Jackson, Mississippi — A Mississippi jail violated inmates' constitutional rights by failing to guard them from violence, failing to fulfill their psychological well being wants, failing to take enough steps for suicide prevention and by relying an excessive amount of on extended solitary confinement, the Justice Division stated Wednesday.
The division launched findings of its two-year investigation of the state's oldest jail, Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman. The probe began after an outburst of violence in late 2019 and early 2020.
"The issues at Parchman are extreme, systemic, and exacerbated by critical deficiencies in staffing and supervision," the division stated in its report.
It stated the Mississippi Division of Corrections "has been on discover of those deficiencies for years and didn't take cheap measures to handle the violations, due partly to non-functional accountability or high quality assurance measures."
"Years of MDOC's deliberate indifference has resulted in critical hurt and a considerable threat of great hurt to individuals confined at Parchman," the division stated.
Assistant Lawyer Common Kristen Clarke, head of the Justice Division's civil rights division, stated 10 homicides and 12 suicides have occurred amongst inmates at Parchman since 2019.
The division stated it discovered "gross understaffing" and "uncontrolled gang exercise." It additionally discovered that inadequate safety gave inmates "unfettered entry to contraband."
Clarke stated Mississippi officers cooperated with the investigation, and the Justice Division and the state will work on steps to resolve the issues.
"This marks the primary time the Justice Division has concluded that a jail's use of solitary confinement violates the constitutional rights of individuals with out critical psychological sickness," Clarke stated in a convention name saying the findings.
Greater than 150 inmates filed a federal lawsuit in 2020 over their therapy in Parchman, saying they had been denied enough medical and psychological well being care, fed contaminated meals and retaliated towards for talking with their attorneys.
The Justice Division has investigated jail situations in recent times in different states, together with Alabama, Texas, South Carolina and Georgia.
The division is constant to analyze situations at three different Mississippi prisons — South Mississippi Correctional Establishment, Central Mississippi Correctional Facility and Wilkinson County Correctional Facility.
Violence has been a longstanding drawback in Mississippi prisons, the place many roles for guards are unfilled. Officers with the state Division of Corrections stated for years that it's troublesome to seek out individuals to work as guards due to low pay, lengthy hours and harmful situations. The pay has elevated in the course of the previous two years.