Lack of staff, widespread coronavirus-led blockade in Colorado prisons creates “tenuous” situations

A combination of extensive blockades, short staffing and growing anxiety about COVID-19 created a situation in Colorado prisons that the state prison director called “tenuous” and outraged detainees’ families.

Detainees are fed improper meals – sometimes just two slices of bread, a piece of bologna and an apple – and sometimes cannot access showers for days on end, said eight families and a former caretaker. The staff is stretched thin as the guards get sick and hundreds go on vacation in one day. Some detainees go for weeks without going out.

“He feels so little like a human being,” said Krystal Griffiths, whose fiancé is being held at Buena Vista Prison.

And a change in the state’s vaccination priorities means that conditions may not change for months.

While a draft plan placed inmates in the second phase of vaccinations, Colorado leaders subsequently eliminated inmates from any priority group. Instead, they will be vaccinated in the same order as the general population, depending on age and medical history, a decision that contradicts the recommendation of the American Medical Association and the National Commission for COVID-19 and Criminal Justice, a national group led by former prosecutors. generals in the USA.

“It doesn’t have to be number 1,” said Dr. Charles Lee, president-elect of the American College of Correctional Physicians. “But it doesn’t make them number 10. Their punishment for everything they did is the loss of freedom, not the absence of care.”

The state’s decision comes as the number of outbreaks in Colorado prisons continues to rise. More than 6,200 Colorado inmates tested positive for COVID-19 in March. Prisons and prisons are eight of the state’s 10 largest active outbreaks. Seventeen men in the care of the penitentiary system died of COVID-19.

The infection rate has caused the Department of Corrections to struggle to fill positions when hundreds of employees are on leave at some point due to COVID-19. The department asked the retired correction officers to complete. Tensions have risen among staff and detainees, who are afraid of catching the virus from each other, said Jamie Amaral, a former correctional officer at Sterling Prison, who resigned in September.

“The division that we have tried so hard to break down between detainees and staff has just grown,” she said. “The staff got angry with the detainees, and the detainees were irritated by the staff because they could not receive answers. It was really tragic to see it, to see it break down. “

Changing the vaccination plan

Inmates have a higher risk of catching COVID-19 and dying or suffering from severe symptoms for several reasons, Lee said. They cannot socially distance themselves inside a prison and share bathrooms and sleeping spaces. They are often low-income people who have had poor or non-existent health care all their lives and more basic illnesses.

1. Dean Williams, executive director of the Colorado Department of Corrections, acknowledged at a legislative hearing Tuesday that Colorado detainees have a higher risk of contracting COVID-19. But when asked about the department’s opinion on the state’s vaccination plan, department spokeswoman Annie Skinner said in an email that “CDOC staff and inmates will receive the vaccine when it becomes available.” .

Colorado’s current plan is similar to that of 10 other states – Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Kansas, Michigan, Oregon, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas and Wisconsin – which does not specifically mention inmates, an analysis by Initiative for prison policy. At least 26 other states have specifically planned to administer vaccines to detainees in the first or second phase of supply. Since December 8, Colorado has had the ninth highest rate of COVID-19 infection in state and federal prison systems, according to The Marshall Project.

The families of the detainees who spoke to The Denver Post had a wide variety of views on when loved ones should be vaccinated. Some feared that vaccination would be forced on loved ones. Others argued that prisoners should be given priority because they cannot practice social distancing. Several said the loved one already had the virus, so the vaccine seemed less pressing than other concerns, such as ensuring that detainees receive enough food.

“Kindergarten meals”

When the detainees were imprisoned in Sterling in the spring, the guards took over the kitchen duties usually performed by the prisoners. Then the food became miserable, Amaral said.

“They literally got a slice of cheese, a slice of bologna, pieces of wet bread, a packet of juice, just things like that,” Amaral said. “The food was not enough to feed a 12-year-old child. I wouldn’t eat it myself. “

The families of several detainees described similar meals, such as a dinner with a tortilla, pieces of bell pepper, an orange and a boiled egg.

“These are grown men, they receive meals in kindergarten,” said Felicia Alvarez, whose 29-year-old son is being held in Sterling.

Skinner, a spokesman for the corrections, acknowledged that prison staff run kitchens when detainees can only say that meals “meet nutritional requirements and are served at appropriate temperatures, in accordance with food safety guidelines.”

Williams said in a hearing Tuesday before the Joint Legislative Budget Committee that extended periods of closure have affected detainees. He congratulated staff on their work during a dangerous pandemic and said there had been no dramatic change in detainees’ behavior due to the changes. He said the prisons are safe, although the situation remains “fragile”.