A United States prison was put into lockdown after around 100 inmates refused to return to their cells amid a heatwave.
Officials from Minnesota Correctional Facility – Stillwater prison – in Bayport said however the situation was “resolved without issue” on Sunday night. The inmates, all from one housing unit, said they did not want to return due to the dangerously high temperatures in the the region.
Something one former inmate described as an act of “self-preservation”. A Department of Corrections spokesman said the situation had remained “calm, peaceful and stable throughout the day”.
It said incacerated individuals became unhappy because it had to limit inmates’ time out of their cells due to staffing levels. Advocates outside the facility said inmates are fed up with the excessive heat, lack of air conditioning and limited access to showers and ice during on and off lockdowns over the past two months.
The prison is in Bayport about 25 miles (40 kilometers) east of Minneapolis, which was under an afternoon heat advisory for temperatures approaching 100 degrees Fahrenheit (37.7 Celsius).
Marvina Haynes of Minnesota Wrongfully Convicted Judicial Reform, whose brother is an inmate at Stillwater, says it received calls from “inmates who are actually inside” from 6.30am. While David Boehnke of Twin Cities Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee, said: “This morning, they decided that they weren’t going to lock into their cells.”
The department confirmed the holiday weekend meant inmates have been on lockdown status, meaning they are kept in their cells with “limited access facility-wide to out-of-cell time for showers, phone use and recreation.”
The executive director of the union representing Stillwater’s correctional officers, Bart Andersen, said in a statement that the incident is “endemic and highlights the truth behind the operations of the MN Department of Corrections with chronic understaffing.”
He says conditions upset the inmates because of restrictions on program and recreation time.
Intense heat across the United States has led to concerns about prisoners. Particularly those living in poorly ventilated or air-conditioned facilities.
The Department of Corrections says two correctional officers remained in a secure control area and in contact with facility staff since the emergency lockdown status was initiated at 8 am. Although no one was injured during the incident.
Members of a crisis negotiation team and the Special Operations Response Team were deployed “out of an abundance of caution.” Built in 1914, Stillwater prison is home to around 1,200 inmates.
Kevin Reese, founder of a criminal justice organization, Until We Are All Free, described Stillwater as a “pizza oven” in the summers. He was incarcerated there during the summers from 2006 through 2009.
He said: “It is a 100-year-old building with no air conditioning, no central air. The walls actually sweat.”
