How the Newest

" Federal Prison
- Became One of the
Deadliest

Fatal beatings. A “torture room. Pairs of men held around the clock in tiny cells,
tempers rising. “They're literally afraid for their lives,’ one lawyer said.

By CHRISTIE THOMPSON, The Marshall Project and JOSEPH SHAPIRO, NPR

Bobby Everson was nearing the end of
his decade-long federal prison
sentence, but he feared he wouldn't
make it home
In July 2021, he was sent to the
Special Management Unit at the new
US. penitentiary in Thomson, ilinois
— a program meant for some of the
most violent and disruptive prisoners,
though many have ended up there who
don’t it that description. Everson, who
was serving time for drug and weapon
charges, had recently been written up
for “threatening bodily harm” and
“assault without serious injury.” but
prison records don't provide details.
After his transfer, his letters home to
his family in New York state grew more
desperate with each passing week.
Everson, whom the family called A,
told them he was locked down nearly
24 hours a day with a cellmate, in cells
5o small that the tollet was crammed
next to the bottom bunk. He was let
out only for occasional medical
appointments, showers or an hour of
exercise in an outdoor cage. He could
hear guards in riot gear blasting men
on his tier with pepper spray and
locking them in hard restraints. His
own wrists, ankles and abdomen were
scarred from these shackles —
prisoners called it the “Thomson

tattoo; according to attomeys.

But the most pressing threat came
from the men officers chose to put in his
cell.“I feel the staff here is purposefully
rying to put me in situations of
conflict” he wrote to his cousin
Roosevelt in late October. “Pray for your
1l cousin, man, that I get through this
unscathed”

In late November, Everson gotin a
fight with his new cellmate. “I'm doing
my best to bob and weave these
incidents? he wrote. “Keep calling up
here, inquiring on me any il free time
youget”

Seventeen days later, Everson, 36, was
found dead in his cell. It was a homicide
caused by "blunt trauma’” with an
object, according o prison records.
Federal prosecutors have yetto file
charges against anyone in connection to
his death, which s still under
investigation.

“I was scared for him, because we
don't know what happens in that
prison; said Everson’s father, Bobby.
“When you get up in the morning and
know he's not going to be here ... just
‘miss AI”

Officials claimed that opening
‘Thomson would make federal prisons
safer by relieving dangerous overcrowd-
ing. Butan investigation by The

05312022

Marshall Project and NPR found that
the newest U.S. penitentiary has quickly
become one of the deadliest, with five
suspected homicides and two alleged
suicides since 2019.

“It's beyond egregious;" said Jack
Donson, a corrections consultant and
former Bureau of Prisons official.
“When you look at the policy and goals
ofthe Special Management Unit, it
blows my mind that there was [even]
one homicide.

“The Marshall Project and NPR
obtained federal prison data and agency
documents, reviewed criminal and civil
court cases and interviewed dozens of
people with knowledge of Thomson. In
stories that echoed with the same
visceral details, dozens of men said they
lived under the pressing threat of
violence from cellmates as well as
brutality at the hands of staff
Specifically, many men reported being
shackled in cuffs so tight they left scars,
orbeing “four-pointed” and chained by
each limb to a bed for hours, far beyond
‘what happens at other prisons and in
violation of bureau policy and federal
regulations.

Most people in the Special
Management Unit are housed in
double-celled solitary confinement
— almost constant lockdown with

1SSUELL s
DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS

another person. The Bureau of Prisons
has said double-celling “mitigates
suicide risks” But psychologists and
oners say living in such claustro-
phobic conditions with another person
can be even worse than being alone,
and often leads to violent outbursts.
Multiple people claimed in federal
court ilings that officers stoked
tensions between cellmates and
intentionally paired men who they
knew would attack each other. One
person formerly incarcerated at

Officers at Thomson hold 2 man in afour-point restaint, with wists and ankles secured t restrict movement, U.S. ATTORNEY'S OFFICE, NORTHERN

Thomson said in officers
spread the false information that he was
asexoffender, inciting physical and
sexual assault from several cellmates.

‘The Marshall Project and NPR asked
the Bureau of Prisons about multiple
lawsuits and claims made in federal
court filings out of Thomson, but agency
spokesperson Scott Taylor said in an
‘email that he could not comment on
pending litigation or individual cases.
He noted that people in federal prisons
are not housed in “solitary confine-

Sue Philips holds a picture of hr deceased son, Matthew. Matthew died aftr an stiack atthe Thomson

prison in March 2020, ALLYSON ORTEGON FOR NPA.

s NEWS INSIDE

ment; because “in general, inmate:
restricted housing are housed two to.a
cell” To ensure safety, a team of prison
officials consider gang affliation,
religion, geography and past incident
reports and complaints when assigning
cellmates. Intentionally ignoring a
known threat from a cellmate would be
misconduct by an officer and investi-
gated, Taylor wrote.

‘The Bureau of Prisons’ Special
Management Unit used to be housed
inside the USS. penitentiary
Lewisburg, Pennsylvania — a notorious,
nearly century-old prison known as
“The Big House." A 2016 Marshall
Project and NPR investigation found
Lewisburg had been sued multiple
times over the high rate of violence
among cellmates and the use of harsh
restraints by staff. In 2018, the Bureau of
Prisons announced it was moving the
unit to Thomson, Mlinois.

According to lawsuits, letters and
interviews, the violence and abuse at
Lewisburg simply relocated to the new
facilit. The Washington Lawyers”

Committee for Civil Rights and Urban
Affairs, alegal nonprofit, has spoken to
dozens of men at Thomson, many of
whom said conditions there were worse
than at any other federal prison —

including Lewisburg,

“They're literally afraid for their lives’
said Jacqueline Kutnik-Bauder, deputy
legal director of the committee, which
had previously sued Lewisburg over a
lack of mental health care. “[But] i they
refuse to be celled with a person who
they think could kill them .. they get
pulled out of the cell and put into
restraints as a punishment”

Kutnik-Bauder has heard similar
descriptions of shackling from
numerous people held at Thomson.
“They'e having their arms and their
legs stretched out and held, separated,
for hours and sometimes for days on
end;’she said. “They are denied food.
‘They are denied water. Many of them
report being left in their own waste. It's
really akin to a torture chamber”

‘According to Bureau of Prisons policy
and federal regulations, such severe
restraints should be used only as a “last
alternative” for people in prison who
are actively dangerous to themselves or
others, and only for as long as it takes to
subdue and control the person. “Force
may not be used to punish an inmate;”
the policy states.

“Generally speaking, per BOP policy,
restraints are not used as a method of
punishing an inmate or in any manner
which restricts blood circulation or
obstructs the inmate's airways or ina
‘manner that causes unnecessary
physical pain or extreme discomfort”
Taylor, the bureau spokesman, wrote in
an email. “Allegations of staff
‘misconduct are taken seriously by BOP
and are referred for investigation to the
Office of the Inspector General”

Federal prisons across the country
are facing growing scrutiny over
outbreaks of violence and abuse by
officers, as documented by The
Associated Press. And understaffing at
many prisons escalated to criss levels
during the pandemic, increasing risks
for taff and incarcerated people alke.
Inresponse, the Senate has formed a
new group to investigate federal prison
operations, and Bureau of Prisons
Director Michael Carvajal announced
his resignation in January. But there's
beenlitle national attention paid so far
to the ongoing violence at Thomson.

On March 2, 2020, officers put
Matthew Phillips —a 31-year-old
Jewish man with a large Star of David
tattooed on his chest — ina recreation
‘cage with two known members of a
‘white supremacist gang, according o a
federal court indictment. The gang
members beat and kicked him until he
‘went unconscious. Officers yelled at the
men to stop, the indictment says. This
‘wasn't the frst time Phillips had been
targeted — he was previously attacked
by gang members at Thomson and
another prison, according to claims
‘made in 2 lawsuit.

Phillips’ parents flew from Texas to
ahospital in Iowa, where their son was
unconscious and handeuffed to his
hospital bed. They had to visit one at
atime, limited to 10 minutes, with

a guard in the room and two guards
outside.

‘According to information from a
Bureau of Prisons internal affairs report
shared with The Marshall Project and
NPR, officers laughed and made jokes at
Phillips’ expense, prompting hospital
staffto complain about their conduct.

Phillips died three days lates as he
neared the end of his seven-year
sentence for drug possession with
intent to distribute and money
laundering.

“Itwasa long horrible journey that
ended in the worst possible way, a death
with no degree of dignity atall’said
Phillips’ mother, Sue. When she flew
home from lowa, her son’slastletter
was waitingin her mailbox. “T don't
think 'l ever recover from it. The
Bureau of Prisons doesn't care about
the damage they leave in their wake. He
didn't deserve to die, he deserved to
come home? The Phillips family filed a
federal lawsuit this February, suing the
bureau for failing to prevent Matthew’s
death. In December 2021, federal
prosecutors in llinois charged the two
‘gang members with committing 2 hate
crime and murder. They both pleaded
not guilty and face up to lfe sentence
f convicted.

