We’ve been restricted to 400 emails per month (both out and in) since COVID. People in every other facility in the BOP get unlimited emails. We already only get two phone calls per day, with the most recent change. (For the past 18 years, BOP allowed us five 15-minute phone calls per day; now they’ve cut it to two. It is proven that family communication decreases recidivism; why would the administrators do this? It’s really hurting my communication with my family and I am sure it is the same for everyone else in this prison. People are fighting over control of others’ unused emails I am literally watching people get extorted for their access to them.
The 400-minute restriction was first imposed because of a fight that occurred during the COVID lockdown, when 30 inmates were let out at a time for 15 minutes and they had to share only six phones and six computers. Everyone wanted to use the computers, so they put us on restriction. Later, they changed it to 15 inmates out for 15 minutes but didn’t change the email limit. And other prisons managed to control the situation without harming family communication that way. And the female facility here at Hazelton doesn’t have this restriction.
Meanwhile, we’re also on commissary restriction. There was nearly a riot over a stolen bag of candy, so they are limiting our commissary spend to $180 (instead of $360). The fight occurred about two weeks they started letting us out of our cells after a lockdown. They had been keeping every unit in this prison locked down except for the Unicor unit because people needed to go to the SHU. (For example, if someone smokes K2, staff takes them to the lieutenant’s office, then brings them back and locks down the entire unit while that one person waits to go to the SHU, even though SHU is never really full.) They lock the guy up in an empty cell in the unit and pretend that’s the SHU, while keeping the entire unit on lockdown – with no commissary, no telephone, no email, no medical, no First Step Act programming, no showers for four days at a time. (What I don’t get is that I was recently in the SHU and there was a whole range empty. Me and my celly were the only people there and it could have housed 32 more inmates!)
So, anyway, we had gone for a month without commissary. I was even giving some of my friends my soap because so many people were out. And there was this new candy available, so everyone wanted to try it. But only a handful of people were allowed to shop.
And now, they just put out a memo saying they are taking away our boots, except for certain workers. That’s like giving knives to a select few inmates and not giving the rest any weapon. The lockdowns aren’t fair either; they still let the kitchen workers out to go to work. That’s a sign that the lockdown is only for punishment purposes. They love inflicting soft torture on all of us.