ISCC FALLING APART AT THE SEAMS WITH COVID-19 RESPONSE, THOUGH SPECIAL INMATES STILL RECEIVING SPECIAL TREATMENT WHILE OTHERS SUFFER
EDITOR'S NOTE / FORWARD - In an email from Director Tewalt, I have been assured that there are efforts in the works to resolve some of the issues discussed below, and I have no reason to doubt the Director's assurances. Some of these efforts will include, but not be limited to more communication between staff and prisoners.
In the email, Director Tewalt pointed out that I am seeing things from my perspective, from inside my cell - and that is correct, so indeed my perspective is limited, and may be a bit skewed. As noted in the following article, it is sometimes difficult to make people happy even when you're trying to help them, but when you know that others - in the same unit and prison - are allowed to be out and about while you are locked in a cell 24 hours per day, frustration sets in, as while the lockdown may be justified, the difference in treatment of identically situated prisoners is not.
Kudos to the Director in listening, and for his offer to keep prisoners (and their families through my publication of his letters on this site) updated with what is going on. We should all appreciate the efforts of the Director and his team, and I'm sure we all look forward to his next update.
One would think that there would always be a viable plan to respond to a contagious disease outbreak in a prison, but not so much at the ISCC where the response to the COVID-19 virus is reminiscent of Keystone Cops meets The Walking Dead. It's not like the coronavirus snuck up on the IDOC, everyone has known about it since March (2020) at the latest, but now that it's here, guards and administrators are running around with their hair on fire, no clue what to do, or what they're doing.
According to correctional officers and medical (Corizon Health) staff they know nothing about what is going on, and do nothing until someone tells them what to do. Some of the prisoners (even in units where there have been no documented cases of COVID-19) are locked in cells, with no idea what is going on, with no communication with or from the outside world (they have no family, TV or radio). Pill call for those locked down (scheduled for 4 pm) is now as late as 11:30 pm, and never earlier than 10 pm in most units despite routine medical appointments having been cancelled, freeing up medical staff for passing out medications.
No showers for 5 days (though IDOC policy requires showers at least every 3 days) and not a library book in sight, prisoners are angry and frustrated, and mentally ill prisoners are on edge to an alarming degree. Telephone access is extremely limited in most areas (they have taped phone lines to the floors with box tape to rig up portable phones which prisoners may use inside their cells once per week) and access to kiosks necessary to order commissary, send/receive emails (if you have no tablet) make/receive video calls and receive critical downloads to keep tablets from locking out is totally out of the question. Meals served in styrofoam trays sits for hours in hallways and when finally delivered to locked down prisoners is cold and clammy or coagulated, with traditionally cold foods such as salads warm and limp. The entire meal is always wet with condensation, often leaving the bread either stuck to the top of the tray, or looking like bread pudding.
Ironically, if you are assigned to the unit which is specifically used for housing elderly, sick and infirm prisoners at extreme risk for contracting COVID-19, or suffering the most by contracting the virus, or others in the dormitory-style housing areas of the facility (according to staff who have recently worked in those areas), you may continue to use phones and kiosks as before, rub elbows in close-quarter bunks and communal showers, and sit at tables playing cards and board games, or maybe just sharing a hot meal.
Some prisoners are immune from the coronavirus and other communicable disease, infection or malady... or so it seems.These (special) prisoners (inmate American Legion members, friends and sycophants of the Legion's inmate "commander"), despite living in the North Wing cell block areas are allowed to move about the facility, "volunteer" for tasks that are already paid jobs assigned to other prisoners (who live in the same units but remain confined to their cells despite wanting to work) and allowed to work outside the unit at their own paid, non-essential jobs where they eat pizza, burgers and other food/drink brought in by staff from outside the prison at least once a week. Showers every day, phones every night, access to a microwave whenever they want, strutting around in specially decorated masks with fancy and specialty fabric no other "class" of prisoners can obtain while the rest of the prison is locked in their cells wearing dingy underwear and drinking tepid water from the tap brings many the man's blood to boil from jealousy or simply rage against the unfairness of it all. If undue privilege = immunity, none of these specially treated lackeys will ever get sick.
Granted, you're not going to make people happy even when you're trying to help, but to throw men into 2 man cells, slam the doors, tell them nothing about what is going on, strip away their humanity, contact with family/friends when they have followed the rules as you have prescribed THEN, on top of THAT, let favored inmates prance around in full view of an entire unit, taking work from assigned workers and allow them, and nobody else, go to their petty, non-essential jobs so they can be out of their cells and get hot showers and phones when 75 other men on a tier are denied the very same things because they might be exposed to a virus - well, that's just a little over the top, even for ISCC/IDOC.