Bureau spokesperson Taylor said he
could not comment on the family’s
ongoing lawsuit. “We can say, however,
that BOPis cooperating fully with the
investigation and prosecution related to
the incident to ensure that justice is
served” he wrote.

‘After Phillips was killed, the violence
at Thomson continued. In November
2020, Edsel Aaron Badon, a 37-year-old
‘member of the Navajo Nation, died
from stab wounds after a fight with
another prisoner.

Boyd Weekley, a 49-year-old man
from South Dakota, died less than a
week later by hanging, accordingto
prison records. (Weekley was the only
person to die in Thomson's general
‘population and not the Special
Management Unit, according to prison
officials.) Roughly two weeks after that,
Patrick Bacon, 36, of Washington state,
died by suicide, according to an
autopsy. In February 2021, 41-year-old

Shay Paniry of California was stabbed to
death. Bobby Everson was killed in
December2021.

‘And then in March 2022, James
Everett, a 35-year-old man from Kansas
City, Missouri, was found dead. The
Bureau of Prisons confirmed in an
email that his death was a suspected
homicide. A death certificate and
autopsy have not been released. I think
that's what bothers me the most, you
send somebody's child home, and you
don't even tell them what happened to
them, said Everett’s father, James.
‘When the family received the body,
there were scars on his son's wrists. “It's
like, ‘Here he is, go bury him! He had
‘witten letters that they were trying to
kil him? There have been at least 167
recorded assaults at Thomson between
January 2019 and October 2021,
accordingto data provided by the
bureau. But this Is an undercount, as it
doesn't include more serious incidents
or deaths that were dealt with outside
the prison disciplinary system.

Legislators said the violence s in part
due to persistent understaffing.
‘Congress members from Illinois
‘appealed to the Bureau of Prisons in
2021 for worker retention bonuses,
‘writing that the deaths at Thomson
“may have been prevented with
additional staff”

Officials have struggled to lure
enough officers to Thomson, a village of
under 1,000 people, especially amid a
nationwide prison saff shortage and a
hiring freeze under former President
Donald Trump. In May 2021, over 30%
of the prison's correctional officer jobs
were unfilled, according to a letter by
‘union officials. Staff, from counselors to
cooks, were regularly conscripted to
work as guards. (As of May 2022, prison
officials report that 78% of corrections
officer positions at Thomson are filled.)

“USP Thomson is experiencing a
staffing crisis, bar none i the Bureau of
Prisons sald Jonathan Zumkehs,
president of Local 4070 of the American
Federation of Government Employees,
in2021. “The conditions witnessed at
'USP Thomson, without immediate
intervention, have cultivated an envi-
ronment with catastrophic potential”

‘The Thomson facility was bult in
2001 by the Ilinois Department of
Corrections. But it sat vacant for years
until the federal government bought the
complex, at the urging of Illinois

1SSUELL 7
congress members. Lawmakers said it
‘would create over a thousand jobs and
bringin millions of dollars for local
businesses.

“Communities across our region of
linois have spent over a decade
thirsting for today’s great news,’ Rep.
Cheri Bustos, a Democrat from linois,
said in 2014 of moves to open the
prison. Tllinois Democratic Sen. Dick
Durbin called it “a significant
investment in the economic future of
northern Illinois”

‘Atthe same time, Durbin was posi-
tioning himselfas a critic of solitary
confinement. I have told the Bureau of
Prisons to make sure that we're learning
lessons about humane treatment that is
not going to endanger the inmate’slfe;”
he said of the new facility in 2 2015
interview with The Marshall Project and
NPR. Of double-celled segregation, ‘I
hope we don't see that at Thomson,” he
said. “T believe it's dangerous”

President Barack Obama initially
considered housing Guantdnamo
detainees at the building in Thomson.
Butin June 2018, Bureau of Prisons
officials announced they were moving
the Special Management Unit from
Lewisburg to Thomson. The move was
toincrease capacity, according to
‘Taylor, the bureau spokesperson.

Meanwhile, the bureau was fighting a
decade-long legal battle against one
man incarcerated at Lewisburg. In 2011,
Sebastian Richardson sued the prison,
claiming he had been leftin painful
restralnts for nearly a month, In retalia-
tion for refusing to cell with a man who
had assaulted multiple roommates. The
chains were so restrictive he was forced
to sleep on the floor, Richardson said in
2 deposition, shoving toilet paper into
his ears and nostrils o keep out bugs.
Richardson's attorneys tried to file a
class-action lawsu, citing the
‘widespread practice of chaining up
prisoners.

An April 2018 report by an agency
that oversees prison conditions
confirmed that multiple men in the
Special Management Unit at Lewisburg
were being chained and shackled,
sometimes for days. Two men set
themselves on fire in protest of the
brutal conditions and were then forced
into restraints, numerous prisoners told
auditors. (In an email, Taylor said the
‘men had set their belongings, not
themselves, on fire *in an attempt to

have staff open their cell door while
they were unrestrained” and assault
officers. ‘It was determined the staff
response was appropriate” he wrote.)
Butwhen officials announced the
unit was moving to Illinois, the court
ruled that the class-action claims were
moot, as the Special Management Unit

‘was no longer in Pennsylvania. The
Bureau of Prisons settled the individual

lawsuit with Richardson this February
for an undisclosed amount. Over a
decade after leaving Lewisburg,
Richardson said in a recent interview
that he still suffers searing pain,
swelling and numbness in his hands.

Some advocates for men at Lewisburg
hoped a new facility would mean better
conditions. But not long after the
Special Management Unit opened at
‘Thomson, incarcerated people started
writing letters making familiar claims of
abuse, and local news reported as more.
‘men were kiled.

Inan emailed statement this week,
Sen. Durbin, who s chair of the Senate
Judiciary Committee and part of a
Senate group working to strengthen
prison oversight, called the deaths at
‘Thomson “unacceptable” and said he
‘was pushing for a “reform-minded”
leader to head the Bureau of Prisons.
Durbin called for agency director
Carvaal's resignation in November.

“For many years, I have sounded the
alarm on BOP's widespread failings” he
wrote. “Its disappointing that the BOP
has yet to fully address ts staffing crisis
and take the steps necessary to improve
conditions of confinement and end the
overuse of restricted housing
throughout all of its facilies, including
Thomson”

‘Heather Sager, a spokesperson for
Rep. Bustos, said in an email that Bustos
would keep pushing to ensure that
‘Thomson had the “resources and
staffing necessary to help keep staff and
those incarcerated safe.”

AtThomson, some call it ‘the
dungeon” or “the torture room” It’s
‘where men say they are locked in hand
and ankle cuffs so tight they leave scars
and nerve damage, according to filings
‘made in federal court. Others claimed
inlawsuits that they were four-pointed,
spread-eagle and immobile, for hours
ata time. Several have claimed in legal
filings that they were put in paper
clothes, denied food and water, and
forced tolay in their own urine

and feces.

Multiple men incarcerated at
‘Thomson said that officers would
fabricate reasons to justify restraining
them, writing on internal forms that
they were making threats or slipped
their hands out of cuffs and hit a guard.

“To be chained down inside of an ice
cold cell where the restraints are cutting
into your flesh, forced to defecate and
urinate on yoursel .. is torture, one
‘man incarcerated at Thomson wrote in
aletter to reporters.

Bureau spokesperson Taylor said any
allegations of abuse of force were taken
seriously and investigated.

‘The bureau did not provide data on
the use of restraints at Thomson. But
they did provide data on how many
times officers there deployed
emergency pepper spray: at least 231
times between January 2019 and August
2020 (the most recent data provided)

— 72 more incidents than the second
highest-use facility.

‘One man who sued the prison as
“John Doe” claimed that officers
mislabeled him a sex offender and told
the other prisaners to “clean up their
car’ meaning getrid ofthe sex offenders
‘and snitches in their unit. According to
his lawsuit, when Doe tried to avoid
returning to his cell out of fear, he was
pepper-sprayed and shackled by guards.
Officers then chained him down to a
concrete bed, beat his body and genitals
with shields and left him there through
the night, according to his court filing.

“This sort of extended physical and
psychological torture caused the
Plaintiff physical pain and suffering,
and extreme, permanent mental
anguish,” the complaint states.

After he was returned to his cell, Doe
‘was repeatedly attacked by his cellmate.
Desperate for help, he slipped a note
about his blood pressure to a nurse,
sneaking in tiny print, “please help me,
I'm being sexually assaulted.” Even after
that person was moved, Doe was beaten
by his next two cellmates, according to
hislegal complaint.

“I've seen a ot of things, and 1 had
never heard of something like this;” said
Richard Dvorak, a civilrights attorney in
the Chicago area who has taken on
Doe’s case, along with another lawsuit
outof Thomson. Doe has since been
‘moved to another prison.

‘The agency has until July to file a
response to the lawsuit in court.

