Since my sentence has started in 2015, I have been at 2 holdover facilities, 3 USPs, 3 FCIs and on my way to another USP where I have enemies from prior altercations. For some crazy reason the media calls doing federal time Club Fed. Please let the journalists who dare come enjoy 90 days at Club Fed. I promise their whole outlook and life would be changed, they would walk away with anger, hatred, hostility, and mere disgust in their hearts.
I’ll start with the living conditions. Not one prison have I been to that doesn’t have mice, cockroaches and other bug problems. Especially in food service. At all the holdovers and pretrial housing under “Federal Inmate” status, we are given below standard bedding. At Atlanta in DCU 2 when you are in transit, when you come in off the bus, you are herded 40 to 60 into a cell meant for 20 standing room only. Then for your meal you are given 4 slices of bread, 1 slice of cheese, 1 slice of bologna, and some fortunate are given an apple not much bigger than a cherry. That’s what the sack is like for your lunch meal. Then you get another one that is identical for your dinner meal. You are in standing room only for hours upon hours. To then be shuttled to a “Unit Cell Block” that has two man cells. Well, upon being placed three deep in a two man cell where you’re the lucky guy to be stuck on the floor. When you ask, “What’s up? I thought they outlawed 3 to a cell,” they laugh, “Ha ha this is USP Atlanta.” So then you ask for a mattress to finally lay down and get some rest, they tell you they don’t have any mattresses until the next bus of people leaves out. So it will be the next day until you receive a mattress. When you look at your bedding, you see a piece of a sheet and a torn up blanket that won’t cover a bed. So you make a cot on the floor, watching bugs run around. When you ask the CO they say next shift will worry about it. So here comes breakfast. 4 plastic spoon scoops of an oatmeal-type product that has the consistency of slime, and a piece of premade cake 2×2 and milk. Your lunch tray is smaller than any plastic tray I’ve ever seen anywhere. Today we had a chicken patty that sits in your bun with an inch around the patty of bread, literally 2.5 inches by 2.5 inches, lettuce that is slimy and brown, a pack of outdated salad dressing, 4 plastic spoons of black beans, and a juice packet that makes an 8 oz. cup. No items are allowed to be purchased in commissary. We remain locked to our cells with nothing, no books, they have not run store in 3 weeks, so no stamps. They don’t even sell paper or envelopes. This pencil is one I found and it’s 2.5 inches long. I received the email about storytelling and asked an orderly to please help me get a couple of stamps so I could send a letter about the wonderful Club Fed. I’ve been in transit for 7 weeks, I’ve lost 35 lbs. and where I’m going I most likely will get hit with locks or stabbed over previous altercations with a guy already housed at the place I’m being sent to. When it was brought to their attention, they told me to go to the USP and deal with it there.
I’ve had the worst food imagined in the last 4 years, been treated poorly, been assaulted, lost over 200 days good conduct just protecting myself. I’ve been denied my appeal, I can’t access legal library in a timely manner due to being locked down 3 to 4 days in a row. No showers. The floors, showers, and housing areas are so deplorable, I can’t understand how this place passes accreditation, or a mere inspection. For the past week at the wee hours of the morning, the fire alarm screams for 3 to 4 hours, we presume they do it on purpose? Who knows. This is just here and now. There is so much more about everywhere else. Thank God I’ve not needed medical emergency, the COs only come around to count at the beginning of shift and meal times to give you a sack, other than that it’s you and your celly, better hope you get along and don’t need help, cause you won’t get it here.
— James L.