Advocates for juveniles held in a former death row building at a Louisiana prison for adults say the youths are suffering through dangerous heat and psychologically damaging isolation in their prison cells with little or no mental health care, inadequate schooling and foul water.
FILE - Vehicles enter the main security gate at the Louisiana State Penitentiary Angola Prison, the largest high-security prison in the country in Angola, La., Aug. 5, 2008. In a federal court filing dated Monday, July 17, 2023, advocates said that juveniles held in a former death row building at the Louisiana prison for adults are suffering through dangerous heat and psychologically damaging isolation in their cells with little or no mental health care, inadequate schooling and foul water.
There was also an affidavit from a medical expert who said the prolonged solitary confinement the youths are exposed to causes “significant risk of serious psychological harm.” Another expert discussed the physical and psychological dangers of keeping the youths in un-airconditioned cells, with fans that are unreliable.
When Edwards announced the plan, state officials were under growing pressure to do something after a series of escapes from the violence-plagued Bridge City Center for Youth in suburban New Orleans. One inmate is suspected in a carjacking and shooting that happened before he was recaptured. Establishing a detention center at Angola was described as a last-ditch but necessary measure amid capacity and safety concerns at juvenile detention facilities.
A lawsuit was filed in August, questioning the state's ability to protect the juveniles and provide them with needed services at the prison. “Given the fact that 83% of youth in OJJ’s secure care system are Black, it is statistically likely that Black youth will disproportionately suffer the brunt of the Governor’s transfer plan,” attorneys wrote then.last September to remove the youths.
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Louisiana youths held at adult prison's old death row suffer heat, isolation, advocates sayAdvocates for juveniles held in a former death row building at a Louisiana prison for adults say the youths are suffering through dangerous heat and psychologically damaging isolation in their prison cells with little or no mental health care, inadequate schooling and foul water
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