A spokesperson for the Justice
Department said in a separate
statement that the department was
“equally committed to ensuring that the
Bureau of Prisons can meet ts dual
‘mission of 1) providing safe, secure,
humane conditions for individuals in
their custody and 2) doing everything
they can to properly prepare individuals
for a return o society

In December 2021, a Thomson
prisoner named Demetrius Hill wrote a
letter to the federal judge in llinois,
filed as part of his own lawsuit, about
the man in a nearby cell. He had been
writing regularly to the court to bring
attention to what was happening at the
penitentiary. “Between 10:00 and 10:47
pm the prisoner in cell F3-13 was
brought out of his cell and placed on a
stretcher, having blood all over his face
and completely unconscious; he wrote.

The man on the siretcher was Bobby
Everson. Hill wrote in a letter to
reporters that Everson, around 567 had
been housed with a much bigger man
who had assaulted multiple previous
cellmates,

“He was murdered in the SMU, forced
into the cell with a raving lunatic who
told the CO unit team over and over
again that he'd kill him,” Hill wrote in
another federal court filing, “He was
victim of staff and prisoners alike, the
same prisoner who was putin chains,
repeatedly slapped in the face, picked
up and slammed, and had gas sprayed
in his face:

The man who Hill claims killed
Everson has not been charged for
Everson's death. But that man had been
writing his own federal legal complaints

ind motions, claiming he had been

beaten by guards while in hard
restraints, assaulted by past cellmates,
denied his medication and previously
housed with men who officers knew
were dangerous

“I am tired of fighting people;
Everson's cellmate wrote, a month
before Everson's death.

Bureau spokesperson Taylor said he
couldn't discuss Everson's death
because it was still under investigation.
He reiterated that allegations of
employee misconductare referred to
the Office of the Inspector General. If
someone in prison has a “security
he wrote, they can tell the
officers on their unit or file an
trative remedy and ask to be moved.

dminis.

From lft, Babby Everson's father Babby Eversan, i sister Ebony,and his mther, Sabrina. The
family woited moniths ot death certifcato oxplaining how Babby had died, MALIK RAINEY FOR THE

MARSHALL PROJECT

Five months after Bobby's death, the
Everson family had not received his
death certificate or an autopsy report
They did receive a phone call and a
pamphlet from the FBI, which said the
agency was investigating Bobby's death.
(Federal prosecutors have not filed
charges, and an FBI official told
reporters they could not discuss the
case.) The family was mailed a box of his
belongings,including handwritten rap
yrics, a Bible, deodorant and wo
self-help books. And they received his
body — bruised and scarred — though
they weren't given enough financial
support to bury him as they wante.
They had (o cremate him instead.

Now there are memorials to Everson
scattered throughout his sister Ebony's
house: a sketch of Bobby drawn by his
cousin, a poster-sized photo collage
with pictures of him at a Rick Ross
concert, the program for his funeral
lined up on the windowsill. Before he
died, Everson wrote how he was excited
10 move home (o New York, reconnect
with family, pursue his rap career and
getajobas a truck drive

The family has been through this
before. One of Everson's cousins died in
aNew York state prison in 2005, when
he was 20 years old. His death was ruled

Bobby Evorson with his aunt Angela Everson,
Tef, and his sistor Ebony during a 2018 visit
at 3 foderal prison in South Carolina, PHOTO
COURTESY OF EBONY EVERSON

asuicide, but his mothe
Everson, doesn't believe It

“I think you grieve longer and harder
because you don't know [what
happened], but you can imagine;”
Angela said. “My boys were not the only
ones killed by the prison, and they
won'tbe the last. Its a pain that just
don'tgo away” W

Angela

IsSUE 1L 9
Hundreds of people held in in the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ (BOP) Special Management Unit
(SMU) endured years of unconstitutional and abusive conditions. Those abuses were particularly
extreme during the more than three years the program was located in the United States Penitentiary
in Thomson, llinois (Thomson).

Over the past 18 months, more than 40 lawyers and legal staff members from the Washington
Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs, Latham & Watkins LLP, Uptown People’s
Law Center, and Levy Firestone Muse LLP, investigated the conditions in the SMU at Thomson.
During that investigation we collected accounts of extreme physical and psychological abuse
from more than 120 people. We also witnessed firsthand abusive and obstructive staff behavior,
and saw with our own eyes injuries inflicted by Thomson employees

Guards regularly placed individuals in dangerous four-point restraints for hours, sometimes
days, and often without food, water, or access to a toilet. Many individuals reported being beaten
and sexually assaulted while in restraints. Guards fastened the restraints so tightly that they
caused scars on individuals’ wrists, ankles, and stomachs. This happened so frequently that the
resulting scars became known as a “Thomson Tattoo.”

In addition to physical abuse, guards subjected people in the SMU to psychological trauma
through the use of extended solitary confinement, referred to by the BOP euphemistically as
“restrictive housing" In the SMU, solitary confinement involved locking two people in a cell for
up to 23 hours a day, a practice known as double-cell solitary confinement. If Thomson officials
wanted to punish someone, they would deliberately assign them a cellmate with whom they had
known conflicts, or who posed a physical or sexual threat (forced celling). Refusing to move to
a double-cell in such dangerous situations often led to further staff-initiated violence, including
four-point restraints.

The physical and psychological trauma took its toll on everyone in the SMU, but was
particularly harmful to those who were psychologically fragile. BOP policy generally prohibits
people with severe mental health conditions from being placed in the SMU." Yet we regularly
interviewed people in the SMU with significant mental health diagnoses including bipolar disorder,
schizophrenia, and posttraumatic stress disorder. Not only did staff at Thomson refuse to provide
appropriate mental health care to these individuals, but they responded to suicidal ideations and
self-harm attempts with brutal beatings, restraints, and extreme isolation.

Cruel and Usual
Racism was also rampant. White SMU staff commonly targeted Black individuals in the SMU,
hurling egregious racial slurs such as “boy “n****r" or “Black bitch” while commiting acts of
violence against them, and even made threats to “make you the next George Floyd," a reference
t0a Black man killed by police during an arrest.

When individuals held in the SMU would attempt to speak to an attorney about these and
other abuses, Thomson staff actively interfered. Staff either refused to schedule, or cancelled,
calls and visits, sometimes at the last minute, often under pretenses. Counsel often needed to
involve senior BOP staff and the Office of the Deputy Attorney General just to arrange asingle legal
call or legal visit with a client. Following calls or visits, guards aggressively fished for information
about the substance of legal conversations and, sometimes, brutally retaliated against individuals
simply for having met with their lawyers.

Thomson staff also actively interfered with the administrative process that allows individuals
whoareimprisonedto complain about the conditions of their confinement—referred to colloquially
as the “grievance process’—by refusing to provide, or otherwise destroying, the forms needed
tofile a grievance. By preventing people from completing the grievance process, staff knowingly
increased the chance that any lawsuit filed would be barred for a failure to exhaust administrative
remedies, no matter how unjustifiable the conduct or severe the constitutional violation. The
individuals with whom we spoke described nothing less than a culture of torture far too pervasive
tobe the result of a few “bad apples.” More than 165 staff members participated in violence, abuse,
or other inhumane treatment at Thomson. Indeed, more than 35 staff members were involved in
4.0r more separate violent incidents. For many, this cycle of violence and abuse was inescapable.
The BOP and Thomson officials regularly held people in the SMU for far longer than the expected
9-12 month duration of the program—in some cases, for close to 4 consecutive years.

This is also not a story of a rogue facility. After the BOP closed the Thomson SMU in
February 2023, they transferred individuals held in Thomson to locations all over the country.
Our clients report that similar issues are pervasive in the other facilities: 13 individuals reported
the use of excessive restraints at their new facilities, 20 have experienced assault by staff or
physical retaliation, 7 have reported being forced into cells with someone the guards knew
was dangerous, 16 reported staff have failed to protect them from known dangers, 6 described
encountering an inaccessible grievance process, and 30 reported a lack of access to mental
health and medical care.

Comprehensive, system-wide reform is needed. At a minimur, the
Department of Justice and BOP should take the following steps:

4, The Department of ustice should 4], The BOP must creae 3 mezningful,
© immediately open a criminal '® accessible grievance process.
investigation into the abuses in 55, TheDepariment of Justce must
the SMU. 3

impose external independent
9 The BOP must immediaely end the oversight.
® SMU program and strictly limit the
use of other restrictive housing.

3, The BOP must stricly limit and
'® monitor the use of restraints.

Crueland Usual
History of the SMU

The BOP has a long history of abusing people in its care. One of many examples is the
pervasive abuse of individuals in the SMU at Thomson.

More than 15 years ago, the BOP opened the first SMU at the United States Penitentiary
in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania. Advocates filed multiple lawsuits challenging the unconstitutional
conditions in the SMU at Lewisburg, including the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil
Rights & Urban Affairs and Latham & Watkins. The BOP closed the SMU at Lewisburg in 2018,
mooting the litigation. Rather than address the unconstitutional conditions that led to the
lawsuits, or address the culture of brutality, the BOP simply transferred approximately 400
individuals—and many members of the staff—to a new SMU at Thomson, shifting the same
venal culture from one SMU to the next. In the absence of any criminal accountability for staff
offenses at the Lewisburg SMU, the culture at the Thomson
SMU became even more medieval.

