Such is the remorseless progression of human society, shedding lives and souls as it goes on its way. It is an ocean into which men sink who have been cast out by the law and consigned, with help most cruelly withheld, to moral death. The sea is the pitiless social darkness into which the penal system casts those it has condemned, an unfathomable waste of misery. The human soul, lost in those depths, may become a corpse. Who shall revive it? - Victor Hugo
If you want to know what is really going on in society, it might be wise to find out how prisoners are treated in the jails and prisons. Fulton County, Georgia, is an interesting study of how not to run a government facility. As I watched Newsmax one day last week, a segment came on about an inmate of the Fulton County Jail that alarmed and disgusted me. Lashawn Thompson was the seventh person to die in the custody of Fulton County Jail in 2022, but his was the death that finally caught the world's attention. It took a scene so filthy that the deputy who discovered it fled to retch: Thompson was found in a filthy cell on the medical wing of the Rice Street jail, covered in lice, bedbugs, and his own waste, his head in a toilet. The same deputy had voiced concerns over Thompson's living conditions just days before.
People die in jail. Does anyone other than the family care? Truth be told, no one cares.
Pat Lavat, Fulton County Sheriff, accepted the resignation of the chief jailer and two other employees. I am sure Lashawn's relatives were not happy with these employees just stepping away from their questionable duties at the jail with no punishment. It is inconceivable that a government in the United States would allow a jail or prison cell to descend into this wretchedness. On top of that, on the medical floor of the jail! I must include pictures of the cell.
The cells are a garbage bin, and the facility averages a stabbing a day!
There is more negative news. Three sheriff deputies were arrested for crimes from sexual contact with prisoners to facilitating an attempted murder! Drug smuggling is rampant. This sounds more like North Korea, Iran, and Cuba than Fulton County, Georgia.
The autopsy report for Lashawn Thompson lists the cause of death as "undetermined." This
cause of death is unacceptable. Colin Kaepernick, the former NFL quarterback, has gotten involved. Kaepernick has paid for an independent autopsy. This is from Ben Crump, a civil rights attorney." 1 In the meantime, how many more inmates will die in the Fulton County jail?
To say the jail is overcrowded is an understatement. Built in 1989, the jail was designed to hold 1,125 inmates. In December 2022, 2,950 people were housed there. The Fulton County Jail holds more than double the population the facility was designed for. The County farms out prisoners to other county jails; however, these counties can only handle so much extra population.
Senator Jon Ossoff, D-GA, has appealed to Attorney General Merrick Garland for help with prisoners' civil rights. The Federal government provides hundreds of millions of dollars through state prisons and jail grants. The Department of Justice is responsible for seeing that the funds are put to good use. Since Thompson's death, the sheriff's office received an additional $5.3 million to provide upgrades at the jail. 2 What was the money spent on?
Sheriff "Labat has been outspoken about Thompson’s death. “We understand, and I have said this publicly, this is absolutely unconscionable, point blank,” he said at an April press conference held with Thompson’s family. 3
Sheriff Labatt wants a new jail. The Fulton County Commissioners approved $869,893 for a study recommending a new jail. This is another way to waste taxpayer money. Let's do a study.
“The solution is not more jails and more incarceration; it is smarter, more sensible justice policies that will reduce the jail population,” Sakira Cook, a vice president at Color of Change, a racial justice organization, said in a statement. 4
"We are moving some of our most vulnerable people to jail facilities that are the worst of the worst. There is no reason for someone who has just created a disturbance to be sitting in such a squalid jail for months. These prisoners need to be moved to other facilities that are equipped to help them emotionally and physically and not be in fear for their lives."
"Drug and mental health problems leading to relatively petty charges drive incarceration: Sheriff Labat has said 54 percent of detainees have some kind of mental health condition, and about 75 percent test positive for drugs on arrival. At Fulton County Jail, the top three most common booking charges in 2021 were criminal trespassing (23.2 percent), possession and use of drugs (9.6 percent), and theft by shoplifting (5 percent). One in eight jail bookings last year in Fulton County were of people experiencing homelessness, according to a Prison Policy Initiative analysis. But the jail also holds a number of people for crimes of violence, often for months or years at a time, as their cases wind their way through the court’s pandemic-clogged logjam.
Last year alone, the facility endured 11 fires, 534 fights, 114 stabbings, and at least two murders, including Shamar McLeroy’s." 5
McLeroy was seen masturbating on a park bench. He was reported by a parent with a child, arrested, convicted, and sent to the Fulton County Jail. McLeroy was found to be suffering from mental illness and housed in the jail's Medical wing.
"Eight months later, police arrested Jeremiah Collier on a murder charge. He was then placed in a cell with McLeroy. According to the October 2022 incident report, early on a Wednesday morning just 12 days later, jailers entered cell 515 and found McLeroy’s body tied down, with strips of bedding binding his ankles and neck to the bed frame. Collier was charged with his murder."6
Jails are not designed to be prisons. After a speedy trial and a case adjudicated, the prisoners should be moved to a prison. This should be in the judge's dispensation of the case. Sometimes, it takes months or years to bring a case to court. In the meantime, the prisoner rots away in the Fulton County Jail.
I will go out on a limb and guess there are not enough beds to house the additional number of prisoners in the Georgia prisons to handle the additional population.
Harrison Floyd, age 39, is being held in the Fulton County Jail without bail. Fani Willis claims Floyd is a flight risk, so she advised no bail. Floyd, a former Marine, husband, and father, is a co-defendant with Donald Trump. Could it be that DA Willis is punishing Floyd for supporting Donald Trump?
If you want more information, I would direct you to read the column by George Child listed below as a reference. It is some extended, challenging reading.
References
1. Whitfield-Anderson, Jayla, National Reporter, 'Like a horror movie': Photos of Lashawn Thompson's body and Fulton County Jail cell spark outrage, Yahoo News, May 4, 2023, https://news.yahoo.com/like-a-horror-movie-photos-of-lashawn-thompsons-body-and-fulton-county-jail-cell-spark-outrage-204927654.html
2. Ibid
3. Ibid
4. Ibid
5. Child, George, The real behind the wall: A look inside the infamous, deadly Fulton County Jail, Atlanta, News and Culture, July 15, 2023
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