From the Editor - Prison Legal News

April 2008
Three Murders in Three Months at Mississippi Control Unit
Lead to Improvements And New Consent Decree
aken as a whole, I am con-
the conditions in Unit
“Tvinced
32 are as bad as anywhere in the whole
country,” observed Margaret Winter, a
lawyer with the National Prison Project
of the American Civil Liberties Union
(ACLU). Unit 32 is otherwise known as
the supermax at Mississippi’s State Penitentiary
in Parchman.
In 2005, the ACLU sued over the
treatment of prisoners in Unit 32. A 2006
consent decree obligated prison officials to
make improvements. However, a June 29,
2007 letter sent to U.S. Magistrate Judge
Jerry Davis disclosed that there had been
“a total breakdown in basic sanitation” at
the supermax unit.
“Prisoners are being moved into cells
without lights, fans, properly functioning
toilets, disinfectant, or any other cleaning
supplies,” the letter stated. “The cells
are filthy. Food trays are delivered filthy.
Prisoners have been fed a diet of peanut
butter and jelly sandwiches for days.”
According to prisoner Steven Farris,
a plaintiff in the lawsuit, the conditions
on Unit 32 began to deteriorate after the
spearing death of prisoner Boris Harper
in June 2007. As Harper passed by the cell
of prisoner Lamarcus Lee Hillard, Hillard
fatally stabbed him with a spear fashioned
from a broken mop handle.
Following Harper’s death, prisoners
sent letters to the ACLU saying that
sanitation on Unit 32 had been reduced
to nil. “There are 1,000 men in Unit 32.
One of them committed the stabbing. We
don’t know what the circumstances were,
but one thing we do know is that it does
not do the public any good to have people
treated like beasts,” Winter said. “It’s just
outside the standards of civilized society
by forcing them to live in excrement.”
“It is my staff’s job in Parchman to
try to change behavior,” said Mississippi
Dept. of Corrections Commissioner Chris
Epps. “That’s why it’s called correction.”
Not all prisoners on Unit 32 are there
because of alleged deviant or violent behavior.
Prisoners with life sentences are
sent to Unit 32 for observation. Prison
officials contend the purpose for putting
such prisoners in supermax is to see how
they will adapt to prison before assigning
them to the general population. Prisoners,
however, contend the practice is to break
them down by showing them the conditions
they can expect if they misbehave.
Most prisoners in Unit 32 are there
for disorderly or unruly behavior, for
refusing to work as unpaid slaves on the
prison farm, or for not attending school or
other programs. More than half have been
written up for disciplinary infractions
more than 19 times, and a few have been
written up 100 or more times. There are
89 charges of escape among the prisoners
held in Unit 32.
An April 2007 beating of a prisoner
demonstrated that the “correction” dispensed
by Parchman’s staff can equate to
physical violence. Kevin King is one of the
tens of thousands of prisoners nationwide
who are mentally ill; he was diagnosed
with impulse control disorder. Since
2002, King has received 165 disciplinary
infractions that include failure to follow
commands, taunting guards and prisoners,
and physical acts such as throwing
urine at staff members.
An unnamed guard had had enough
of King. While the cause is uncertain,
what is certain is that the guard beat King
in the shower with a pair of handcuffs.
King was then forced to kneel while
restrained as another guard sprayed pepper
spray into the wound. Pictures taken
after the incident show King with a jagged
cut on his head and his shirt drenched
in blood. The unknown guard resigned
shortly thereafter.
“We investigated, and the investigators
reported to me. We found the officer
didn’t do his job, and the officer resigned,”
said Epps. “We policed ourselves and got
rid of that bad apple. But we’ve still got
Kevin King.”
Epps called King “one of the worst
inmates in the nation,” citing him as a
prime example of the need for Unit 32.
“He’s constantly into something. He
thrives on pissing inmates and guards
off,” Epps continued. “Kevin King is a
fruitcake. He’s just a nuisance.”
Most people who are untrained in
dealing with the mentally ill come to
the same conclusion. Critics say that is
exactly why the criminal justice system
is ill-equipped to handle an influx of
prisoners with mental illnesses; prisons
have become the nation’s largest provider
of mental health services in the decades
since the psychiatric hospital system was
dismantled.
22
“He is mentally ill, and the problem
does not get any better when a feisty guy
with a mental illness is constantly gassed,”
said Winter. “It’s not good control. It’s not
good therapy for a mentally ill person.”
Sadly, though, it seems that is the most
likely type of therapy King will receive in
Unit 32 for the remainder of his nine-year
sentence.
The conditions on Unit 32 are bad
enough to drive even the sane to suicide.
Tacoma Elmore, 29, was an intelligent person,
yet he landed in prison and ended up
in supermax. In mid-June 2007, Elmore
was found hanging by a sheet in his cell.
The frequency of suicide attempts and
levels of violence at the supermax unit
concern the ACLU.
“The ACLU hasn’t a clue about running
a prison,” retorted Epps. Considering
the conditions at Unit 32, some could say
the same about the Mississippi Dept. of
Corrections.
“There is unquestionably a small
number of prisoners who are so exceedingly
dangerous they need to be held
under the tightest possible security, but
that is a very small number, relatively
speaking,” Winters said. “Even with that
small number, there is no justification for
holding them in conditions as harsh as
Unit 32.”
The larger question is what effect the
conditions at Unit 32 have in terms of rehabilitating
prisoners and preparing them
to reenter society. Nearly half of Unit 32’s
prisoners are scheduled to be released
within the next seven years, and the vast
majority will one day be set free.
MDOC Commissioner Chris Epps
visited Parchman while the ongoing
consent decree in the ACLU lawsuit was
in effect. “I went to every building, and
[Unit] 32 is doing fine,” he said. “This is a
group that is unappeasable. All they are
doing is racking up attorney fees for you
and me in tax dollars.”
Looks, and rhetoric, can be deceiving.
Things were not “doing fine” on the morning
of July 17, 2007. While patrolling Unit
32, a guard noticed a gun in a prisoner’s
cell. As he was going to tell prison supervisions,
he advised another guard, Marcus
Fairley, of the situation.
Fairley went to investigate and saw
the gun lying openly in the cell of prisoner
Patrick Hawkins. “The inmate was sitting
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