From the moment the SMU opened at Thomson, people
held there reported unconstitutional conditions surpassing ...the BOP and its
lshcse at Lewisburg, and an increase in staff violence. staff have once

pecifically, they reported excessive se of restraints, staff . N
assaults, racial discrimination, being forced into cells with again avoided
individuals who were known threats, interference with access any accountability.
to counsel and the grievance process, being forced by staff
to fight other detained people, and wide-spread retaliation
by guards.

Inresponse we opened an investigation that would last more than 18 months. Yet again, before
litigation could be filed, the BOP closed the SMU at Thomson. While we applaud its closure, the
BOP and its staff have once again avoided any accountability. It is our understanding that none
of the abuses described in detail below have resulted in either administrative consequences or
criminal charges against the BOP staff involved. In fact, individuals at three different facilities have
reported that multiple former Thomson guards are now working at their new institutions.

Cruel and Usual
The Investigation

During our investigation we received information from more than 120 people in the SMU,
conducted at least 100 interviews and legal calls, and reviewed over a thousand pages of
correspondence and institutional records.

We uncovered a widespread culture of abuse involving officials up and down the chain
of command. Thomson staff assaulted people in the SMU almost daily—for personal reasons,
retaliation for grieving prior abuses, and sometimes for no reason atall. Five individuals imprisoned
at USP Thomson died unnatural deaths between 2019 and 2022, the most of any BOP facility.
Countless other individuals suffered serious injuries and unquantifiable psychological trauma,
‘and many risked grave retaliations just to stand up for their rights.

acts of physical violence separate incidents of retaliation

by guards by guards against more than
50 people

uses of excessive restraint

by guards

These numbers reflect only the experiences of the people who contacted us. Understandably,
many more were uncomfortable with disclosing, were otherwise unable to disclose their
experiences, or had left the SMU by the time we began investigating. Since the BOP closed
the SMU i February 2023, more than 25 additional people have provided their own first-hand
accounts that are highly consistent with those reported to us during the investigation. Thus, the
true extent of the abuse is likely far greater.

Below we describe the most common forms of abuse inflicted by Thomson staff on people in
the SMU. This list is not exhaustive.

Crueland Usual
The Investigation

Abusive Use of Restraints

SMU staff regularly violated both federal regulations and BOP policies prohibiting the use of
force, including restraints, as a form of punishment. Specifically, BOP staff repeatedly violated
BOP Program Statements and federal regulations, which only allow for temporary and progressive
use of restraints, only for the purpose of preventing an individual from hurting themselves, staff,
or others, or causing serious property damage, and never in a way that causes unnecessary pain
or extreme discomfort.’

SMU staff repeatedly and intentionally violated these prohibitions. Staff went so far as to
dedicate a cell to be used as a restraint room, making it easier for guards (and their supervisors)
to avoid accountability. Multiple people reported that staff denied them food, water, and access
to a toilet while in restraints, contrary to federal regulations.” As a result, they were forced to sit
or lay in their own excrement.

Overall, we were able to uncover evidence of the following abuses:

8 people who guards assaulted or 13 people who guards left in 4-point
violently restrained restraints anywhere from 24 to 96
hours straight
3 people who guards assaulted while

in restraints 178 individual incidents of guards
using restraints as a form of
28 people who guards assaulted or punishment or torture
restrained multiple times

Four-Point Restraints. Four-point restraints severely imit a person's movement by individually
shackling all four limbs. At Thomson, guards would often add a belly chain and tighten the
restraints so much that individuals were painfully stretched in four different directions and forced
to lie prostrate on a concrete slab for hours or even days at a time. The restraints often caused
temporary paralysis or numbness and left permanent scars, or “Thomson Tattoos” Attorneys
visiting people held at the Thomson SMU saw the scars on multiple individuals firsthand.

Restraint Chairs. Restraint chairs immobilize a person in a chair through straps applied
across their chest, ankles, wrists, and arms—like a full body haress. In the SMU, the straps
were intentionally applied to cut into people’s skin and to force their elbows and wrists into
uncomfortable positions that cause shaking, numbness, and even temporary paralysis. Restraint
chairs are banned in several states and have been linked to more than 36 deaths going back to
the 1990

Ambulatory Restraints. Ambulatory restraints limit a person's ability to move their arms and
legs while still allowing for some mobility. For example, a person who is handcuffed and wearing
leg shackles can walk, but the length of their stride is restricted to exceedingly small steps. In the
SMU, staff added a chain connecting the restraints on the ankles to the restraints on the wrists
and tightened the chain to cut off circulation and pierce the skin during movement.

Cruel and Usual
058

General Radiology-Wrist-2 View AP/Lat

Survivor: A.S.

Officials abused A.S. in retaliation for
writing letters to the American Civil Liberties
Union and Department of Justice's Office of
the Inspector General (OIG). Just after A.S.
handed the letters to his counselor to mail, a
‘group of guards dragged him from his cell and
attacked him at the direction of a Lieutenant,
who initiated the attack by simply saying
“Now." The guards dug their nails into A.
eyes, bent his fingers backwards, bashed his
head into the ground, and struck him in the
back, side, and legs. “We're going to teach
your dumb n****r ass” one said.

Then, while wheeling A.S. to the restraint
room on a gurney for further punishment,
they choked him and dug into his eyes with
gloves covered in pepper spray. Once in the
restraint room, officials placed him in four-
point restraints, sneaking in blows to his body
while carefully avoiding the view of a handheld
‘camera operated by a guard at the door.

Two hours later, six officials came back
witha lieutenant to assault him again. One told
him, “You're our bitch. We can do whatever
we want to you. Now there's no cameras and
nobody is going to stop us.” Over the course
of several hours, officials repeatedly tortured
AS., kneeing him in the groin and prying
apart his lips so they could bang metal keys
on his teeth. At one point a Lieutenant asked
the other officials in the room, “Yall haven't
broken him yet? | would've had him at least
three inches taller by now.”

The officials immediately tightened the
restraints in response, which gouged into

The Investigation

Provider.

oncer regarding underiyny
One Time

AS’s skin, and violently stretched his legs
toward the table at the bottom of the concrete
slab. The lieutenant exclaimed, “That Black
bitch is going to be taller;” laughed, and left
the cell.

AS!s body convulsed as he screamed in
pain and prayed for death. Hours later, during
a restraint check, another lieutenant said,
“I'm not going to help you. | don't give a fuck
about you. Stop crying:” Another hour passed
before a nurse finally loosened the restraints.
Thirteen hours after the assault began, a
third lieutenant took A.S. back to his cell, but
warned him, “Better not tell nobody what
happened or next time will be worse. You see
nobody can stop us, so keep your fucking
mouth shut about this whole ordeal, boy."

Survivor: O.P.

Thomson staff frequently assaulted O
while he was restrained. Once, guards choked
OFP. in restraints. As he struggled to breathe,
he heard an official say, “Don't kill him right
now because wefe still under investigation
for the last murder” Another of then
held O.P's head against the concrete restraint
slab, hitting him repeatedly. As O.P. lay there,
battered, he heard an official ask if anyone
would volunteer that O.P. attacked thern first.
OP. was then held in four-point restraints
for four days. To this day, O.P. suffers injuries
including a “Thomson Tattoo;” nerve damage,
and scars from a rash that developed as he
laid in his own waste.

Crueland Usual
The Investigation

Dangerous Cell Practices and Extreme Isolation

People confined to the SMU were subject to what the BOP euphemistically calls “restrictive
housing.” In restrictive housing, people are locked in their cells more than twenty-two hours a
day, often for months or years at a time. Some people are completely isolated without any other
human contact, while others are forced to share a cell the size of a parking space" with another
person—a form of extreme confinement called double-cell solitary. Psychologists and those who
have been subjected to double-cell soltary say is often worse than single-cell solitary because it
regularly leads to violent outbursts "that cellmates cannot escape.

staff at Thomson intentionally contrived dangerous cell assignments to incite violence
(referred to here as “forced celling"). For instance, officials paired together cellmates with
known conflicts or vulnerabilities; offered incentives, like reduced time in the SMU, to encourage
fights; used those fights as a pretext to intervene with acts of violence; falsified subsequent
incident reports; and beat up or restrained anyone who refused to play along. According to one
person, this led to multiple “staged fights” every week. As another put it, “Cell consolidation
days are when officers get geeked out or happy because they know 9 times out of 10 theres
going to be violence.”

The BOP was well aware of these problems. On March 2, 2020, SMU staff locked Matthew
Phillips, a 31-year-old Jewish man, in a cage with two known white supremacist/anti-Semitic gang
members. The gang members beat and kicked Matthew unconscious while the guards watched.
He died three days later.” All of this occurred before we began our investigation, yet violent forced
celling arrangements continued.

individuals experienced at least one forced-celling
arrangement against their consent.

