Support NeoGAF

[xbhaskarx]

Good read...

Inside America’s Toughest Federal Prison
For years, conditions inside the United States’ only federal supermax facility were largely a mystery. But a landmark lawsuit is finally revealing the harsh world within.

At left, the United States Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility, otherwise known as the ADX, in Florence, Colo.

For those who aren't familiar with ADX Florence:

Notable former inmates
Notable current inmates
Some pretty horrible people on those lists, from Timothy McVeigh to Ted Kaczynski and numerous Al-Qaeda operatives... plus Woody Harrelson's dad.

From the wikipedia page:
Notorious escape artist Richard Lee McNair wrote to a journalist from his cell in 2009 to say "Thank God for prisons [...] There are some very sick people in here... Animals you would never want living near your family or the public in general. I don't know how corrections staff deal with it. They get spit on, shit on, abused and I have seen them risk their own lives and save a prisoner many times."

It was #1 on Mother Jones' America's 10 Worst Prisons list

 

[NYCmetsfan]

They also did a profile on norweign prisons and their humanity. I don't have a link, on phone

 

[xbhaskarx]

Post your favorite ADX Florence inmate

Joseph Konopka

Pleaded guilty in 2002 to causing blackouts in Wisconsin by damaging power substations and utility facilities, as well as storing cyanide in the Chicago subway system; also known as "Dr. Chaos."

 

[hunnies28]

Saw the list of current inmates and was inmediately afraid of what they could acomplish together.

 

[Ekdrm2d1]

wow, I've never seen a snow shot. That's a great photo.

Spoiler

The prison is messed up. Brutal conditions

 

[xbhaskarx]

The man who started it all... aww he looks like a sweet old grandpa

Thomas Silverstein

Aryan Brotherhood prison gang leader (considered one of the most dangerous inmates in the federal prison system); transferred to ADX after murdering Correction Officer Merle Clutts at USP Marion in 1983 while serving a sentence for bank robbery. Silverstein's crime was the impetus for the construction of ADX.


Reading these is making me want to re-watch Oz

 

[Ekdrm2d1]

Post your favorite ADX Florence inmate

lol. Great game!

I never knew about Charles Harrelson. Dude was hardcore
Was an American organized crime figure who was convicted of assassinating federal judge John H. Wood, Jr., the first federal judge killed in the 20th century. He was the estranged father of actor Woody Harrelson.

 

[Nerdkiller]

plus Woody Harrelson's dad.

Looking up on this, HOLY CRAP!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Harrelson

 

[Ekdrm2d1]

The man who started it all... aww he looks like a sweet old grandpa

Thomas Silverstein

Aryan Brotherhood prison gang leader (considered one of the most dangerous inmates in the federal prison system); transferred to ADX after murdering Correction Officer Merle Clutts at USP Marion in 1983 while serving a sentence for bank robbery. Silverstein's crime was the impetus for the construction of ADX.


Reading these is making me want to re-watch Oz

This dude..

He has been incarcerated continuously since 1977 and has been convicted of four separate murders while imprisoned, one of which was overturned.He has been in solitary confinement since 1983, when he killed prison guard Merle Clutts at the Marion Penitentiary in Illinois.

He's been in solitary since I was born 0_0

Is that humane? ADX can destroy your mind

 

[Dreams-Visions]

I can't say I'm surprised or particularly concerned.

These are killers, mass-murderers (or at least attempted mass-murderers), serial rapists, and criminal element masterminds. Several murdered other inmates or corrections officers. I'd prefer they largely remain very uncomfortable. They have books, periodicals, and radio. That's enough entertainment. They could have more gym equipment, but it's not like they need to be able to get extra strong. That's enough equipment. Place should be clean and orderly, but that's about it.

 

[Mammoth Jones]

I mean, these are some serious motherfuckers locked up there. It sucks that it's not the Hilton but if that's what it takes to keep these dangerous dudes away from me and mine then so be it.

 

[shadyspace]

This dude..



He's been in solitary since I was born 0_0

Is that humane? ADX can destroy your mind

How is that even possible.

