From Retaliation to Torture in a Florida Prison
Unfit for Habitation (2018)
By Kevin “Rashid” Johnson
Inhumane conditions
Known today as Florida State Prison (FSP) what was originally called Florida’s East Unit was
constructed in 1961, and included another institution now known as Union Correctional
Institution.
Nearly 60 years old, FSP has been poorly maintained with cellblocks unfit for habitation.
During Florida’s sweltering summer and autumn months the cells, lacking air conditioning,
become sweat boxes and infested with ants, spiders and huge cockroaches, with black mold
growing on the ceilings. Rats frequent the cell blocks year round and all cells suffer water
leakage from faulty plumbing and rainfall.
Paint peels from cell surfaces like large open sores, exposing oily concrete and the rusted
surfaces of metal bunks, doors and fixtures.
During the cold months the cells remain like refrigerators, so cold that even with multiple layers
of clothing and bedding one finds it difficult to get warm.
As I exposed in a recent article (1), this condition is caused by the large cell windows’ metal
shutters having become so warped that they don’t close at all or completely, and therefore admit
the cold outside air. But the cold air doesn’t just naturally drift into the cells, it is rather sucked in
by powerful exhaust fans mounted on top of each cellblock that remain on 24/7.
So while the prison does have internal heating, it does not work because all warm air that is
supposed to blow and circulate into the cells is sucked out through the exhaust fans, while they
suck in the cold outside air through the open and drafty windows.
In many cells this icy air is pulled in with such force it creates a loud whooshing sound. The
effect is like having a window fan turned on high and blowing outside winter air into an unheated
room (with outside temperatures in the 30-50°F range).
The windows in some cellblocks are in worse repair then in others. In fact, they are worst in the
disciplinary wings (B and C-wings), which seems intentional, where in these cellblocks prisoners
may not retain thermal underwear, and are allowed only one set of thin state-issued clothing.
They are also frequently targeted with strip cell status, on which they are left for no less than
three days in the cold cells with nothing but boxer shorts.
FSP maintains one of Florida’s main solitary confinement, or Close Management, units, where
prisoners remain locked inside single occupancy cells all day every day.
Many of these cellblocks have metal commodes that must be flushed by guards from outside the
cells. The guards often refuse requests to flush them, and many times these cells house mentally
ill prisoners who don’t request flushing.
Decades of these conditions have caused thick layers of rust, and residue of fermented body
waste to build up inside these commodes and their piping, which emits a horrible stench, that
cannot be cleaned. In most cases FSP officials seldom, or never, provide prisoners with supplies
with which to try and clean them.
One can readily see that living conditions in FSP are outright barbaric.
Inhumane retaliation
When I wrote my article, “Florida Prisoners are Laying it Down,” which was published online on
January 9, 2018, the FSP warden Barry Reddish incensed by my publishing abusive conditions in
Florida’s prisons – especially in FSP – had me targeted with a bogus retaliatory disciplinary
report (DR), charging me with “inciting to riot.” I exposed this abuse in a subsequent article. (2)
On January 19th a kangaroo ‘hearing’ was staged on the DR by others of Reddish’s subordinates,
who acted as prosecutors rather than impartial triers. The hearing team’s representative, a
classification worker named M. Albritton, argued that I had no rights to write anything and the
very fact of my article’s publicizing and criticizing prison conditions was punishable conduct in
the eyes of Florida Department of Corruption (FDOC) officials. This expressing their shared
aversion alongside Reddish to having the inhumane conditions at FSP exposed to the public.
The hearing was only a formality, as my fate was already decided from when Reddish first had
the retaliatory DR written. The conviction was planned before the hearing was even conducted –
I was told beforehand that I was already slated to be moved to B-wing on disciplinary
confinement status.
Accordingly, as soon as I left the ‘hearing’ to be returned to my cell I was instructed to pack my
property and was immediately moved to B-wing, in what was obviously one of the wing’s most
damaged cells (cell B1220).
The cell light was busted open, the commode wouldn’t flush and was clogged with debris and
fermented body waste, the sprinkler head was broken off, and of course the cell window
wouldn’t close. With outside temperatures in the 30°s that morning, the cell was literally
freezing. It was so cold in fact that I was only able to write two brief legal letters before my
hands stiffened and the ink in my pen became so thick from the cold that I couldn’t write
anymore.
The letters brought attention to this torturous and retaliatory abuse, but I remained with a
window that wouldn’t close from January 19th until January 26th when, while I was visiting with
an attorney, the warden decided to have the window ‘fixed.’