Cruel and Usual
The Investigation

Indet e Sol

ry

People imprisoned in the SMU at Thomson were primarily held in double-cell isolation for
more than 23 hours per day, every day. Being constantly locked in a space the size of a parking
space with another person can be worse than being alone.” Many people in the Thomson
SMU endured double-cell solitary for years, despite the BOP's own program statement, which
states the SMU is intended for periods not longer than 9-13 months at a time and 24 months
in total* For many, the SMU became an indefinite form of isolation in violation of the BOP's

own program statement.”

individuals spent more than 24
44 e sMu,
in direct violation of the maximum time
permitted

14 individuals spent more than 3
consecutive years in the SMU,

with several approaching 4 years

Survivor: Kareem Louis

Over repeated objections, officials forced
Mr. Louis to cell with an individual they knew
was dangerous. This cellmate eventually
stabbed Mr. Louis in the hands, back, arms,
and neck, then raped him while he was
unconscious.

Survivor: E.C.

GuardstriedtouseC. topunishadifferent
person, saying, “We're going to put you in his
cell, and you have to beat his ass. He's coming
off suicide watch; you're going to have to fuck
him up or you got one coming The last time

“...you'’re going
to have to
fuck him up
or you got one coming.”

54 individuals spent a combined 112
years in the SMU, an average

of more than 2 years each

he refused to fight a cellmate, guards beat
him so badly they blinded him in one eye.
However, EC. still refused to cooperate. As a
result, he was too terrified to leave his cell for
jht months—even to shower.

Survivor: E.M.

Officials forced E.M., a trans woman, to
cell with an openly anti-LGBTQIA+ individual,
who threatened to rape her and beat her until
she died. When she reported this to an official
and asked for a different cell assignment, he
told her to “fight or fuck.” E.M. then attempted
suicide.

Survivor: Daryl Hickson

When Mr. Hickson objected to a cell
assignment because of a conflict with his
cellmate, a white guard told him, “You either
kill or be killed” The guard then added,
“You're going back in that cell to get killed,
n****1 When Mr. Hickson continued to object,
officials placed him in four-point restraints.

Crueland Usual
10

The Investigation

Mental Health — From Indifference to Violence

Individuals with serious mental health conditions are generally not supposed to be placed in
the SMU." BOP psychologists are required to assess whether a person has a disqualifying mental
health condition before they are transferred to the SMU, and if an individual develops a mental health
condition that interferes with their ability to progress through the SMU program, staff are required to
transfer that person out of the SMU.” In reality, neither happened. We spoke with dozens of individuals
in the SMU who had severe mental health conditions, including bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and
posttraumatic stress disorder. A number of them reported the BOP downgraded their mental health
care level, either just prior to or after their transfer, so they would be eligible for the SMU—when they
otherwise would not have been.

Ourfindings are well-known to the BOP, and they are consistent with a 2017 report by the OIG.
In that report, the OIG found that mental health policies adopted in 2014 resulted in a significant
decrease in the number of individuals identified as having mental illness. " Principally damning
was the OIG's finding that “mental health staff may have reduced the number of inmates who
needed regular mental health treatment because they did not have the necessary resources
to meet the policy’s increased treatment standards”" The OIG found the problem “particularly
pronounced among SMU inmates at USP Lewisburg” where all 27 individuals with mental iliness
had their care levels improperly reduced.

Solitary or restrictive housing, an ever-present condition of confinement in the SMU, can be
especially harmful to individuals with mental health conditions. The OIG' 2017 report was extremely
critical ofthe BOP's policies and practices relating to restrictive housing, finding they: did not adequately
address the use of such housing for people with mental llness, did not sufficiently track or monitor the
confinement of individuals with mental illness in such housing, and did not consistently document
individuals’ mental liness, and therefore the BOP was unable to provide accurate or appropriate mental
health care.

Offcials at Thomson exacerbated these problems by failing to provide even the most basic mental
health care. Treatment instead consisted of one or two-minute psychology visits, approximately once
amonth. These “meetings" would be conducted with the psychologist on one side of the cell door and

Cruel and Usual
The Investigation

the person in the SMU on the other. And in-between meetings, officials “treated” people by providing
them books or puzzles.

The misclassification of serious mental health conditions combined with the complete lack of
any meaningful mental health treatment led to highly foreseeable—and devastating—results. Many
individuals held in the SMU in Thomson reported a significant deterioration of their mental health
and increases in suicidal ideation and attempts. Yet, when an individual reported suicidal ideations to
‘guards or engaged in seff-harm, guards would often respond with violence rather than care. Officials
would beat suicidal individuals and place them in restraints in a suicide watch room, where they were
left completely isolated, wearing only paper clothes. Individuals would languish there, sometimes for

2 week or more, with no mental health services.

43 individuals in the SMU reported a
serious mental health diagnosis,

including severe depression and schizophrenia

Survivor: J.B.

1B attempted suicide nine times in the
SMU. Once, after telling staff he had swallowed
excess pills, guards restrained him to a chair
for 24 hours. He was denied food, water, and
access toatoilet the entire time. Another time,
after telling the BOP's Health Services Clinic
he was hallucinating, and asking to speak
with a psychologist, guards punished him by
placing him in restraints for four days straight.
When 1.8. complained about the inadequate
psychological care to Thomson's doctors, one
told him: “Get with the program or you'll die.”

Survivor: D.L.

Prior to being placed in the SMU, D.L. had
beendiagnosed withschizophreniaandplaced
onmental health care leve! 3. His mental health
care level was reduced, however, so he could
be transferred to the SMU at Thomson. While
waiting to be transferred, D.L. filed grievances
disputing the reduction in his mental health
care level. Despite these grievances and his
known mental iliness, D.L. was transferred to
the SMU. For eight months D.L. repeatedly
told staff at Thomson that he should not be

1 5 individuals attempted suicide, in some
cases as many as 9 times

there and continued to file grievances. Just
before shuttering the SMU, the BOP admitted
he needed additional psychological services
and transferred him to a different facility.

“He’s playing games,
so beat his ass
and take him back
to his cell”

Survivor: O.P.

After OP. told a doctor that he wanted to
Kill himself, the doctor replied, “Why did you
wait until I'm supposed to leave work to bring
me this crap?” The doctor asked O.P. how he
planned to do kill himself and in response
said, “Go do it then!” She subsequently told
officials, “He's playing games, so beat his ass
and take him back to his cell

Crueland Usual

The Investigation

Sexual Assaults

Sex- and Gender-Based Violence

Staff routinely used sex- and gender-based violence against people in the SMU. Fifteen
individuals reported 22 separate incidents of sexual assault by staff, sometimes while they were in
restraints. People also reported being assaulted after guards intentionally double-celled them with
someone known to be sexually violent. Additionally, multiple transgender individuals reported
that staff forced them to cell with individuals who were openly anti-LGBTQIA+, resulting in several
sexual assaults or rapes. Staff, in retaliation for meeting with lawyers, threatened sexual assault.

19 incidents were reported in which 3 individuals reported being sexually
guards sexually assaulted a person in assaulted after being forced to
the SMU directly double-cell with someone who Thomson staff

knew was sexually violent
8 of those assaults were committed while
the individual was in restraints

Survivor: LH. and sawing a security shield into his penis,

leaving cuts and abrasions.
On at least two occasions, officials

strapped JH. to a gurney, wheeled
the rotunda, stripped him naked, and
themselves assaulting his genitals, laughing
when he begged them to stop.

Survivor: M.B.

Officials restrained M.B. in four-points as
retaliation for a note he wrote alerting the
Warden to threats against his life by guards.
Survivor: O.P. While in restraints, an official threatened to
cut off M.B!s penis but instead cut off three of
Officials sexually assaulted O.P. multiple pjg dreadiocks, waving them in the air while
times, squeezing and twisting his testicles; shouting, “I spared your dick!”
attempting to insert a finger into his rectum;

False Charges and Infractions

Staff frequently fabricated incident reports and filed false disciplinary infractions against
individuals. The most common allegation was that individuals stuck their penises through a tiny
flap in their cell doors and masturbated. Staff would then use these false disciplinary infractions
to mislabel individuals as sex offenders and spread that information throughout the unit, placing

them in grave danger.
Contrary to staff claims, the people we spoke with generally had no history of this behavior in
their records and had not been identified as sex offenders before being transferred to the SMU.

Cruel and Usual
Survivor: O.P.

Thomson staff placed O.P. in four-point
restraints for four days, claiming he had
harassed one of the nurses. Staff repeatedly
insisted O.P. admit to this false charge during

Rampant Racism

The Investigation

torture sessions while restrained. OP. never
admitted to the infraction. Months after the
fact, OP. was exonerated and the infraction
expunged from his record.

Much of the violence in the SMU resulted from blatant, unadulterated racism. White guards.

targeted Black individuals with derogatory racial terms—such as n’

1, boy, monkey, and Black

bitch—on a daily basis, often while committing assaults or placing individuals in restraints, but

sometimes to simply assert their control

Survivor: Darius Townsend

Following his return from suicide watch,
an official told Mr. Townsend that he was
going to “teach [Mr. Townsend] a lesson”
not to harm himself. Several officials later
rushed into Mr. Townsend's cell, punched,
kicked, and dragged him to the designated
restraint room where they restrained him
on a concrete slab. As he laid there, one of
the officials put his knee on Mr. Townsend's
chest, choked him, and told him that if he
“kept being disruptive’—which Mr. Townsend
understood to mean raising grievances about
prison conditions—"We're going to make you
the next George Floyd."

