| Amid
Coronavirus in MCC Jail No Soap or Light
Says Letter To Inner City Press
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon
BBC
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SDNY COURTHOUSE,
March 28 -- As Coronavirus
COVID-19 has spread including
in the prison system, Inner
City Press has for two weeks
reported in person from nearly
every bail hearing and appeal
in the U.S. District Court for
the Southern District of New
York courthouse.
Based on
its articles it has received
communications from many
inmates and their family
members. This is one of them:
"Mr. Lee, the conditions
inside the MCC due to
coronavirus, are
inhuman. I have first
hand information from an
inmate, and would love to
share it, so the world is
aware of this situation that
should be a shame to the
authorities. Since last
Saturday March the 21st, and
having few confirmed cases of
COVID-19 inside the prison,
inmates at MCC Manhattan have
been practically on lockdown
and isolated, only being
allowed to call their family a
few times for a couple of
minutes.
This inmate described To his
family the horrible situation
for all the
inmates.
They have NO
SOAP, no shampoo, no cleaning
products, no clean uniforms
for 3 weeks, no food or not
enough food, they are locked
in their cells almost all day
and the guards won’t even
bother to check on them for
hours and hours; the guards
close the doors and
practically disappear; they
can hear people screaming and
crying all the time; people
are being moved from one place
to the other at all time. No
sanitary conditions
whatsoever, which increases
the risk of the coronavirus
spread among all the
prison.
There are
no doctors checking on the
inmates to verify their health
condition; the inmate told his
family his eyes and throat
were burning, and there was no
one to tell, besides, there’s
no medication available
whatsoever, not even at
commissary to buy. No
toothpaste or toothbrushes
available; no soap or hand
sanitizer provided. No
cleaning products for their
cells. This
inmate reported to his family
on Friday March the 20th that
his cell had gone out of
light; the light was not re
established until couple days
ago, so he was forced to be
isolated in his cell with no
light for several days."
In
fairness the U.S. Bureau of
Prison tells a different tale,
including in letters to SDNY
Chief Judge Colleen McMahon,
who on March 27 Inner City
Press witnessed
and conversed with as she
experimented with technology
to hear from inmates seeking
release from the prisons.
But BOP's
letters and the US Attorney's
Office arguments are in the
PACER database, which unlike
most media publication has not
dropped its paywall for
coverage of Coronavirus.
All of this
hypocrisy takes place amid
this global
crisis as for example the
United Nations while laying
off UN Delegates Dining
Room workers at his
headquarters in New York City
without
any mitigation brags
about giving old masks to the
City amid a disease its boss
Antonio Guterres helped mock
and cover up, and bans
the Press which asks. We'll
have more on this. For now, a
song,
here.
***
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