‘QAnon Shaman’ rioters eat organic food, while most prisons and prisons have a reputation for serving unhealthy food

by

“The fact that this man has this kind of preference shows the double standard in the criminal justice system and in the detention system,” said Pastor Al Sharpton, an iconic civil rights activist and founder of the National Action Network.

By order of the judge, Chansley was transferred to William G. Truesdale Adult Detention Center in Alexandria, Virginia last Thursday. He was moved there after Aramark, one of the largest food service providers in the country and the prison-contracted food service provider, said it could meet court demands and provide organic meals, said Amy Bertsch, spokeswoman for the Alexandria Sheriff’s Office. .

His lawyers have argued in court documents that he needs an organic diet because of his belief in shamanism, an ideology that “focuses on belief in supernatural phenomena such as the world of gods, demons and ancestral spirits.”

Sharpton, who has been arrested more than 30 times and taken into custody by state and federal institutions after protesting injustice, said some prisons can honor a prisoner’s request, especially if it is a religious diet. But “sometimes that’s not likely.”

“In the state prisons, you eat what they give you or you starve … it’s an absolute punishment and punishment that goes beyond human rights and dignity,” Sharpton said. “In the federal government, they have different protocols, and they ask if you have dietary or religious preferences.”

A Look Inside Federal Prison Food

William G. Truesdale Adult Detention Center – where former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and other high-profile defendants were previously held – is not a federal prison.

But if convicted and convicted, Chansley, who is a federal defendant, will likely be transferred to a BOP facility.

Federal detainees are given a variety of breakfast items, including hot oatmeal, bread, jelly and fruit, according to a copy of the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) national menu for 2020, which was shared with CNN. For lunch and dinner, there’s a five-week changing menu that includes beef or soy tacos, tuna salad or hummus, and pepper steak or lentils, the menu says.

For its fiscal year 2019 budget, the BOP estimated it will serve about 175 million meals to more than 184,000 federal inmates. The BOP also estimated that more than $ 401,000 would be spent on food services for the 122 institutions and other facilities. That’s about 4% of the agency’s budget for salaries and expenses.

Justin Long, a spokesperson for the BOP, said fresh fruits and vegetables are served daily, and “inmates have the option to choose from a normal, heart-healthy or no meat dish, including vegan options, for each meal.”

“The quality of the food served to our inmates is a priority of the Bureau of Prisons,” Long said. He could not confirm whether the food served in BOP facilities is organic.

According to a report by the Department of Justice’s Inspector General, the BOP has established a protocol to ensure that the food supply is secure and does not always document or communicate with supplier quality issues.
In recent years, sellers have been accused of supplying counterfeit food to BOP. Last year, two meat packing plant executives were sentenced to 46 and 42 months in prison after being charged with providing $ 1 million worth of adulterated meat, including whole cow hearts labeled “ground beef,” to 32 BOP institutions, the report said.
Last month, the owners of a food company that supplied South Carolina prisons agreed to pay $ 250,000 after authorities claimed the company was diluting spices that “consisted largely of filler” from 2011 to 2018, the Justice Department said in a press release. .

“Contractors selected and paid by the government to provide food to inmates are expected to meet contractual and other standards,” said Kenneth R. Dieffenbach, special agent in charge of the Inspector General’s Fraud Detection Office’s Department of Justice Office .

“When they supply counterfeit products, as the defendants would have done here, the government is deceived and the health and safety of detainees is endangered.”

Black and brown people are served ‘terrible food’ every day, proponents say

The Alexandria Detention Center, where Chansley is being held while awaiting trial.

Leslie Soble, a research fellow at Impact Justice, a nonprofit advocating for criminal justice reform, said feeding organic food to inmates in US prisons is “completely unheard of.”

“Millions of other incarcerated people, mostly black and brown people from low-income communities, are served horrible food day after day, year after year,” said Soble, lead author of Eating Behind Bars: Ending the Hidden Punishment of Food in Prison ‘, a report on the quality and impact of food in American prisons.

“Chansley is a blatant example of white privilege and racial injustice,” she said, referring to his ability to get such food and also relocate facilities to do so.

The report, based on responses from nearly 500 previously incarcerated people and family members, found that in many cases the food served is unsafe, unattractive, and of low nutritional value.

“Someone told us the only time they would get chocolate milk was when the milk was rotten,” said Soble, who has done extensive research on food served in prison.

About 75% of respondents reported being served spoiled or tainted food while in detention, the report said, and numerous people who worked in their prison kitchen said they were asked to serve chicken or beef from packages marked as “not for human consumption.”

While most facilities require meals to include fruits and vegetables, Soble says, what is served ranges from a spoonful of applesauce, pieces of canned fruit, and canned green beans. In most states, Soble estimates that prisons spend between $ 2.50 and $ 3 per person on meals per day.

When asked about the food served in Alexandria prison, an Aramark spokesperson told CNN that all of the correctional facility menus are designed by “registered dietitians to meet the nutritional requirements” specified by each individual facility. and the guidelines of the American Correctional Association.

Sharpton said he believes there should be a federal law to address the nutrition of inmates, as not all people in prison are convicted of a crime.

Some still can’t pay bail, he said, and “they are treated as less than people, their health has not been taken into account. Their dietary preferences have not been taken into account.”

“It should be a law in the United States that we do not lock up people or force them to eat food to survive on livelihoods provided by the state that conflict with whatever their health needs, religious needs or dietary preferences may be,” ” he said.

Soble has seen the decision to grant Chansley’s request for organic food criticized, and hopes it will lead more people to wonder why having poor quality food has become a norm.

“Why is it acceptable to use food as punishment for people in prison?” Soble said.

.Source