‘Welcome to hell’: Lawsuit seeks relief from prison heat
TDCJ says fans, showers enough to cool inmates
Larry McCollum arrived at the Hutchins prison unit near Dallas to a grim greeting. “Welcome to hell,” the guards told him.
A cab driver with the look and physique of Santa Claus, McCollum was to finish an 11-month stint there for cashing a hot check. Instead, after six sweltering days on the cell block, the 58-year-old died of heatstroke.
McCollum shared his experiences in a letter that he wrote before his death.
“I can’t imagine what my dad was going through,” said his daughter, Stephanie Kingrey. “How scared he probably was, not knowing what was going to happen.”
McCollum is among 22 people who have died as a result of indoor weather conditions at 15 state prisons since 1998, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. The
majority of Texas prisons do not have air conditioning in living areas.
The lawyers handling McCollum’s wrongful-death lawsuit against the TDCJ also are tackling the rights of current and future inmates in a separate lawsuit that will be heard in Houston this week.
The case centers on six inmates at the Wallace Pack Unit in Navasota, about 75 miles northwest of downtown Houston. The plaintiffs argue that the cooling mechanisms the prison provides — fans, showers and cool drinking water — won’t protect inmates from the dangers of extreme heat. Being locked inside with humidity and temperatures topping 100 degrees, they argue, amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.
U.S. District Judge Keith Ellison has granted class-action status to the case, and the lawyers this week are requesting immediate relief for all Wallace Pack inmates — healthy and sick, young and old.
State criminal justice officials argue it’s too expensive to provide air conditioning throughout housing units. They say the warden and top administrators understand the danger of rising indoor temperatures during heat waves and take steps to mitigate it.
“We are prepared to vigorously defend our position in court,” said Jason Clark, a spokesman for TDCJ. “The well-being of staff and offenders is a top priority for the agency, and we remain committed to making sure that both are safe during the extreme heat.”
Prison officials uniformly take a variety of precautions to help reduce heat-related illnesses, Clark said. Water and ice are provided to staff and inmates; activity is restricted during the hottest hours of the day; and staff is trained to identify symptoms of heat-related illnesses and refer people for treatment.
The inmates, represented by Austin-based Edwards Law, contend such efforts are inadequate. They note in court documents that TDCJ requires cool air and ventilation for its hog barns with mist-generators that automatically turn on when the temperature rises above 74 degrees. And yet, “TDCJ has no similar policies to protect humans.”
The debate boils down to a civil rights matter, said Carter White, director of the civil rights clinic at the University of California Davis School of Law, who has experience with class-action suits involving inmates.
“When people get sentenced to time in prison, it’s not a death sentence,” White said. “They’re supposed to be housed in humane conditions that don’t cause these heat-related illnesses.”
Cooling off
Only 28 of the state’s 107 state prison facilities provide air conditioning in housing areas, according to TDCJ. Medical, psychiatric and geriatric facilities are air-conditioned in all areas.
Many state facilities were built before air conditioning, and most built afterward do not have it because of costs for construction, maintenance and utilities, said Clark, the TDCJ spokesman.
The Pack Unit, a minimumsecurity facility built in 1983, houses more than 500 inmates with medical needs.
In May, it was near capacity with 1,478 men. Half the prisoners have been over age 50, and 200 or so are over 65. About 200 inmates are young and healthy, shouldering the bulk of the labor, according to lawyers with Edwards Law.
Some portions of Pack have air conditioning — including solitary cells and the infirmary — but not the prisoner’s dormitories. Officials have designated some indoor areas where inmates can go for respite, but inmates can’t spend all their time in these areas.
During extreme heat, officials say, the prison restricts outdoor activity, provides water breaks for workers and offers cold showers and extra drinking water and ice when available. It provides blowers and fans and attempts to ventilate the units. Guards encourage inmates to wear shorts.
But every summer some Pack inmates require treatment for heat-related illnesses, documents indicate. The windows in the dorms are sealed shut, and inmates often sleep on the concrete floor because it is cooler than on their bunks.
Each of the Pack inmates in the lawsuit has suffered setbacks as a result of indoor heat — five have medical complications and take medications that put them at heightened risk for heat exposure; the sixth is healthy.
The inmates are asking the court to require an explicit heat wave policy at Pack Unit with remedies for inmates at different risk levels. They also want the judge to force the prison to lower the indoor temperatures during heat waves and mandate on-demand showers, portable coolers, open windows with bug screens and three-hour periods of respite in air-conditioned parts of the facility.
Among other details, they want the prison to monitor inmates’ water consumption, provide wellness checks and announce the temperature hourly during heat waves.
Ellison’s ruling could set a precedent that would enable inmates at other facilities to challenge policies and practices, said Jennifer E. Laurin, a professor of criminal and civil rights law at University of Texas.
“If the judge orders changes to the prison,” she said, “prisoners at other facilities could seek the same reforms.”
Short but deadly stint
McCollum, a grandfather who drove a Yellow cab, was living with his wife in Waco when he was arrested. Someone had approached him outside a bank and asked him to cash a check with proceeds from a stolen car, his daughter said. McCollum, who had previous convictions for DWI and theft, was sentenced to 11 months in prison.
When it came time to transfer him from the county jail to Hutchins Unit to serve his sentence, McCollum was scared, his family said. He had heard terrible things about the place.
After McCollum died, his wife Sandra received a letter he had written the day he arrived at Hutchins. When the prisoners arrived at the facility, the letter says, the guards taunted him with the grim greeting.
McCollum, who was diabetic with arthritis and high blood pressure, was given a top bunk. Per prison system policy, he wasn’t issued a water cup, forcing him to use his hands to scoop water when he was thirsty, his family claims in court filings. But he rarely did that, the family believes, because he had trouble getting down from his bunk.
On July 22, 2011, fellow inmates found him having convulsions on the top bunk. He was taken to Parkland Hospital in Dallas, where his body temperature was found to be over 109 degrees. His family kept vigil for six days before cutting off life support.
Ten inmates died from heat exposure over a three-week period that summer at prisons in Palestine, Rusk, Huntsville and Kenedy, according to TDCJ records.
Kingrey and her family were the first relatives of a heat-illness victim to bring suit against TDCJ. Her aim, she said, is “to prevent other families from going through the hell we’re going through.”
“It’s not humane,” Kingrey said. “It makes me sick to my stomach knowing that other men and women living in Texas and all the other southern states get so hot and they have no relief whatsoever.”