Just how bad FCI Thomson is can best be illustrated by a comparison to FCI Seagoville, which houses the same classification of prisoners. At Seagoville, I don’t spent one second locked in a maximum-security USP cell like I did at Thomson. Instead, there are no cells. There are not even any locks on the cell doors. Count is conducted with you standing in the room with the door open, and they walk past and count. Count usually takes about 10 minutes, as opposed to Thomson, where they lock you into your cell and it takes 60 to 90 minutes before we were allowed out again.
At Seagoville, a “lockdown” when they lock the door to the housing unit. You can still shower, talk on the phone, work on the computer, run up and down the hallway and watch TV. There is no need for panic buttons, and if someone has a medical issue, they can get to the CO at any time of the day or night. Thomson doesn’t adhere to policy; it doesn’t conduct hourly health and welfare checks as mandated in 5525.01 6(g). So, when the doors are closed, the prospect of death is always there and everyone knows it. At Thomson, every inmate is locked in the max security USP-like cells for at least 10 hours a day, not including count times.
The food is also often expired, in violation of the Food Service Manual and Program. And inmates are searched outside chow hall about 20% of the time.
Plus, officers regularly YELL at inmates, like they are in the harassment business. When they patrol, they look for any kind of violation, shining lights in our faces.
Legal mail and even regular mail are regularly screwed with. I had a legal document sent to me at Thomson that they denied, claiming it was not legal mail, despite it meeting all the criteria. Even though FreePrints is a third-party vendor, staff will only give us copies.
Thomson also says you cannot have ladders on bunks.
The bottom line: Thomson operates like it’s a USP, when it’s a low. There is nothing low about it but no one seems to care.