That morning he had a captain B. Woods enter the cell to ‘observe’ the outside air being sucked
in through the window with such force it sounded like a waterfall. During the attorney visit I was
able to have this captain admit, in the presence of the attorney and her assistant, that the window
indeed required repairing. He assured us that it had now been fixed.
It wasn’t repaired, however, but ‘fixed’ by maintenance workers bolting its warped shutters
down by power-drilling screws through them. This resulted in making the window unable to
open at all anymore, although it still admitted a draft. Which is telling, since it demonstrated
such severe structural damage and malfunctioning of FSP’s cell windows that they can’t be
repaired to operate as designed. Obviously, screwing more windows shut is no solution, because
then there’d be no air circulating into the cells at all, making them death traps during the
sweltering summer and autumn months.
So, while my cell window was screwed closed, all the other cells still have malfunctioning
windows and their occupants still suffer in extreme cold —and many are targeted daily with
abusive strip cell status as I discussed in my prior article “Time on Ice.” (3)
In fact several who were housed in cells around and next to me wrote sworn statements about
their own suffering in cells with damaged windows, and how strip cell status is routinely abused.
These prisoners included: Isaac Logan #W23317; Eduardo Vargas #L61184; Emanuel Edwards
#E37896; Urshima Weaver #J21206; Vincent Murphy, Jr. #A129485; Ulrick Watson #V28829;
Willy Brown # L80586; and Carlos Mendoza #B07979. (Their statements are posted with this
article.)
A Temporary Fix
But bolting the window closed in my cell wasn’t intended to correct or resolve my predicament.
It was only a reaction to deflect outside protests against, and attention to, the warden’s retaliatory
torture. Especially since I could and ultimately would be moved at any time to another cell with
yet another malfunctioning window. Which is exactly what occurred on February 7th, when I
was moved from B1220 to C1204. So I am now once again confined in a cell with a window in
almost the exact same condition as the one in my prior cell before it was bolted closed.
It is well known that many Florida prisons are in disrepair and unfit for habitation. This has been
exposed in the mainstream media and made the subject of state legislative hearings. (4) Yet, as
demonstrated, FSP remains and it’s prisoners continue to live in such inhumane conditions.
We need active, sustained public protest of these conditions and if they cannot be immediately
repaired, the prisoners should be removed from them.
Contact Florida legislators, like representative David Richardson, who sits on the criminal justice
subcommittee, about these conditions, and demand their correction or our removal from such
housing, and an end to my retaliatory treatment for publicizing such abuses.
Representative David Richardson can be reached at:
Capital Office
200 House Office Building
402 South Monroe St.
Tallahassee, FL 32399–1300
Phone: (850) 717-5113
District Office
Suite 402A
1701 Meridian Ave.
Miami Beach, FL 33139–1890
Phone: (305) 535-5426
Also, join and support Florida SPARC (Supporting Prisoners And Real Change), a new
organization composed of Florida prisoners’ loved ones and supporters, oriented to building and
growing a statewide public support base and network for us that will educate and inform the
public of the reality of Florida’s prison conditions. Florida SPARC aims to organize and build
public awareness and protest against these inhumane conditions and abuses, and build support
for us.
Just type in SPARC Florida (on Facebook) and/or write flsparc@gmail.com.
And spread the word!
Dare to struggle, Dare to win!
All power to the people!
Notes:
*This article was completed on February 16, 2018. Before I could mail it out I was, that same
day, abruptly packed up and transferred away from Florida State Prison to Florida’s Santa Rosa
Correctional Institution. Despite my transfer, the men still at FSP and its future victims continue
to suffer the mistreatment described in this article, as the attached affidavits attest to. Those
conditions must be protested until eliminated.
1. Kevin Rashid Johnson, “Time on Ice: Florida Officials Torture Prisoners with Freezing Strip
Cells” (2018). http://rashidmod.com
2. Kevin Rashid Johnson, “Florida Warden Retaliates for Article Publicizing Prison Abuses,
Slave Labor and Prisoner Protest”(2018) http://rashidmod.com
3. op. cite
4. Mary Ellen Klas, “‘Horrific’ Conditions at Florida Prison Languish Until Legislator Shows Up
and Asks Why,” Miami Herald, December 6, 2016; Julie K Brown and Mary Ellen Klas,
“Former Florida Prison Chief Says Governor Rick Scott Ignored Crisis in Corrections System,”
Miami Herald, January 31, 2015.
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