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Florida prison with no A/C sued over extreme summer heat

Online Niel November 1, 2024

Sweltering heat in a Miami-area concrete prison without air conditioning contributed to four deaths and subjected inmates to cruel and unusual punishment, according to a federal lawsuit filed Thursday.

Three Dade Correctional Institution prisoners, represented by Florida Institute of Justice, said in the class action that the state unit’s heat index exceeds 100 degrees in the summer. Inmates are “routinely treated” in the infirmary for heat rash, heat exhaustion and related illnesses, the lawsuit says, before being returned to the “dangerously hot conditions” that made them sick.

Florida Institute of Justice attorney Andrew Udelsman told USA TODAY that the nonprofit law firm has received an increasing number of complaints about prison heat over the past decade.

“In Miami-Dade County, it’s considered animal cruelty to leave a dog in a parked car in the summer,” Udelsman said. “And here, basically, (the Florida Department of Corrections) incarcerates in this prison 1,300 people in these places. concrete boxes all summer and basically ignoring their pleas for relief.”

Dade Correctional Institution and the Florida Department of Corrections did not immediately respond to USA TODAY’s requests for comment.

The lawsuit comes as forecasters warn of unseasonably warm temperatures across the globe. In the hottest summer on record this year, researchers said people in prison were made especially vulnerable to heat-related illness — or death — in confined spaces, often without air conditioning.

A recent study at The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has been found more than 98% of prisons in the United States experienced at least ten days that were warmer than in any previous summer, with the worst of the heat-exposed prisons concentrated in the Southwest.

The trial claims grueling prison conditions in the summer heat

According to the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, most of the men in the 28-year-old prison suffer from at least one form of heat-related illness during the summer.

“Some died from heat stroke or heart conditions that were exacerbated by prolonged exposure to extreme heat,” the complaint said.

The only air conditioning is in the officers’ control rooms, and the plaintiffs said guards stationed in the dining area would rush prisoners to eat so they could return to the cooled quarters.

In a desperate attempt to escape the heat, the lawsuit said, many prisoners wet their sheets and sleep on the concrete floor.

Individuals in solitary confinement spend about 23 hours a day in hot, poorly ventilated cells that are smaller than an average parking space, where they sleep, eat and use the toilet, according to the complaint. They are allowed a limited number of showers per week.

A person who spent months in prison bathed in toilet water at night because it was colder than the water in the sink, the complaint said.

The process comes after a disappointing legislative session in Florida for prison reform advocates. State legislators refused to consider several bills aimed at improving prison conditions, including legislation that would have made air conditioning mandatory in every housing unit in all Florida correctional facilities.

Extreme heat contributed to prison deaths, the lawsuit says

The lawsuit alleges heat played a role in four deaths, and the toll could rise as more information comes to light, Udelsman told USA TODAY.

One inmate, identified as “JB” in the lawsuit, had complained for weeks of chest pains and shortness of breath, the lawsuit states. The 81-year-old man was in a wheelchair, so he was assigned to a single cell, which had poor ventilation.

On September 20, complainant Dwayne Wilson said he heard JB calling for help from the cell. Wilson found him lying on the floor gasping for air, so he alerted a guard to EMS and JB received respiratory treatment before being ordered back to his cell.

“The medical staff accused JB of coming to the air-conditioned infirmary simply to escape the heat,” the complaint says. “Prisoners tried to plead on JB’s behalf, telling medical staff and officers that he was very ill.”

JB was found dead in his cell on September 24th. Court records said the heat index reached 104 degrees that day — within the limit National Weather Service “danger” zone – and the exhaust fans in his cell weren’t working.

“Prolonged exposure to the hot, unventilated air at (Dade Correctional Institution) is likely to have contributed to JB’s death,” the lawsuit states.

The plaintiffs say they got sick from the heat

The three plaintiffs named in Thursday’s lawsuit said they became ill from the heat in the prison this summer and had “exhausted all available administrative avenues.”

Wilson, 66, passed out in August in his dorm on a day when the heat index reached 100 degrees, according to the complaint. He was transported to a medical facility and given an IV, and a medical provider told him to “stay as cool as possible.”

Another plaintiff, Tyrone Harris, 54, said in the lawsuit that he had to be taken to the medical facility for hour-long breathing treatment two to three times a week this summer. Harris has asthma and takes medication for high blood pressure and cholesterol, which makes him more susceptible to heat illness, the lawsuit states. He often has heat cramps, heat rashes and feels dizzy.

Court filings noted that the population at Dade Correctional Facility is particularly vulnerable to heat exhaustion because more than half are over 50 and nearly 25 percent are over 65. Many inmates have medical conditions or disabilities that increase susceptibility to heat illness.

Most US prisons do not have universal A/C

A USA TODAY analysis in 2022, it found that at least 44 states did not universally air-condition their prisons, and only one — Tennessee — said it was fully air-conditioned.

In Florida, about 24 percent of state prison housing units have air conditioning, corrections department spokeswoman Molly Best previously told USA TODAY. Fans and exhaust systems are used instead of A/C units.

People in prisons often face particularly dire conditions when extreme heat hits, as facilities are ill-equipped for scorching temperatures. And while some states aren’t typically known for oppressive heat, experts said they should be prepared for the realities of a changing climate.

“Many of these prisons were not built to be comfortable or humane in the first place,” said Ufuoma Ovienmhada, lead author of the MIT study on prison heat. “Climate change only exacerbates the fact that prisons are not designed to allow incarcerated populations to moderate their own exposure to environmental risk factors such as extreme heat.”

Contributing: Jeanine Santucci, Javier Zarracina, Jennifer Borresen, USA TODAY; Elena Barrera, USA TODAY NETWORK – Florida