limited. At Stateville Correctional Center, we're being served the same three items over and over again. Breakfast consists of two medium size pancakes or waffles (with no syrup or jelly) and a scoop of cereal or oatmeal. There are only three items that are rotated for lunch and dinner: a single hamburger or polish sausage or cold cuts with only one slice of bread or no bread at all. We may get broccoli stems or rice and two cookies when available. It's not like we were receiving hardy and healthy meals before, however, they were whole meals and met the requirements of special dietary needs of people with health problems. We're dying slowly, especially the most vulnerable, the elderly. Most elderly people who have been in custody for 20 to 30 years or more, do not have family members alive to support them emotionally or financially. So they have no choice but to eat whatever the prison provides. So many of us are going to bed hungry each and every night. We're dying slowly because death by incarceration is a real thing. Then when you factor in the elderly health issues, high blood pressure, diabetes,cancer and other underlying conditions that all call for us to eat right, exercise and get proper sleep. But how can we do any of that if the food is not there? Where does the energy come from? It seems like we're just wasting away. We're dying slowly, because some of us who can afford to purchase food from the expensive prison commissary (that can legally mark up prices by 33% to us) shelves are nearly bare. The elderly people in custody with underlying conditions only option is to buy and consume foods that go against their dietary requirements. The prison staff has only been able to obtain junk food that's high in sugar and salt. The most vulnerable are forced into a choice of buying potato chips, cookies and candy bars. We're experiencing a food desert inside these prison walls. Can you imagine feeding your hungry, elderly diabetic parents or grandparents items full of sugar and salt? What would their life expectancy look like? The elderly in custody must live daily with the option of starving or going against the doctor's strict advice of not consuming unhealthy food in order for them to live longer- the elderly prisoner dilemma. Lawmakers, the Governor and policymakers now have the historic opportunity to be leaders in parole justice and stopping the pain and suffering of the most vulnerable behind bars. While reducing the prison population which will also save Illinois taxpayers tens of millions of dollars. All hope is in Governor Pritzker keeping his promise that Illinois will be a beacon of humanity. Illinoisans need to make a humanitarian effort to stop the pain and suffering of death by incarceration sentences of fellow citizens who are in custody. The state needs to have a mechanism that allows for mid-sentence review to make it possible for the elderly people in custody that have participated in rehabilitative and educational programs to be able to reduce their lengthy prison sentences through good behavior. This argument is not saying let every person out of prison, but at least assess them individually. Many of us shouldn't be defined for our past mistakes because it ignores a person's capacity to change. At the time of this writing I am in my last year of a Master's degree program at North Park University at Stateville for restorative arts and ministry. My goal in life is to help at-risk-youth. I want to help guide them into not making the same mistakes I made as a youth. That is my plan. There are many of us here studying for the Commercial Driver's License exam hoping to become a trucker driver that can help move this country beyond the supply chain problem that is slowing up the economy. Most prison jobs only pay twenty dollars a month, but requires the same full time hours and hard work. Many of us dream of becoming essential workers and fill in the jobs that many Americans are declining to take these days. Not only will it help the economy by lowering the unemployment rate, but it will also save taxpayers of this state tens of millions of dollars of wasted money for warehousing rehabilitated incarcerated citizens. Keep in mind incarcerated adults aged 55 and older are the least likely to commit a new crime across all age groups. And, at this moment, there are hundreds of clemency petitions that are sitting on the Governor's desk waiting to be signed. Rehabilitated incarcerated citizens are an untapped resource that needs to be utilized if Illinois is ever going to be a beacon of humanity. About the author: Lonnie Smith B00708, he's 56 years old and has been incarcerated for 33 long years and suffers from high blood pressure.  Every year, Illinois incarcerates over 250,000 people who are awaiting trial. None of these people have been convicted of a crime, and most are jailed simply because they can’t afford to pay a money bond. Pretrial incarceration is hurting communities across our state.
Please call in today and for release of folx in Cook County jail. A reminder that of the 250,000 people locked up in Illinois jails, 90% are there PRE-TRIAL because they can't afford bond. Those numbers are bad enough, but now with COVID-19 numbers rising, and seven people have died on COVD19 in Cook County jail, we can make calls to save lives. Sheriff’s Office Phone: (312) 603-6444 Email: CCSO@cookcountyil.gov “Hi, my name is ______ and I live in _________. I’m calling to demand that the Cook County Sheriff’s Office take steps to dramatically lower the number of people in jail in response to COVID-19 and ensure that anyone in his custody is able to practice social distancing.” Office of the Chief Judge Phone: (312) 603-6000 Email: timothy.evans@cookcountyil.gov “Hi, my name is ______ and I live in _________. I’m calling to demand that the Cook County Chief Judge take steps to dramatically lower the number of people in jail in response to COVID-19. This means facilitating bond review hearings for people currently in jail and instructing judges not to admit new people to the jail.” Read more from our friends at the Chicago Community Bond Fund. If you are new to abolition, check out this wonderful resource from Abolition Journal. With six sessions, you can go at your own pace. Feel free to donate to this organization for their good work!
by Sylvia A. Harvey
The Marshall Project Life Inside series "As a child, I got used to the barbed wire gates and the officer holding a rifle in the gun tower. I knew prison guards would make me undo my hair in the hopes of finding heroin tucked in the folds of my braids. It was merely the price I had to pay the prison deities. In exchange for surrendering my freedom, I was allowed to see my father." Read more... by Eli Hager and Weihua Li
"The president of Minneapolis’s police union called George Floyd a “violent criminal” and those protesting his killing by a police officer a “terrorist movement.” A union chief in Baltimore once said Black Lives Matter activists were a “lynch mob”; one in Philadelphia referred to them as “a pack of rabid animals.” Another has labeled St. Louis’s democratically elected prosecutor, who is black and supports police reform, a “menace to society” who must be removed “by force” if necessary.All of these union leaders also have this in common: They are white." Read more by Abbie VanSickle
The Marshall Project The coronavirus-stricken prisoners kept off the books. Officials in Santa Barbara County faced a dilemma weeks ago. They desperately wanted permission from California authorities to “reopen” their local economy as the coronavirus ebbed in the state. But a major outbreak of COVID-19 at FCI Lompoc, the federal prison there, had skewed the metrics. Santa Barbara resolved its problem by lobbying state officials to exclude prisoners from relevant public health analyses. “It’s a fiction,” says a justice reform advocate. It’s also a scenario likely to be repeated in other counties across the country where prisons are COVID-19 hotspots. Read more... |
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