 

[newjeruse]

Post your favorite ADX Florence inmate

Joseph Konopka

Pleaded guilty in 2002 to causing blackouts in Wisconsin by damaging power substations and utility facilities, as well as storing cyanide in the Chicago subway system; also known as "Dr. Chaos."

Seems tame.

 

[Dreams-Visions]

Is that humane? ADX can destroy your mind

Does it matter? Do YOU want to be around him? He killed 4 other inmates and a correctional officer IN JAIL.

It seems he is objectively UNSAFE to be around. It's not his safety and comfort that matters. His mind was clearly destroyed before he got to this supermax.

 

[WedgeX]

Unconscionable that people with mental health diagnosis were kept without their medication. Sometimes in order to administer punishments. We've got a damn Constitution for a reason.

 

[Ekdrm2d1]

How is that even possible.

Wonder if it's as punishment or if he's a threat. If he was let loose would he instantly kill somebody or act out.

Life imprisonment (without parole)
Release date: 11/02/2095

lol

 

[xbhaskarx]

Seems tame.

He's Doctor Chaos, how supervillain-y is your nickname?

 

[Ekdrm2d1]

Does it matter? Do YOU want to be around him? He killed 4 other inmates and a correctional officer IN JAIL.

It seems he is objectively UNSAFE to be around. It's not his safety and comfort that matters. His mind was clearly destroyed before he got to this supermax.

Correct.

 

[Jarrod38]

Naser Jason Adbo serving 2 life sentences plus another 60 years.

 

[Ekdrm2d1]

Naser Jason Adbo serving 2 life sentences plus another 60 years.

Damn.

 

[Ekdrm2d1]

José Padilla
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/José_Padilla_(prisoner)

Photo of Jose Padilla on sensory-deprived trip to the dentist; it caused shock when published by the New York Times in December 2006.

Damn.. That's wild

 

[MJPIA]

Soooo this is like a real world Arkham Asylum

The ADX is the highest-security prison in the country. It was designed to be escape-proof, the Alcatraz of the Rockies, a place to incarcerate the worst, most unredeemable class of criminal — “a very small subset of the inmate population who show,” in the words of Norman Carlson, the former director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, “absolutely no concern for human life.” Ted Kaczynski and the Atlanta Olympics bomber Eric Rudolph call the ADX home. The 9/11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui is held there, too, along with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing mastermind Ramzi Yousef; the Oklahoma City bomber Terry Nichols; the underwear bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab; and the former Bonanno crime-family boss Vincent Basciano. Michael Swango, a serial-killing doctor who may have poisoned 60 of his patients, is serving three consecutive life sentences; Larry Hoover, the Gangster Disciples kingpin made famous by rappers like Rick Ross, is serving six; the traitorous F.B.I. agent Robert Hanssen, a Soviet spy, 15.

He enlisted Dr. Doris Gundersen, a Denver-based forensic psychiatrist, who was allowed inside the ADX as part of his legal team. After evaluating 45 prisoners, she estimated that 70 percent met the criteria for at least one serious mental illness. She and Aro spoke to inmates who swallowed razor blades, inmates who were left for days or weeks shackled to their beds (where they were routinely allowed to soil themselves), an inmate who ate his own feces so regularly that staff psychiatrists made a special note only when he did so with unusual “voracity.” A number of prisoners were taken off prescribed medications. (Until recently prison regulations forbade the placement of inmates on psychotropic medication in the Control Unit, the most restrictive section of the ADX, as, by definition, such medication implies severe mental illness.) Others claimed that they were denied treatment, aside from “therapy classes” on the prison television’s educational station and workbooks with titles like “Cage Your Rage,” despite repeated written requests. (The ADX lawsuit says that only two psychologists and one part-time psychiatrist serve the entire prison.)

Jones said the staff psychiatrist stopped his prescription for Seroquel, a drug taken for bipolar disorder, telling him, “We don’t give out feel-good drugs here.” Jones experienced severe mood swings. To cope, he would work out in his cell until he was too tired to move. Sometimes he cut himself. In response, guards fastened his arms and legs to his bed with a medieval quartet of restraints, a process known as four-pointing.

