UNITARIAN UNIVERSALIST PRISON MINISTRY OF ILLINOIS
  • Home
  • Education
    • Prison Industrial Complex
    • Radical Hospitality
    • Self-led Learning >
      • In Prison - Learning
      • Justice Reform - Learning
      • Re-Entry - Learning
      • History - Learning
    • In the Media
  • Work we do
    • Advocacy >
      • COVID-19 Advocacy
      • Past-Advocacy
      • Pretrial Advocacy
      • Solitary - Learning
    • Congregations >
      • PenPals
      • Solidarity Circles
    • Prison Ministries >
      • Curricula
    • Calendar
  • Get involved
  • About Us
    • Who We Are
    • Why We Exist
    • Partners & Allies
  • Donate

Educating ourselves

Breaking News: UUPMI Concerns over COVID-19 in IL Prisons and Jails

3/7/2020

1 Comment

 
On the morning of March 7, 2020, UUPMI sent a letter to 
Rob Jeffreys, Acting Director Illinois Department of Corrections 
and 
Jim Kaitschuk, Executive Director Illinois Sheriffs’ Association.  The letter addresses concerns over how COVID-19 may affect people who work and live in Illinois prisons and jails. The letter reads:


"Rob Jeffreys, Acting Director
Illinois Department of Corrections

Jim Kaitschuk, Executive Director
​Illinois Sheriffs’ Association

March 7, 2020
We are writing to express our concern over how COVID-19 may affect people who work and live in Illinois prisons and jails. As Unitarian Universalists, we respect and affirm the inherent worth and dignity of every person. We care deeply about the well being of your staff and those incarcerated. This virus knows no distinction between those who are inside and those who are out. We urge you to take urgent action to assure a safe, fair, and humane process to contain the spread of COVID-19 among people in custody.
When COVID-19 enters a facility, it is likely to spread rapidly. We are asking that the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) and county jails refrain from moving anyone who is infected into solitary confinement or from placing an entire facility on lockdown. We urge you to plan now for placement of people who are ill on medical units, and to immediately hire sufficient medical staff to ensure that understaffing will not result in unnecessary deaths of people in custody.1 We especially hope that people who are ill will not suffer the additional pain of solitary confinement.
Medical teams must be dispatched to jails, prisons, halfway houses, and other locked facilities to assess and treat patients. An outbreak in IDOC facilities may lead to many people failing to come to work due to illness. Physicians on-site must have the authority to dictate necessary changes in facility conditions in order to treat the sick and stem the spread of the illness. We are concerned that if a prison or jail population is infected at a time when the virus is widespread in the larger community, and hospitals are at their limits, the death rate within the facility could be substantial. Many prisoners are elderly or have compromised immune systems.
We are asking that the IDOC and county sheriffs statewide consider immediately ordering a one-time review of all people in custody who are elderly or ill, with an eye toward providing medical furloughs or compassionate release to as many of them as possible. Doing so would not only protect them, but also other incarcerated people, officers and staff by decreasing the strain on resources within the prisons once the virus does hit. Ordering a one- time review does not necessarily mean releasing people now, but the review needs to occur immediately since it cannot be accomplished overnight. Given the overcrowding in some facilities, immediate planning is vital to preventing a humanitarian disaster.
We are grateful to you for your careful consideration of this letter, and confident that your early action will save lives. Moreover, we hope that you communicate your plans with your staff, those incarcerated, and the friends and family connected to these people in your care.
​

Very truly yours,
Rev. Allison Farnum
Executive Director
Unitarian Universalist Prison Ministry of Illinois


1 See Lippert v. Baldwin, which mandates a staffing plan that addresses the quantity and quality of medical professionals, health care spaces, and medical equipment in each facility."


1 Comment
Joan Bauer link
10/12/2020 09:43:35 am

My son is 59 yrs old in Jacksonville Corr. Cent. in IL & had COVID on Sept. 1, 2020 & survived, thank God, along with his underlying conditions of: scarred lungs w/latent TB, & a regurgitative heart valve, & an allergy to all forms of penicillin (for pneumonia, etc.). He is now due for release at 85% on April 23, 2021 - basically 6 mos. away. 1. He has petitioned for different sentence credits = BUT has had no recognition = which those are his only hope now for an early release! Being in
"un-social" distances from all others promotes any other illnesses (pneumonia, etc.) to become rampant in his dorm-setting w/bunks barely 3' apart!, especially w/his immune resistance still at a low = & in recovery. 2. Beyond that he is trying to remain positive regarding his re-entry plans to be able to live at my house BUT - IF not approved, he still hasn't been able to locate a back-up place to live in IL = & he'll remain incarcerated instead of being released. {+++Lack of healthy conditions there are super prevalent & obviously a hazard for him constantly, especially = w/lack of necessary precautions (i.e., social distancing, enough soap, proper separation of ill prisoners, etc). He even went so far to question them= why they couldn't separate the men more feet apart by not using some bunks = when there seemed to be enough space to use w/in other bldgs there = but there was no answer given (=?perhaps shortage of staff? due to COVID?). [Today his facility is again spiking COVID cases =w/233 prisoners confirmed infected (a wk ago was 215); & w/33 staff infected (a wk ago was 29)]. (He had also petitioned Governor for Emergency Release from COVID due to his underlying vulnerable conditions but was denied on Aug. 27, 2020 =3 days b/4 he got COVID.) We thank you for any advocacy help & info you can give us.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    What this is about

    Learning asks us to change – so that the world might be a place for all are free to thrive

    Categories

    All
    COVID19
    IP: Death Row
    IP: Education
    IP: Exploitation
    IP: Health Care
    IP In Prison
    IP: LGTBQ
    IP: Mental Health
    IP: Religion
    IP: Solitary Confinement
    IP: Women
    JR: History
    JR Justice Reform
    JR - Justice Reform
    JR: Mental Health
    JR: PIC Today
    JR: Reform
    JR: Strike
    Police
    Re Entry: Parole
    Re-entry: Parole
    Re Entry: Realities
    Re-entry: Realities
    Re Entry: Rights
    Re-entry: Rights

    Archives

    November 2022
    January 2022
    October 2021
    November 2020
    October 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017

    RSS Feed

UUPMI

We equip UU's in Illinois to ​transform institutions and support people harmed by the prison industrial complex.
Advocacy
Education
Inside Ministries
Congregational Work
© COPYRIGHT 2018. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  • Home
  • Education
    • Prison Industrial Complex
    • Radical Hospitality
    • Self-led Learning >
      • In Prison - Learning
      • Justice Reform - Learning
      • Re-Entry - Learning
      • History - Learning
    • In the Media
  • Work we do
    • Advocacy >
      • COVID-19 Advocacy
      • Past-Advocacy
      • Pretrial Advocacy
      • Solitary - Learning
    • Congregations >
      • PenPals
      • Solidarity Circles
    • Prison Ministries >
      • Curricula
    • Calendar
  • Get involved
  • About Us
    • Who We Are
    • Why We Exist
    • Partners & Allies
  • Donate