But hey, I'm feeling much better now...
In the email, Director Tewalt pointed out that I am seeing things from my perspective, from inside my cell - and that is correct, so indeed my perspective is limited, and may be a bit skewed. As noted in the following article, it is sometimes difficult to make people happy even when you're trying to help them, but when you know that others - in the same unit and prison - are allowed to be out and about while you are locked in a cell 24 hours per day, frustration sets in, as while the lockdown may be justified, the difference in treatment of identically situated prisoners is not.
Kudos to the Director in listening, and for his offer to keep prisoners (and their families through my publication of his letters on this site) updated with what is going on. We should all appreciate the efforts of the Director and his team, and I'm sure we all look forward to his next update.
One would think that there would always be a viable plan to respond to a contagious disease outbreak in a prison, but not so much at the ISCC where the response to the COVID-19 virus is reminiscent of Keystone Cops meets The Walking Dead. It's not like the coronavirus snuck up on the IDOC, everyone has known about it since March (2020) at the latest, but now that it's here, guards and administrators are running around with their hair on fire, no clue what to do, or what they're doing.
According to correctional officers and medical (Corizon Health) staff they know nothing about what is going on, and do nothing until someone tells them what to do. Some of the prisoners (even in units where there have been no documented cases of COVID-19) are locked in cells, with no idea what is going on, with no communication with or from the outside world (they have no family, TV or radio). Pill call for those locked down (scheduled for 4 pm) is now as late as 11:30 pm, and never earlier than 10 pm in most units despite routine medical appointments having been cancelled, freeing up medical staff for passing out medications.
No showers for 5 days (though IDOC policy requires showers at least every 3 days) and not a library book in sight, prisoners are angry and frustrated, and mentally ill prisoners are on edge to an alarming degree. Telephone access is extremely limited in most areas (they have taped phone lines to the floors with box tape to rig up portable phones which prisoners may use inside their cells once per week) and access to kiosks necessary to order commissary, send/receive emails (if you have no tablet) make/receive video calls and receive critical downloads to keep tablets from locking out is totally out of the question. Meals served in styrofoam trays sits for hours in hallways and when finally delivered to locked down prisoners is cold and clammy or coagulated, with traditionally cold foods such as salads warm and limp. The entire meal is always wet with condensation, often leaving the bread either stuck to the top of the tray, or looking like bread pudding.
Ironically, if you are assigned to the unit which is specifically used for housing elderly, sick and infirm prisoners at extreme risk for contracting COVID-19, or suffering the most by contracting the virus, or others in the dormitory-style housing areas of the facility (according to staff who have recently worked in those areas), you may continue to use phones and kiosks as before, rub elbows in close-quarter bunks and communal showers, and sit at tables playing cards and board games, or maybe just sharing a hot meal.
Some prisoners are immune from the coronavirus and other communicable disease, infection or malady... or so it seems.These (special) prisoners (inmate American Legion members, friends and sycophants of the Legion's inmate "commander"), despite living in the North Wing cell block areas are allowed to move about the facility, "volunteer" for tasks that are already paid jobs assigned to other prisoners (who live in the same units but remain confined to their cells despite wanting to work) and allowed to work outside the unit at their own paid, non-essential jobs where they eat pizza, burgers and other food/drink brought in by staff from outside the prison at least once a week. Showers every day, phones every night, access to a microwave whenever they want, strutting around in specially decorated masks with fancy and specialty fabric no other "class" of prisoners can obtain while the rest of the prison is locked in their cells wearing dingy underwear and drinking tepid water from the tap brings many the man's blood to boil from jealousy or simply rage against the unfairness of it all. If undue privilege = immunity, none of these specially treated lackeys will ever get sick.
Granted, you're not going to make people happy even when you're trying to help, but to throw men into 2 man cells, slam the doors, tell them nothing about what is going on, strip away their humanity, contact with family/friends when they have followed the rules as you have prescribed THEN, on top of THAT, let favored inmates prance around in full view of an entire unit, taking work from assigned workers and allow them, and nobody else, go to their petty, non-essential jobs so they can be out of their cells and get hot showers and phones when 75 other men on a tier are denied the very same things because they might be exposed to a virus - well, that's just a little over the top, even for ISCC/IDOC.
But hey, I'm feeling much better now...