On Thursday, I wrote about the rapidly deteriorating situation at Federal Correctional Institution, Miami. That low-security federal prison in South Florida faces a crisis of spiking coronavirus infections.
In response to my article, other families of Miami inmates have reached out to express their shared concern over the conditions. Critical issues involve inadequate access to medical care — for example, two prisoners reportedly having to share an asthma inhaler — a requirement that prisoners pay for certain over-the-counter medications, the spreading virus, a malfunctioning air conditioning system (Miami is hot in August), and Warden Sylvester Jenkin’s failure to address these issues. Two more prisoners and staff tested positive for the virus overnight, bringing the total number of infections in the prison to 98 inmates and 12 staff.
The warden is refusing to let low-risk inmates out on compassionate release or home confinement as provided for in the CARES Act and as recommended to prison authorities by Attorney General William Barr. As a result, the courts are having to step in. On Thursday, a federal district referenced the prison conditions to refuse a government’s request to keep a prisoner incarcerated.
It gets worse.
As I noted on Thursday, a bureau spokesperson insisted that prisoners have access to the medicines they require and that prisoner safety is a paramount focus. The message: All is under control. Speaking on the condition of anonymity due to the very credible threat of retaliation against their loved ones, the families were astounded by this official Bureau of Prisons response. And to demonstrate why they are concerned about remaining anonymous, within two hours of my story being published, Monty Grow, a prisoner whose mother had spoken to me, had his communication privileges suspended, had his room inspected, and was summoned before the prison leadership. It seems quite clear that the warden has few qualms about using aggressive measures to keep his apparent leadership failures out of the news.
Following my discussions with families, I again emailed the Bureau of Prisons’s public affairs team yesterday, questioning the bureau’s all-is-well assertions. I did not receive a response.
With the health of prisoners and staff now evidently at great risk, the current situation represents an intolerable failure of leadership. The first line of responsibility here would appear to rest with the prison warden. But in the government’s possible breach of its constitutional duty to provide basic care and avoid capricious, cruel, and unusual punishment, bureau Director Michael Carvajal and Barr must also now take responsibility.
Correction: An earlier version of this article stated that Kenneth Atkinson is the warden of FCI Miami. In fact, Sylvester Jenkins is the current warden of FCI Miami, Kenneth Atkinson is the former warden. The Washington Examiner regrets the error.
