Image by Emiliano Bar.

In early February, Bullock Prison warms up slightly, but the heat is still not working, and the temperature in the prison soon drops again. Furthermore, new problems with the building make the prison even colder and the problems even worse throughout mid to late February.

I interview “Derek” and many other prisoners in early February and throughout the month about the cold. In a previous interview, quoted in Part One of the series on the cold, Derek described a plan to try to get as many prisoners as possible to submit complaint forms about the heat not working.

Since then, “Yes, sir, we did that,” says Derek. “We filled out the request slips and put them in the box for them to check on the heat. And I can’t tell any difference, man. It’s freezing in here to me.”

Asked how many prisoners he estimates submitted complaints, “Oh lord, I can’t say for sure about that,” he answers. “We got a whole packet of request slips, which is maybe 100 to a pack. So, we passed them out, but I can’t say who filled them out and who didn’t. I just went around asking them to do that, because that was the only way we were going to be able to get anything done.”

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I interview Derek again last week.

“Everything is just messed up in here, man. I’m telling you. Cruel and unusual punishment,” he says at the top of the interview.

“Everybody in here is sick,” he says, “especially the old men. They’re all coughing and hacking and stuff. It’s freezing in here.” He estimates that about half of the people in his dorm of 80 or so are sick.

Derek and all the other prisoners I’ve interviewed last week (more than are included in this story) report that, in addition to the heat not working in the prison, the hot water has stopped working as well.

“Our water is cold. Man, we can’t take a hot shower,” says Derek in late February. “I took a shower earlier. I was freezing to death. I’ve been cold for like three days, but I had to get in the shower earlier. There wasn’t a choice about it. I had to do it.”

That’s not the only new problem making the heat worse since we spoke the week before.

“Prisons are made out of concrete and steel,” Derek elaborates. “You know that. Up top, they have a ceiling area through where all the electric wire and all that stuff is running through, but it has a breeze going through it. Well, the maintenance people came in here the other day and they took a bunch of lights down in our dorm. Anyway, when they took those lights........

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