Survivor: J.B.

Guards restrained 18. 17 times while he
was in the SMU at Thomson. Once, a guard
came to his cell and said, “You n***'s are
going in chains. We're gonna fuck yall up”
During a different assault, an official shoved
his genitals into 1B's face, calling him “my
little n****r boy." Another time, in response to
1B, filing a sexual assault grievance, an official

told him to “assume the position, snitch f****t
e Another added, “You think you mean
something, n*****r? White men run the world."
When JB. tried reporting this abuse to a
lieutenant, he refused to accept the grievance
saying, “Im not taking that shit, n****r. Its
gonna keep happening to you:"

Other Survivors:

An Official told a restrained OP. that he
was his “master.” then lifted his shield high in
the air and slammed it twice into O.P's face,
bloodying his nose. After 1.B. attempted to file
agrievance about an assault, officialstold him,
“stop filing on us, n****r” When Wade Wilson
complained about not having access to a
shower for days at a time, one official called
him a “dumb ass Black n****r” a “bitch,” and a
“dumb ass Black monkey” before destroying
his belongings. A supervisor responded by
saying, “Good, cause yall n***'rs need to
pack shit, cause yall are moving to G-3, and
just to mention, G-3 is a disciplinary block”
And while JT. was in four-point restraints, an
official told him, “Lay the fuck back, you n****r
monkey jacking fuck.” then choked him.

Crueland Usual

m

m
1

The Investigation

) Tamper
Lega) Calls Monitored, Mait
Re: Legs
Chomson
USP Thoms! -
oma) Counsel Witt .
- s’ Commi

Interference with Access to Counsel

Federal regulations,” BOP policy,"" and legal ethics* require attorneys to have unmonitored
access to their clients. Thomson consistently failed to provide regular access to people in the.
SMU, let alone unmonitored access.

Throughout our investigation, staff at Thomson unconstitutionally interfered with our clients’
right to confidential legal mail.” Staff opened incoming legal mail outside the presence of the
recipient, unreasonably delayed outgoing legal mail, and destroyed legal mail individuals kept in
their cells, all in violation of BOP policies and federal regulations.’ This interference with legal
mail was routine and pervasive.

Staff never informed D.S. about a legal | thatstaff had opened a confidential legal letter
visit with our attorneys in September 2022. from us about the visit and placed it on his
While we were able to meet with DS, when bed in an ominous and threatening manner.
he returned to his cell from that visit, he found

Cruel and Usi

The Investigation

Confidential Legal Calls

Likewise, staff at Thomson interfered with our ability to have confidential legal calls with
clients. Our requests for unmonitored legal calls were repeatedly met with inappropriate inquiries
into the nature of our relationship with the person we requested to speak with, and demands that
we disclose the subject matter of the conversations. Calls would be scheduled and then cancelled
with no explanation. Staff would trump up false charges against individuals scheduled to speak
with us, then punish them in order to create a pretense for cancelling a legal call. Likewise, when
individuals were on suicide watch, staff would not allow them to speak with us and would even
conceal from them that we were trying to reach

them, compounding their mental health crisis.

Even when allowed, calls usually took weeks Staff would trump up false

to schedule. One counselor simply refused to charges against individuals
schedule any cals with the people on his case gcheduled to speak with us,

load.” When staff did schedule legal calls, n sh them in ord
they would frequently stagger them weeks en punish them In order

apart and not inform individuals—including to create a pretense for
individuals on suicide watch—that the call was cancelling a legal call.
scheduled until just hours before the call was to
take place, leaving the individuals with the false
impression that counsel had forgotten about them. Keeping individuals unaware of their lawyers’
efforts to reach out to them only compounded the individuals’ poor mental health, distress, and
suicidal ideation

staff would also inappropriately monitor privileged calls in violation of BOP Program
Statements,”* often forcing individuals to conduct legal calls from a shower stall while staff
remained in the room. Attorneys could sometimes hear staff (and others) in the background. In
January 2022, the Warden at Thomson further interfered with attorney-client phone conversations
by initiating a new policy charging 23 cents per minute for long-distance unmonitored legal calls,
even if the call was requested and scheduled by counsel. The policy was ultimately withdrawn
after our attorneys raised the issue with BOP regional counsel.”

Confidential Legal Visits

‘Thomson staff also interfered with legal visits, often by retaliating against individuals who met
with us. Staff (including Thomson's lawyers) also used pretenses to cancel attorney visits at the
last minute, including on the day of the visit itself. This was done despite the visits being long-
scheduled and staff knowing the lawyers had flown from Washington, D.C. to llinois. Counsel had
to contact senior BOP staff and the Office of the Deputy Attorney General to reverse Thomson
staff's efforts to interfere with these legal visits.

Survivor: AJ.
When AJ. met with us in September allow him to bring his records, but invasively
2022, he attempted to bring his legal files, strip-searched him before allowing him to

grievance and medical records, and other meet with counsel.
documentation. Staff not only refused to

Crueland Usual

m

The Investigation
Dear Regional Counsel Winter:

‘We have just learned that Thomson staff assaulted two of our clients immediately after they spoke w
retaliatory assaults violate our clients' consttutional and cvil rights. Our clients attempted to submit
regarding the assauls in response to these incidents, but Thomson staf refuses 1o distbute & fom
‘wrote handwritten BP-8 grievances. Thomson staff intercepted those grievances and refused to s

that Thomson staff assaulted two of our clients immediately after they spoke with us via legal atached), Tromson s

olate our clients' constitutional and civil rights. Our clients attempted to submit BP-8 grievanc!Ceated & Thamson. ek

s i response to these incidents, but Thomson staff refuses to distribute BP forms. As a result, e e shows

p-8 grievances. Thomson staf intercepted those grievances and refused to accept them. ur dtes (soeatached s
S

S

individuals today

Grievance and Accountability Failures

Under the Prison Litigation Reform Act, individuals usually cannot bring suit to address
unconstitutional conditions—like the ones in the SMU—without first completing the prison facility's
‘administrative remedy process, commonly referred to as the “grievance process At Thomson, staff
‘weaponized structural flaws in the grievance process to prevent individuals from ever being able to
file lawsuits.

To'start, SMU staff made obtaining grievance forms unnecessarily difficutt. Guards and counselors
at Thomson routinely refused to provide or process grievance forms. Because an individual s typically
‘completely barred from bringing a lawsuit if they do not file their initial grievance within 20 days of
an incident, staff could easily interfere with the grievance process by simply refusing to provide or
process the forms. In other instances, staff ripped up the forms (completed and not) inside the cells
of people incarcerated at the SMU.

Filing grievances could also be dangerous. Individuals in the BOP are often required to get
grievance forms from, and file their initial grievances with, the very staff who abused them.” As a
result, individuals are often left with an impossible choice: waive any right to legal redress or seek
justice and risk severe retaliation. In the SMU, guards punished people for filing grievances by putting
them in restraints, placing them in dangerous celling situations, threatening to rape them, destroying
their property, and trumping up false sexual assault or masturbation infractions. Thomson staff
created a culture of fear and intimidation that systematically suppressed the use of the grievance
process, both shielding and emboldening the very people itis supposed to hold accountable.

Evenifa person in the SMU can obtain and submit an initial grievance form, the process s virtually
impossible to finish. It has four levels, each with its own form and strict deadlines. As the person
moves through each level of the grievance process, they must attach the BOP's written response to
the prior level of grievance. It s quite common, however, for BOP staff to simply fail to respond. If
the person does ot attach the BOP's written responses, even if they have not received it before the
deadline to appeal, they are routinely found to have “failed" to comply with the grievance process. As
aresult, they are barred from bringing a lawsuit no matter how bad the violation of their constitutional
or federal law rights,

Alltold, staff control the grievance process, they are incentivized to make it as difficult to complete:
as possible, and they routinely use it to thwart litigation.

Survivors

When DL. attempted to grieve one
of many forced celling arrangements, his
counselor took over a month to provide forms.
During that time, the counselor would ask why
D.L. wanted a form and what he was going to
sayinit.

When A.S. attempted to grieve an issue
concerning his legal mail his counselor told
him, “I'm not giving you no more grievance
forms When he attempted to file a grievance
for more than one incident at a time, his
counselor said, “You're issued one [grievance

form] per policy” There is no such policy,
and AS. still does not know what happened

“You must have forgotten
what we do to n#¥*¥¥rs
around here.

I'm gonna break
your fucking hands since
you like to write us up,
motherfucker.”

to his legal mail. Officials also confiscated
and destroyed all A.S's stamps, legal papers,
and family pictures. When he asked why, an
official screamed in his face: “You must have
forgotten what we do to n’

The Investigation

¥'m gonna break your fucking hands since you
like to write us up, motherfucker.” He then told
AS., ominously, “Filing grievances will get you
ina lot of trouble.