Taking people off their medications though?
No
Nope
That's a horrible idea.


[E]

Powers had no history of mental illness before his incarceration. But after Wong’s murder, he began to display symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, which manifested in the form of panic attacks, near-constant anxiety and nightmares in which inmates with weapons cornered Powers in an isolated area of the prison. By 1999, he had not received his sentence reduction and had become convinced that the B.O.P. was planning on transferring him out of protective custody. So he decided to escape.

He put a dummy in his bed, hid inside a grate in the rec yard and scaled the side of a building with a homemade grappling hook. From the rooftop, he jumped over a 16-foot electric fence, then climbed a second barbed-wire fence with FedEx boxes tape to his arms and legs. Once outside, he stole a car and headed to Syracuse to see his son.

When his son didn’t answer his phone, he tried to visit his half sister. (She wasn’t home, but when he spotted a neighbor struggling with a lawn mower, he cut her grass.) The police picked him up after two days. A reporter from The Syracuse Post-Standard interviewed Powers at the local jail and asked him whether he would do it again. The article reads as a lighthearted human-interest feature about a gentleman bandit, and Powers’s affirmative answer became the kicker. “Without life’s normal sensations and emotions and feelings,” Powers said, “what have you got?”

Batman's got nothing on this guy.

 

[Enron]

Jesus Christ at the list of current inmates. I totally forgot about Robert Hanssen. How the hell he avoided a death penalty is beyond me.

 

[Chumly]

I can't say I'm surprised or particularly concerned.

These are killers, mass-murderers (or at least attempted mass-murderers), serial rapists, and criminal element masterminds. Several murdered other inmates or corrections officers. I'd prefer they largely remain very uncomfortable. They have books, periodicals, and radio. That's enough entertainment. They could have more gym equipment, but it's not like they need to be able to get extra strong. That's enough equipment. Place should be clean and orderly, but that's about it.

Maybe before posting you should read the article. I'm serious. You would realize your assumption that these are all the worst of worst is completely wrong. It's pretty disgusting to brush this off so easily with the way they are treating people.

 

[evil solrac v3.0]

Unconscionable that people with mental health diagnosis were kept without their medication. Sometimes in order to administer punishments. We've got a damn Constitution for a reason.

these are super-villains not normal criminals. for god's sake they have Dr.Chaos and the Unabomber in the same building!!

 

[Deadly Cyclone]

Ha, I posted this yesterday. Very good read.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?p=157795555#post157795555

 

[jerry1594]

these are super-villains not normal criminals. for god's sake they have Dr.Chaos and the Unabomber in the same building!!

Having people eating their own shit and being tied down while having psychotic breaks is just fucked up.

 

[evil solrac v3.0]

He put a dummy in his bed, hid inside a grate in the rec yard and scaled the side of a building with a homemade grappling hook. From the rooftop, he jumped over a 16-foot electric fence, then climbed a second barbed-wire fence with FedEx boxes tape to his arms and legs. Once outside, he stole a car and headed to Syracuse to see his son.

When his son didn’t answer his phone, he tried to visit his half sister. (She wasn’t home, but when he spotted a neighbor struggling with a lawn mower, he cut her grass.) The police picked him up after two days. A reporter from The Syracuse Post-Standard interviewed Powers at the local jail and asked him whether he would do it again. The article reads as a lighthearted human-interest feature about a gentleman bandit, and Powers’s affirmative answer became the kicker. “Without life’s normal sensations and emotions and feelings,” Powers said, “what have you got?”

Oooh this guy sounds like Mr. Zsassz.

 

[evil solrac v3.0]

Having people eating their own shit and being tied down while having psychotic breaks is just fucked up.

I don't have to have sympathy for every single human being. not every one is deserving of it.

 

[SteveWinwood]

Ha, I posted this yesterday. Very good read.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?p=157795555#post157795555

posted even earlier here when i read it

 

[TxdoHawk]

I wonder how much the staff gets. I don't think you could pay me enough.

 

[MJPIA]

Its a long read but worth it.
Changes have been made after the lawsuit happened.

