“It’s a modern-day Alcatraz,” said David Cuevas, president of the Harris County Sheriff’s Office deputies’ union. “The conditions are untenable for both employees and offenders — we are in a human rights crisis.”
for allegedly beating an inmate to death and — in an incident that has not been previously reported — a women who was so mentally ill that officers repeatedly spotted her drinking toilet water gave birth alone in her cell. Later, after jail staff took her to the hospital, she allegedly attacked the baby and began stomping on the infant’s head before anyone intervened and saved the child.
For people in custody, the problems aren’t hard to spot, even on a short stay. Tayler — who asked to be identified only by her first name — told me about the eight hours she spent going through intake at the Joint Processing Center after a misdemeanor arrest.“There were people screaming, people crying,” she told me. She remembered it was around 3 a.m., and all the lights were on.
Andre Taylor — a 26-year-old who spent two weeks in a quarantine unit after another arrestee came in with monkeypox in August — said he and the other men in medical isolation were treated “like animals” and had irregular access to phones, meals and showers. During his time in custody, Hamrick said, he witnessed at least one stabbing and regularly saw inmates attack one another using boiling water as a weapon.
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Essay: ‘Modern-day Alcatraz’ — Harris County Jail inmates, deputies fear for their lives.“It’s a modern-day Alcatraz,” said David Cuevas, president of the Harris County Sheriff’s Office deputies’ union. “The conditions are untenable for both employees and offenders — we are in a human rights crisis.”
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