Southern Poverty Law Center Report Shows Culture of Abuse at Florida Prison
by Michael Thompson
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has released a new report describing a two-year investigation into the endemic culture of violence and abuse in Florida prisons, especially that of the Gulf Correctional Institution (“Gulf”) in the Panhandle region. While Gulf is likely the worst case, SPLC points out that the abuse is part of a greater culture existing within Florida that evolved from the post-Civil War systems built on “Black Codes, chain gangs, convict leasing, Jim Crow laws, the War on Drugs, and mass incarceration.” Indeed, the Ku Klux Klan has concentrated its presence in central and northern Florida, which is also where 75% of Florida prisons are located.
Gulf locks up between 1,500 and 1,600 men, most of whom are Black or brown, near the small town of Wewahitchka, a nearly all-white town of only 2,000 residents. Guard’s use of violence has earned Gulf the nickname “We-will-hit-ya,” playing on the name of the town. But violence is not used in isolation. It is accompanied by threats, degrading punishments, and deprivation.
Among the many abusive tools, Gulf guards will initiate property restrictions, which can remove all of an incarcerated person’s property, including their clothes except their boxers, and place them in solitary confinement to sleep on a cold steel bunk for up to three days. While denial of meals is an obvious civil rights violation, guards have learned to use lids over empty trays, so-called “air trays,” in order to avoid video documentation. They also engage in “catfishing,” the practice of forcing barbers to shave a victim’s entire head, including eyebrows, causing those other incarcerated persons to become accomplices in the humiliation.
The use of chemical agents like pepper spray is not new to prisons, yet Gulf staff often intentionally spray the irritants directly into the mouth and ears of their targets, even going so far as tearing off their victims’ pants and spraying the victims’ groins and between their buttocks, furthering the pain and humiliation. Humiliation also comes for the victim through a practice of stripping them to their boxers and forcing them to stand in plain view of other prisoners on storm drain grates in the sun, rain, or cold, often with their limbs in odd positions or holding weighted objects.
The Florida Department of Corrections (DOC) is severely understaffed and overcrowded, encouraging the systemic violence. As far back as 2017, former DOC Secretary Julie Jones told the Senate Appropriations Committee that correctional staffing “is the root of virtually all the department’s problems.” In 2021, the DOC reported that staffing challenges had “reached crisis levels” with 29 facilities exceeding 20% vacancy rates. As of September 2023, Gulf was sitting at a 58% vacancy rate. And that was tied for the third highest rate in the state.
According to the SPLC report, “The burden of overcrowding and understaffing often results in dangerous consequences for people incarcerated at Gulf.” Violence by staff only serves to enable violence by those they oversee, such that gangs thrive. The report adds, “Nearly every person SPLC interviewed reported that gangs are entrenched in their daily lives at Gulf. To them, it feels like the gangs run the institution. They attribute their problems to a lack of officers, officer complicity or indifference, or fear among officers to intervene.”
Even the act of asking for protective custody (“Protective Management,” or “PM”), called “checking in,” can be a cause for staff-led abuse. DOC policy is that people who fear assault should notify staff who would then place them in solitary confinement pending investigation. However, shortage of space and the violent culture have led to a general disdain for those requesting help. It is only after the incarcerated person has been severely injured that they are transferred to another institution. The report is replete with first-person stories of people asking for assistance, only to be denied and even given disciplinary infractions.
Former Republican state Senator Jeff Brandes has founded the Florida Policy Project, which examines statewide issues such as criminal justice. Regarding SPLC’s report, he said, “I think if one-tenth of that is true, it highlights the fact that we have a department of chaos.” He added, “They’re setting themselves up for massive litigation over inmates being harmed because of lack of staffing. At some juncture, it becomes unreasonable and I think the courts will find that as well.”
Then again, maybe not. As SPLC identified in its report, courts have been hesitant to weigh in. Of the over 1,500 civil rights cases across the nation over a five-year period, “plaintiffs prevailed in only 11 cases, including two class actions.” Meanwhile, President Donald Trump (R) has eviscerated the Department of Justice division “responsible for investigating and litigating unlawful prison conditions and redirected the remaining staff to enforce his executive orders reversing civil rights gains.”
Sources: Southern Poverty Law Center, Florida Phoenix
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