After more than 38 years within prison in the Alabama jail system which is one of the most crowded and violent in the United States, Larry Jordan feels lucky to be able to live long enough for his freedom.
A distinguished Vietnam War veteran had survived prostate cancer and the hepatitis C in prison when an judge granted him early release in the last quarter of last year.
“I did not give up on hope,” says Jordan, aged 74, who resides in Alabama. “I have a lot of prisoners who have done.”
There were at least 6,182 deaths in federal and state prisons in the year 2020, a 46% increase over the year before as per the latest data published by researchers of UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project. UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project.
“During the epidemic, many prisoners were sentenced to death,” says Wanda Bertram as spokeswoman for Prison Policy Initiative, a non-profit that conducts research and analysis of the criminal justice system.
In the present, Jordan worries about his life expectancy. He struggles with pain in his legs and feet caused by a potentially life-threatening vascular blockage, and research suggests prison accelerates the aging process.
2 million Americans in prison or jail
The life expectancy of people within the United States in 2021 for the second time in consecutive years as per the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This decline is attributed to the devastation of covid-19, as well as an increase in overdoses of drugs.
A few academics and activists claim that the trend is also highlighting the long-term adverse health effects of massive incarceration in a country that has around 2 million jailed or imprisoned people, among the most severe rates in the industrialized world.
A Senate report from last year revealed that an oversight by the U.S. Department of Justice was unable to find more than 900 deaths in prisons as well as local jails during the fiscal year 2021. The report stated that department’s ineffective data collection and reporting hampered the transparency of the system and the oversight by Congress of the deaths of prisoners.
Many people just like Jordan have their sentences lifted from jails and prisons each year suffering from conditions like cancer, heart disease, or infectious illnesses they contracted while in prison. The problem is particularly acute in Alabama, Louisiana, and other Southeastern states that have the highest rates of incarceration in the United States.
Behind bars far longer
One of the main reasons that the U.S. trails other developed nations in terms of life expectancy is because it has a higher percentage of prisoners and keep them in prison for longer according to Chris Wildeman, a Duke University sociology professor who has studied the relationship between the criminal justice system and life expectancy.
“It’s an issue for health in the populace,” Wildeman says. “The more squalid the prison conditions the more likely it is that incarceration will lead to a higher risk of death.”
Mass incarceration can have the potential to have a ripple impact across the entire society.
Inmates might be more susceptible as compared to the rest of society illnesses such as covid or HIV which can infect relatives and community members after their release. The federal government also has not collected or released sufficient information on deaths occurring in prison which could help determine the patterns of illness and to prevent death and illness within and outside of institutions, research claim.
Over the course of a 40-year period beginning around the year 1980, there were more than a million people in prisons and jails has more than quadrupled thanks to laws that were tough on crime as well as the drug war.
Congress as well as states like Alabama have implemented reforms in recent years in the context of an agreement between the two parties that the cost of prison has increased to a point where some prisoners might release without posing a threat to the safety of the public.
The changes came too late and have not gone enough to reduce the health-related harms that are most severe certain researchers and those who advocate for change say.
Yet there is no proof that imprisonment alone reduces life lifespan. However, studies in the early 2000s did find that that the rate of death of prisoners were 3.5 times greater than the general population within the first few years following release. Experts have found that deaths due to violence, drug use, as well as a lack of access to health services were particularly significant in the first two weeks following release.
Another study revealed that the currently or previously imprisoned Black people had the highest mortality rate of 65% rate than their non-Black counterparts. Black individuals also comprise an disproportionately large percentage of the prison population in state institutions.
“Operating in the darkness”
The passage in 2000 of the Death in Custody Reporting Act and its reauthorization at the time of 2014 mandated the DOJ to gather information on deaths that occur in local and state prisons and jails.
The data should include information on the date and place of death, information on the demographics of those who died, details on the organization involved, as well as the method of the death.
However, a report released by the Government Accountability Office found that 70% of the documents that the Department of Justice received were lacking at least one mandatory number of data points. Federal officials also didn’t have an action plan to take steps to correct states that did not meet reporting obligations according to the GAO discovered.
In the absence of data, that the federal government cannot definitively determine the number of people who been killed in jails and prisons since the covid-19 epidemic began the researchers claim.
“Without information, we’re operating in the in the dark,” says Andrea Armstrong Professor in the Loyola University New Orleans College of Law who has been a witness before Congress on the subject.
Armstrong states that state and federal officials need to use the data to determine which institutions fail to provide adequate medical care, healthy food, or any other service which could save lives.
The DOJ did not make its officials available for interviews to address questions regarding GAO’s report. GAO report.
In a statement written by the agency the agency’s officials stated that they worked with state and law enforcement officials to overcome the obstacles in the way of accurate and complete reporting.
“The Justice Department recognizes the crucial importance of reducing the number of deaths in the custody system,” the statement said. “Complete and accurate information is crucial to draw meaningful conclusions regarding the factors that cause premature or unnecessary deaths, as well as promising policies and practices which can decrease fatalities.”
Department officials stated that they are determined to improve its application in accordance with the Death in Custody Reporting Act and that it has stepped up efforts to increase its quality as well as the amount of the data it gathers.
The DOJ has the state of Alabama which is the state where Jordan was imprisoned of not adequately protecting the incarcerated from assault, sexual assault, and over the top pressure from prison staff as well as of keeping prisoners in dangerous and unhealthy conditions.
A long sentence is among the most lengthy in Alabama history
Jordan was sentenced to the full 38-year term of his 40-year prison sentence for reckless murder that was a result of an accident in a car, which the lawyer for Jordan argued in his application for early release. It was one of most lengthy sentences ever of his time in Alabama time for this crime. A jury found Jordan guilty of drunken driving when driving a car that collided with another victim, who was killed. If he is found guilty in the present, he could be eligible for an eminent sentence of 13 years in jail since he doesn’t have previous criminal history, according to Alabama Circuit Judge Stephen Wallace, who reviewed Jordan’s application for an early release.
With legal assistance from Redeeming Redemption Earned, an Alabama non-profit led by an ex-state Supreme Court chief justice, Jordan asked the court to grant early release.
On September. 26th, 2022 Wallace made an announcement to release Jordan from prison in accordance with an order that permits Alabama judges to reconsider sentences.
A couple of months after, Jordan says, he underwent surgery to address the vascular blockage which was restricting the flow of blood into his leg on the left and foot. A photo shows a surgical scar that extends from his thigh up to close to his ankle.
The Alabama Department of Corrections refused an interview request for questions regarding conditions in Alabama’s prisons.
Jordan claims his vascular problem was so painful. Jordan claims he didn’t receive the proper treatment during his time in prison “You saw my leg dying.”
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