Simultaneous to the settlement negotiations, however, the B.O.P. unilaterally began effecting certain (though by no means all) of the requested changes at the ADX. New mental-health programming was added, additional psychologists were hired and a new unit for high-security mentally ill prisoners opened in Atlanta. As predicted, a number of the inmates named in the suit have been transferred out of the ADX — including Powers, who was sent to a high-security prison in Tucson last year.

This guy

They also met David Shelby, a schizophrenic who, in 1995, became convinced that God wanted him to free Charles Manson from prison and that the best way to achieve this would be to send threatening letters to President Bill Clinton. He arrived at the ADX in 2000. Nine years later, in response to another command from God, Shelby, who just a few months earlier tried to commit suicide by slashing his arms, legs and stomach, fashioned a tourniquet around the base of his left pinkie, hacked off the top two joints with a Bic razor blade and ate his finger with a bowl of ramen. When he became agitated and summoned a guard to say he’d done a “terrible thing,” he mostly meant that he’d eaten meat; for the previous few months, he had been a vegetarian.

He also began experiencing schizophrenic episodes in which he heard God’s voice in his head. It’s not difficult to imagine that Shelby’s life would have followed a different trajectory had he received comprehensive psychological treatment. When officials picked him up at a post office, he was preparing to mail Clinton a package containing a pocketknife and a light bulb that was booby-trapped, Looney Tunes style, with gunpowder. “I think you are doing a good job,” the note read, “and I am sending you the pocketknife as a gift and a light bulb so you won’t strain your eyes.” Shelby, in a deal with prosecutors, pleaded guilty and received a 24-year prison sentence. He was moved to the ADX two years later, after he took a female cook hostage with a homemade knife. Shelby told her that he wanted a warden “to order the best sniper to come in here and kill me.” By all subsequent accounts, including his hostage’s, he was careful not to hurt her during his suicide attempt. A staff psychiatrist eventually talked him down.

With the proper medications

David Shelby, the ADX inmate who ate his finger, was also transferred to a medium-security facility, in Butner, N.C. He is six feet tall and 300 pounds, with thick-framed prison-issue glasses and a round, clean-shaven face. (At the ADX, he had an unruly beard, suggestive of a backwoods survivalist). Before he described a violent episode from his past when I visited him this fall, he paused and said, softly: “I hope I don’t make you feel uncomfortable, sir. I’m well-medicated now, so you’re perfectly safe.”

Since his move to Butner, Shelby has thrived. He shares his cell with another prisoner, and the door remains unlocked for much of the day. Shelby said his unit, Duke, was for people who are “special.” (All the units at Butner are named for Southeastern college-sports powers.) “We’re crazy,” he cheerily explained. “We’re all in the pill line in Duke. I’ve got three kinds of insanity: One is depression, one is bipolar, one is schizophrenia. But right now, my personal prescription is perfect.” He has even had a couple of brief encounters with Butner’s most famous inmate, Bernard Madoff, though, Shelby noted: “We’re from such different worlds, I don’t think he’d want to know me. Unless he’s interested in squirrel hunting.”

Turned into this guy.

 

[DarkFlow]

Does it matter? Do YOU want to be around him? He killed 4 other inmates and a correctional officer IN JAIL.

It seems he is objectively UNSAFE to be around. It's not his safety and comfort that matters. His mind was clearly destroyed before he got to this supermax.

Who cares, he's still a human being. Prison shouldn't be some sick touture justice fantasy. Making people go insane and eat there own fingers and drill holes in there head is not my idea of punishment. As long as they kept out of society, everything is fine. They don't need to live a swank life, but human contact and some decency is not to much to ask for.

 

[benjipwns]

I've always thought it's a shame that Lockup couldn't do a shoot inside this place.

The one they did inside the max security one in Alaska which had great views from the cells was interesting. But it was somewhat like Florence in that, once you got out (assuming you could escape), where the hell were you going to get on foot since it was in the middle of nowhere in mountains?

This is apparently the Aussies equivalent to Florence: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goulburn_Correctional_Centre