High suicide rate, rats among troubles cited at Atlanta penitentiary

The Atlanta Federal Penitentiary isn’t like your average U.S. prison, witnesses told a congressional panel headed by Georgia U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff. It’s worse.

One federal judge, Ossoff said in his role as chairman of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, “noted that incarceration (there) is like adding another layer of punishment due to the appalling conditions.”

Rats, sewage backups, mold, ubiquitous contraband and a troubling suicide rate were among the problems at the prison cited during a hearing Ossoff held this past week.

“In roughly four years, eight inmates at USP Atlanta died by suicide: two prior to my arrival and six during my tenure,” Erika Ramirez, a former prison psychologist, told the panel. “To put this into perspective, federal prisons typically see between one and three suicides over a five-year period.”

Terri Whitehead, a former administrator at the penitentiary, said the rat infestation was so bad that staff propped open doors to the building to let in stray cats.

Whitehead then said what most would expect doesn’t need saying: “It is never a good idea to leave prison doors open.”

Ossoff said officials at the Federal Bureau of Prisons knew about the issues in Georgia and failed to act.

“Interviews and records reveal a facility where inmates, including presumptively innocent pretrial detainees, were denied proper nutrition, access to clean drinking water and hygiene products, lacked access to medical care, endured months of lockdown with limited or no access to the outdoors or basic services, and had rats and roaches in their food and cells,” Ossoff said.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has documented issues at the penitentiary over the years, as well as a detention center for pretrial defendants and a minimum-security prison camp contained on the same property south of downtown.