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COLD CELLS PUT BOP WARDEN ON HOT SEAT

U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres toured MDC Brooklyn, the federal high-rise lockup in the Sunset Park neighborhood of the borough, yesterday. She did not seem to like what she saw.

The Judge conducted her walk-through with lawyers and a court reporter in tow, hearing about the inmates’ days in the dark and freezing cold – without medical or mental health treatment – while Federal Bureau of Prisons staff worked in coats and gloves.

CNN reported that Judge Torres spoke with inmates through their cell doors, repeating what they said for the benefit of the court stenographer and lawyers and officials who accompanied her.

One inmate described the “mental breakdown” of his cellmate while the power was out, according to the court transcript. The outage rendered “emergency buttons” to get the attention of guards ineffective.

When the inmate finally reached an officer to tell him his cellmate was suicidal, “I think they took it as a joke,” he told Torres.

The inmate said he “physically had to take … literally had to take the noose out of his cellmate’s hand.”

“He was trying to kill himself,” the inmate said.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Torres said.

“Thank you for being worried about us, ma’am, and treating us like human beings,” the inmate told the judge.

The Judge repeated for the reporter, “He is a mental health patient, and he was feeling suicidal and no one came to help him. He said the temperature dropped to freezing. They had nothing in there, they had no thermal shirts.”

She observed water damaged ceilings in another cell, where, she said, “you can see copious amounts of paint peeling and hanging from the ceiling. The ceiling is painted white, but the water damaged area has a kind of a golden tone to it. It almost looks like wet tissues hanging from the ceiling.” The inmate in the cell told her that it was “like sleeping under a waterfall.”

“He says they didn’t care for you,” Torres told the lawyers and court reporter. “If you tried to get an extra blanket, they ignored him.”

Lack of power, freezing conditions and appalling treatment of inmates at the Brooklyn facility sparked a national outcry and unprecedented protests this past weekend, leading to the Judge ordering the unusual hearing and forced tour of the prison. The string of heat outages began at the Brooklyn detention facility weeks earlier, according to jail staff and inmates who testified during the hearing.

Instead of intervening to protect those incarcerated at the jail, the warden at MDC, Herman Quay, lied about the extent of the crisis, while downplaying long-standing issues at the facility, attorneys told the Judge. “I have personal knowledge that what the warden said was false,” Deirdre von Dornum, attorney-in-charge of the Federal Defenders of New York, alleged during yesterday’s hearing.

Warden Quay asserted that detainees were never deprived of heat, medical access or hot meals, but von Dornum — who was able to tour MDC Brooklyn last weekend only because Judge ordered the BOP to let her in – said she witnessed clients confined to freezing cells, some of them suffering from serious medical conditions. A number had not received a hot meal in five days.

MDC inmate Donnell Murray testified that BOP employees had measured the temperature of his cell as being between 30 and 40 degrees. He complained that he was cut off from speaking with family members and attorneys — something else Warden Quay denied — and was unprepared for his impending trial.

“The lights was out. The heat was off, and we was locked in,” Murray testified. “It was hard on me because it was dark. It was cold. I was nervous.”

The hearing came after Federal Public Defender Ezra Spilke requested the Court look into “inhumane conditions” at MDC. It was the first time that BOP employees testified under oath about conditions at the facility. BOP lawyers tried to postpone the hearing and Judge Torres’ inspection tour on Monday night, but were denied.

Warden Quay, who has been accused of lying by officials, BOP staff and inmates, was a “no-show” at the hearing. BOP employees who did testify offered details that directly conflicted with Quay’s denials and the BOP spin that the prison was merely “experiencing a partial power outage” related to an electrical fire last Sunday.

The heat is on, if not in the facility, then at least on the Warden’s backside. The Dept of Justice announced Wednesday that its Inspector General will investigate the BOP’s response to heating and electrical failures at MDC Brooklyn.

In a statement, the DOJ said the IG, who conducts independent, internal investigations, would determine if the BOP properly responded to the crisis at the Metropolitan Detention Center and whether it had adequate contingency plans in place.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-New York), denounced what he called a “total lack of urgency and concern” by the BOP. Nadler and other officials toured the facility last weekend, where according to The New York Times, over 1,600 inmates have been largely confined to their freezing, dark cells for nearly a week, since an electrical fire partially cut off power to the jail. The fire resulted in a ban on visitation and a lockdown.

“The situation is really, really a nightmare,” said Rep. Nydia M. Velázquez (D-New York), whose district includes the jail. Officials, including Rep. Velázquez and Nadler, initially were denied a tour of the facility on Friday night.

The BOP said in a statement on Saturday night that a new electrical panel had been installed by that day and that the “facility is working to restore power as expeditiously as possible.” It expected work to be completed by yesterday. Earlier, the BOP issued a statement that the facility was “experiencing a partial power outage… Cells have heat and hot water, there is lighting in the common areas and inmates are receiving hot meals,” the release said. The BOP blamed the electrical failure on Consolidated Edison, the local electric utility.

Con Ed disputed the BOP report, saying “It’s an internal problem, and their electricians will have to fix it. End of story.” Likewise, correctional officers’ union leaders and defense lawyers rebutted the BOP account. The local union president said the problems began around Jan. 5, when the facility first lost power. The heating issues began last week, leaving inmates and staff to face freezing weather for the first time. “We didn’t have heat in the building, we didn’t have light,” he said. “The weather was actually unbearable.”

A case manager told The Times that the inmates “just stay huddled up in the bed. “I have several inmates that are very elderly. One of them complained that he’s been sick for the last few days. He looks sickly. He’s walking slower. Talking slower.”

The City of New York offered relief supplies to MDC Brooklyn late last week. The facility initially turned down the relief supplies, but after New York City William diBlasio said the City was sending trucks full of blankets, hand warmers, and generators, regardless of whether they’d be accepted. MDC Brooklyn reportedly said Saturday it would accept the help, and the supplies arrived late in the evening.

CNN, A federal judge toured a troubled New York jail. What she found is disturbing (Feb. 7)

The New York Times, ‘A Nightmare’: Inside the Federal Jail in Brooklyn With Little Heat or Electricity (Feb. 2)

The New York Times, Justice Department Calls for Investigation Into Brooklyn Jail Where Heat and Power Failed (Feb. 6)

The Gothamist, Protests Continue As Officials Report ‘Intolerable, Immoral’ Conditions Inside Freezing Brooklyn Jail (Feb. 3)

The Gothamist, Brooklyn Jail Officials Accused Of Lying About Heat Outages: ‘What The Warden Said Was False’ (Feb. 5)

– Thomas L. Root