Posted on 04/25/2003 12:22:33 PM PDT by new cruelty
JACKSON, Miss. -After running a few laps around the exercise pen, Alan Dale Walker lies down on the cool concrete, closes his eyes and imagines he is anywhere else but on Mississippi's death row.
For Walker, convicted in 1991 of raping and killing a woman, it's one of the few opportunities to escape the screams and maniacal laughter of his fellow condemned inmates. The conditions here are so bad that some contend they are literally driving the inmates insane.
A federal lawsuit filed on behalf of six inmates by the American Civil Liberties Union says the stifling heat, filth, insects and other conditions could explain why some of those on death row are suffering from mental illness.
"I used to raise fighting chickens," Walker wrote in one of several letters he and other inmates sent to The Associated Press. "The way I had those chickens caged up makes me think about how they have me caged up here."
State Corrections Commissioner Christopher Epps said the death row at the prison in Parchman shouldn't be singled out.
"I've been in this business for 23 years and I've been to many prisons throughout the U.S. Ours is no different from any other state that I've been in," Epps said.
At a hearing on the lawsuit earlier this year, James Balsamo, the director of environmental health and safety at Tulane University, said he took temperature, humidity and air volume readings in about 15 cells at Parchman last August, and found the heat index exceeded 100 degrees
Many inmates keep their windows closed to protect themselves from spiders and insects, he said, which adds to the heat and ventilation problems.
Another witness, Dr. Terry Kupers, a California psychiatrist who has written a book on prison madness, said he found several inmates with mental problems in a tour of death row last August.
"They mess up their cell, they're totally disheveled, they scream day and night, they smear feces, they throw feces and urine down the hall, they flood the tier," Kupers testified.
In a recent telephone interview, Kupers said conditions at Parchman were worse than any he's seen at death rows in six states - and they directly contribute to severe emotional and mental problems.
"There were massive problems there," Kupers said. "It was a combination of extreme isolation and idleness along with very hazardous sanitation conditions that I've seen nowhere else."
He said the mental health care amounted to "warehousing" inmates and providing some with medication. He said they need true mental health care because many may never see an execution chamber.
Six people have been executed in Mississippi since 1976. Out of approximately 170 death sentences in the state since that year, about 70 have been vacated. There are now 66 men and one woman awaiting execution.
Epps said mental health care should improve when Correctional Medical Services, a St. Louis company that specializes in prison health care, begins its contract with the Mississippi prison system July 1. Among the changes will be adding four full-time psychiatrists to bolster the current part-time workers.
Margaret Winter, associate director of the ACLU's National Prison Project, said more needs to be done and adding psychiatrists "will not address the enormous problems that were identified during the trial."
Carolyn Clayton, who helped found the victims' rights group Survival Inc. after her daughter was kidnapped, raped and slain in 1986, said she had mixed feelings about making improvements to death row.
She said conditions described in the prisoners' suit sounded harsh, but "I immediately go to the victim's feelings. Their loved ones are in the ground."
Well, if they aren't executed, they should never have another free day as long as they live, so we don't have to worry about how they'd react to living in the real world.
I don't know about nowadays, but in the old days, Parchman was a 'working farm'. They raised all their own food, animals for slaughter, dairy products, etc. Seems to me, that if they stopped this practice, it might be a good time to bring it back! If they're worried about the Death Row inmates, give them their own garden in the confines of Death Row!
No one should have to stay at 100+ degrees.
Gee, maybe the ACLU can order the court to install a jacuzzi hot tub filled with blondes and a bamboo-hut bar for convicted murdered, Walker.
Naaah...
Dear Alan Dale Walker,
(yawn)
Short trip...
Would you be able to clarify?
Heat, insects, screams and laughter. Compare that to the brutal rapes and murders they've committed against innocent men, women, and children.
Exactly. All they have to do is waive their appeals and in no time they will see the death chamber. (Hence, the ball is in their court.)
Well I grew up in Louisiana which usually has 100% humidity so 90 degrees is hot hot hot. Mississippi is drier but not that much.
of course I read later that they were referring to a "heat index" of 100%+ which already has the humidity factored in, so it may not be as bad as I was thinking.
Oh yeah, they throw their poop around too. What was the name of that guy who pretended to be insane in order to avoid prosecution? Yeah.
And Scott Peterson's defense is definitely going to be insanity. Why else would you leave so many clues and put yourself where the bodies were found.
First Santorum is framed for something HE DID NOT SAY, then all of the old accusations about GITMO, OF WHICH THE UNITED STATES HAS BEEN CLEARED TWICE are magically resurrected and NOW the ENTIRE PRISON SYSTEM must be changed lots of love and care given to physchopathic killers BECAUSE THE ACLU SAYS IT WAS PRISON THAT MADE THEM PSYCHOPATHS??? LIKE THEY WERE NICE, WELL ADJUSTED PEOPLE WHO JUST LIKE TO MURDER OTHER PEOPLE??
GREAT SHADES OF MALVO, what s this, National Wingnut Campaign Trolling Issue Month??
They're on death row. Give them death. I'm not allowing my taxes to be hiked in order to give comforts to killers that sometimes I can't afford to give to my own family.
RIGHT!
Yeah, and insects too! Those are two of the reasons why I left Louisiana. Of course, I didn't rape and murder anybody so I was pretty much free to go whenever I wanted. These boys really should have thought things through before they went and did all that.
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