Officials likewise took every piece of
documentation M.R. kept n his cell pertaining
to an excessive force grievance, including
copies of appeals he had yet to mail to the
Regional Office, causing him to miss his
deadlines. No one has been held responsible
for the underlying excessive force used
against M.R.

When DLT. attempted to file a handwritten
grievance for a violent assault after he was
unable to obtain a prison-provided form
for weeks, his counselor simply responded,
“That's not how this works” No one has been
held accountable for assaulting DT.

When H.D. asked about the status of
multiple grievances, the guards lied, telling
him he never filed anything. He never received
responses and was unable to complete the
grievance process.

When M.S., who is transgender, filed a
handwritten grievance after officials refused
to give her a prison-provided form, officials
placed her in a cell with an openly anti-
LGBTQIA+ cellmate, who beat her up. No one
has been held accountable for the forced
celling or assault because M.S. could not
access the grievance process and was afraid.

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m
Necessary Reforms

The SMU at Thomson is closed, but many of the same constitutional and civil rights violations
continue to occur throughout the BOP. The Washington Lawyers’ Committee and Uptown People’s
Law Center receive intakes from individuals throughout the BOP that report assaults by staff,
prolonged unnecessary use of restraints, intentional interference with the grievance process,
lack of mental health services, and denial of access to counsel, among other things.

The BOP should ot implement the SMU in some other location, as it did when it moved the
SMU from Lewisburg, PA to Thomson, IL in 2018, Moreover, many of the staff responsible for
abusing the individuals in the SMU remain employed by the BOP. We are aware of no disciplinary
actions or criminal charges against any of them. Indeed, a May 2023 report by the OIG found
the BOP was “unable to effectively jate and adjudicate employee misconduct cases
because [the BOP] is not sufficiently staffed " As of September 2022, the BOP had approximately
7,893 open employee misconduct cases and only 60 Special Investigative Officers to conduct
investigations. Perhaps more concerning, the OIG found that the BOP had notimposed discipline
in 2,279 other cases where the allegations of misconduct
were sustained."

‘ The BOP's inaction, however, does not excuse the DOJ from its

abligation to investigate and bring charges against SMU staff who have

violated the law. The DOJ's failure to do so serves to reinforce the notion that staff

are untouchable and are free to abuse individuals in their care. In the interest of justice

and to protect the constitutional and civil rights of those in the BOP's care, the following reforms
should be adopted immediately:

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1 - The Department of Justice Should Immediately Open
a Criminal Investigation into the Abuses in the SMU.

To our knowledge, the BOP staff involved in the abuses at the Thomson SMU remain employed
by the BOP. A thorough independent criminal investigation is necessary to ensure that staff and
their supervisors are held accountable for any criminal act or constitutional violation against the
people imprisoned in the SMU at Thomson. The BOP culture needs reform far more than the law
does. The Thomson SMU's staff, based on the credible allegations from the people with whom we
spoke, are responsible for widespread violations of law and policy.

2 - Immediately End the SMU Program and Strictly Limit
the Use of Other Restrictive Housing in the BOP.

‘The BOP should shutter the SMU permanently and retract Program Statement P5217.02. The
BOP should also end the regular and systematic use of restrictive housing. As of the date of this
report, there are 11,171 individuals held in either prolonged isolation with limited human contact
(solitary confinement) or prolonged isolation in a cell with another individual (double-cell solitary
confinement).” Instead, the BOP should design alternatives that are consistent with American
Public Health Association Policy Statement 201310, American Bar Association Standard 23-2.
American Medical Association House of Delegates Resolution 403 (A-23), United Nations Standard
Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (the Nelson Mandela Rules), and H.R176, as follows:

1. Ifused, restrictive housing should be limited to circumstances where there is reasonable
cause to believe that substantial and immediate serious harm to another exists.”

2. Mental health and medical examinations should be required prior to placing an individual
in solitary confinement."” The BOP should ban the placement in restrictive housing of
anyone with a history of a serious mental health conditions and those who are currently
experiencing symptoms consistent with a serious mental health or medical condition.
Rather, the policy should mandate that such individuals be transferred to an appropriate
medical facility as soon as possible. This policy change is critical.

3. Anyone placed in restrictive housing must have the right to a hearing within 72 hours of
placement, with the assistance of counsel, and daily evaluations by a clinician.

4. BOP policy should limit solitary confinement to as short of a time as possible, with a
maximum of 15 consecutive days and no more than 20 days during a 60-day period."

5. Even when placed in solitary confinement for these limited periods, the BOP should re-
quire individuals to receive a minimum of four hours a day of recreation or other acti
outside of the cell during daylight hours.

3 - Strictly Limit & Monitor the Use of Restraints

The BOP should revise the current Use of Force and Application of Restraints Program
Statement, BOP Program Statement 5566.06, to strictly limit the use of four-point, chair, and
ambulatory restraints, and to increase oversight in any circumstance where such restraints are
applied. The BOP should not permit any restraint for more than two hours under any circumstances.

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If an individual is unable to self-regulate within that time, the program statement should require
they be immediately moved to an appropriate mental health or medical facility.

Program Statement 5566.06 should also be amended to require all restraint be continuously
recorded for the entirety of the restraint. The policy should further require the Warden at every
facility, or their designee, to review all restraint recordings within four working days of the
beginning of the restraint, unless requested sooner by the Regional Director, and to preserve all
such recordings for no less than five years. Any videos wherein staff potentially violate BOP policy
or an individual's constitutional rights should be immediately forwarded to the Regional Director.
The Regional Director should be required to review the recordings and forward videotapes of
potential policy or constitutional violations related to the Assistant Director, Correctional Programs
ision, and Central Office, for review within five working days. Further, the BOP should amend
the policy statement to require a written report any time restraints are used other than for the
purpose of transportation.

4 - Create a Meaningful, Accessible Grievance Process

‘The BOP must rectify the problems with its Administrative Remedy Program by:

1. Updating Program Statement 133018 to limit the administrative grievance process to
three steps: a formal grievance filed with the Warden, an appeal to the Regional Director,
and a final appeal to the General Counsel; "

2. Incorporating procedural safeguards identical to those contained in the Remedy Proce-
dures under the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA), for individuals who submit a griev-
ance alleging the use of force, forced celling, failure to intervene, or other forms of phys-
ical or emotional abuse by BOP staff, or physical or emotional abuse by third parties but
with the knowledge of BOP staff;"*

Developing and implementing a process across all BOP facilities that allows people in
prison to have unrestricted access to grievance forms without the need to engage BOP
staff directly—such as an electronic grievance process or a grievance form library avail-
able in all housing areas. If paper rather than electronic grievances is provided, the facil
ty should provide opaque sealable envelopes and access to a locked grievance box daily
50 that individuals can submit grievances without review or interference from staff;

4. Directing additional resources to conduct a comprehensive review of all grievance docu-
ments and to conduct unannounced regular audits of every facility to ensure grievances
are responded to and returned with sufficient time for the person to include the response
in the next step in the process.

5 - Create External Independent Oversight.

Office of the Inspector General. The Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General
should establish a regular inspection regime of all BOP facilities to assess and report on the
appropriateness of the use of single-cell solitary confinement, forced double-celling practices,
administrative segregation, all other forms of restrictive housing, use of restraints, and the use
of force against individuals held in BOP facilities consistent with its authority under 28 CFR Part
0 Subpart £-4, 5 U.S.C. 301; 28 US.C. 509, 510, 515-519. The Inspector General should be given

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authority to conduct additional inspections or investigations to monitor the BOP's compliance
with all corrective action plans. Such additional inspections or investigations can be either
announced or unannounced at the discretion of the Inspector General.

©Ombudsperson. Establish and fund an Ombudsman office in the Department of Justice who
is authorized and directed to do the followin

1. Maintain a nationwide toll-free telephone number, a collect telephone number, a live
caption or other phone system for deaf and hard of hearing individuals, an accessible
website, and a mailing address for the receipt of complaints and inquiries regarding
the BOP;

2. Promote awareness among BOP department employees, imprisoned people and their
family members, and the public regarding the purpose of the office of the ombudsper-
son, services provided, and how the office can be contacted;

3. Receive complaints from individuals who are imprisoned, their family members, the
representative of a person in prison, staff, contractors, or others with personal knowl-
«edge about the conditions in the relevant BOP facility

4. Provide information, as appropriate, to individuals who are in prison, their family members
and representatives, BOP employees, and others regarding the rights of imprisoned in
viduals;

5. Establish a nationwide uniform reporting system to collect and analyze data related to
complaints received by the ombudsperson regarding the BOP;

6. Establish procedures to collect and resolve complaints;

put into the ombudsperson's acti
meetings at least quarterly;

7. Establish procedures to gather stakeholder i
and priorities, which shall include holding publi

8. Aid people in prison or their family members whom the ombudsperson determines
needs assistance, including advocating with an agency, provider, or other person in the
best interests of the person who is imprisoned;

inal

. Make referrals, including to appropriate law enforcement authorities, when
complaints by people in prison are received by the office;

10. Notwithstanding any other provision of law to the contrary, review criminal investiga-
tions to ensure the investigations were accurate, unbiased, and thorough;

1. By a date certain each year, annually submit to the DOJ OIG and Office of Civil Rights,
and make publicly available, a report that is both aggregated and disaggregated by
each facility and includes, at a minimum, the number of complaints received, the num-
ber of complaints resolved by the ombudsperson, a description of systemic o individ-
ual investigations or outcomes achieved by the ombudsperson in the preceding year,
any outstanding or unresolved concerns or recommendations of the ombudsperson,
and input or comments from stakeholders regarding the ombudsperson's acti
during the preceding year;

12. Adopt and comply with rules, policies, and procedures necessary to implement the
above provisions.

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Conclusion

The investigation of the SMU at Thomson has exposed systemic problems within the BOP that
must be addressed immediately—including the excessive and violent use of restraints, insufficient
treatment of individuals with mental health conditions, and pervasive use of restrictive housing,
The administrative grievance process must also be revised to ensure that it provides actual,
timely opportunities for individuals to seek remedies through the BOP, rather than simply shield
staff from accountability. Finally, until such time as the BOP proves it is capable of investigating

complaints about staff and enforcing its Standards of Employee Conduct in a timely manner, the
DOJ must impose robust external oversight.
Endnotes

1. The BOP claims that it does not practice
solitary confinement. However, the Department

of Justice Office of the Inspector General issued

a report in 2017 finding a practice across several
facilities of housing individuals, including those
with mental illnesses, “in single-cell confinement
for long periods of time, isolated from other
inmates and with limited human contact.” Review
of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Use of Restrictive
Housing for Inmates with Mental fllness, Office.

of the Inspector General, U.S. Department of
Justice, Evaluation and Inspections Division 17-05,
Executive Summary (July 2017). Instead, the BOP
euphemistically refers toits program of locking
individuals in cells for 22 hours or more a day,
“restrictive housing.” The BOP considers special
housing units, housing at the Administrative
Maximurn Facility (ADX), and housing in SMUs to all
be restrictive housing. As of June 30, 2023 there
are 11173 people being held in restrictive housing
in the BOP: 10,846 in special housing units and
327 in ADX. With the closure of Thomson, there
are no individuals currently being held in an SMU
program. Restricted Housing, Statistics, Federal
Bureau of Prisons, June 30, 2023, httos//uwit bop.
‘gov/about/statistics/statistics inmate shu.isp.

2. Federal Bureau of Prisons, Program
Statement, P531016 (May 1, 2014).

3. We primarily reviewed documents collected
from the individuals who contacted us, all of which
corroborated their experiences. Obtaining fles
from the BOP directly was close to impossible.

‘The BOP requires attorneys to file FOIA requests.
to get even basic records, but it can take years for
the BOP to respond, f they ever do. During this
investigation, we submitted more than 28 FOIA
requests. To date, the BOP has responded to one.
On May 10, 2023, Latham & Watkins LLP, and the
Washington Lawyers' Committee filed a lawsuit

in the United States District Court for the District
of Columbia to compel the BOP to provide the
records from over 55 outstanding FOIA requests.
Washington Lawyers’ Comm. v. United States
Department of Justice, No. 1:23-cv-01328 (D.DC.

filed May 10, 2023)

4. Federal Bureau of Prisons, Program
Statement, 5566.06, CN-1 (August 29, 2014); 28
CFR § 552.24 (1989).

5. 28CFR§552.24.

6. Maurice Chammah, They Went to Jail. Then

They Say They Were Strapped to a Char for Days,
The Marshall Project (Feb. 7, 2020),

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hitps:/fwww hemarshallproject.org/2020/02/07)
they-went.to-jail-then-they-say-they-were-
strapped-to-a-chair-for-days.

7. Resticted Housing, Statistics, Federal

Bureau of Prisons, June 30, 2023, httos:/Juwibop.
‘gov/about/statistics/statistics inmate. shu.isp.

8. The average cell size in the BOP is 7 x 12
feet, or a maximum of 84 square feet, while the
average parking spot is 7.5 x 16 10 20 feet. Ryan J.
Reilly and Saki Knafo, America's Top Prison Official
Doesnt Know How Big a Prison Cell I, Huffington
Post, February 26, 2014, hitps:/Jwwwhulfpost.com/
entry/bop-director-prison-cell-size n 4855865;
Charles Montaldo, Maximurm Security Federal
Prison: ADX Supermax, ThoughtCo., updated
January 28, 2020, hitos://www.ihoughtco.com/

‘adxsuperma-overview-972970.

9. Christie Thompson and Joseph Shapiro,
How the Newest Federal Prison Became One of
the Deadllest, The Marshall Project, May 31, 2022,
hitps:/fwww hemarshallproject 0ra/2022/05/31,
how-the-newest-federal-prison-became-one-of-
the-deadliest.

10. 1d.

0. 1.

2. 1d.

13. 1d.

14. Federal Bureau of Prisons, Program
Statement, P5217.02 (August 9, 2016).

15. 1d.

16. 1d.

1. 1d.

18. Review of the Federal Bureau of Prisons
Use of Restrictive Housing for Inmates with Mental
fliness, Office of the Inspector General, USS.
Department of Justice, July 2017, hitps: /ol justice.
‘govlreports/2017/e1705.pdf.

19, 1d.

20.1d,

21 1.

22. 28 CFR.§540103.
23, Federal Bureau of Prisons, Program
Statement, P5264.08 (corrected copy February 11,
2008).

24. Rules of Professional Conduct, Amended
Rules 16 and 1.8, District of Columbia 8ar.

25. Federal Bureau of Prisons, Program
Statement 526514 (April 5, 2011); 28 CFR § 54018
and 28 CFR §54019.

26.1d.

27. March 18, 2022 email to Rick Winter,
Regional Counsel from the Washington Lawyers’
Committee for Civil Rights & Urban Affairs; April
26,2022 letter to Mary Noland from Washington
Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights & Urban Affairs
(documenting no response to requests for legal
calls for over a month).

28, Federal Bureau of Prisons, Program
Statement P5264.08 (January 24, 2008).

29. March 11, 2022 letter to Rick Winter,
Regional Counsel from the Washington Lawyers’
Committee for Civil Rights & Urban Affais,
outlining staff interference with clients’ access
to counsel. The fe for calls with counsel were
eliminated because of the letter to regional
counsel.

30. Federal Bureau of Prisons, Program
Statement, 133018 (January 6, 2014). There are two
limited exceptions that exist within the program
statements but are in practice unavailable. For
grievances filed pursuant to the Prison Rape
Elimination Act (PREA), individuals who allege
sexual abuse may submit a grievance without
submitting it to a staff member who is the subject
or the complaint, and the grievances will not
subsequently be referred to the staff member.

d., 28 CFR.§ 115. The same program statement
theoretically allows imprisoned individuals to

mail certain “sensitive” grievances directly to the
Regional Office (avoiding the first two levels of
review). However, if the regional coordinator does.
not consider the request sensitive, it will simply
be returned to the person filing the grievance
and they will be required to complete the regular
administrative remedy process. Id. Not a single
individual we spoke to in the SMU, however,
reported successfully filing a sensitive grievance
with the regional coordinator.

31. Limited-Scope Review o the Federal Bureau
of Prisons’ Strategies to [dentify, Communicate, and
Remedy Operational Issues, Department of Justice,
Office of the Inspector General, Evaluation and
Inspections Division, May 2023, htips:/foic.justice.
‘gousites/default/fles/reports/23-065.pdf

32.1d.
33.1d,
34.1d,

35. Restricted Housing, Statistics, Federal
Bureau of Prisons, June 30, 2023, https://wviw.bop.
‘gov/about/statistics/statistics inmate shu.isp.

36. H.R. 176 (2021); American Bar Association
Standard 23-27(a).

37, United Nations General Assembly
Resolution 70/175, Rule 45 (adopted 17 Dec.
2015); American Public Health Association, Policy
201310, Problem Statement (2013); American Bar
Association Standard 23-2.8.

38. United Nations General Assembly
Resolution 70/175, Rule 45 (adopted 17 Dec.
2015); American Public Health Association, Policy
201310, Problem Statement (2013); American Bar
Association Standard 23-2.8.

39.1d.

40. American Public Health Association, Policy
201310, Action Steps; United Nations General
Assembly Resolution 70/175, Rules 43 and 45
(adlopted 17 Dec. 2015).

41 HRAT6.

42. Currently, there is a four-step process.
Individuals held in the BOP only have 20 days.
after an incident oceurs to complete the fist two
steps in the grievance process. Federal Bureau of
Prisons, Program Statement, 133018, (January 6,
2014); 28 US.C. § 54213 and 54214. Specifically,
the individual must file 3 BP-8 form, also known as
an “informal grievance:” within 20 calendar days
of the incident they are grieving. They are also
required to file the second step using a BP-9 form,
referred to as a “formal grievance” before the
end of the same 20-day period. Given the overlap
between the deadiines for the BP-8 (informal
resolution) and BP-9 (grievance to Warden), the
BP-8 should be eliminated.

43. Federal Bureau of Prisons, Program
Statement 133018,

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