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"I am enclosed in a cell that is 8 feet wide by 9 feet long on an average of 22 hours each day. Today while I write this letter, I have been 36 hours without going out and tomorrow if they do not take us out it will have been three days without moving from this same space. In this little space I have everything. From eating my meals to taking care of my needs. So it is my dining room and latrine at the same time. My bed is a slab of cement. And the whole cell is painted the same dead yellow color. From an aesthetic point of view, it is as attractive as a jail for zoo animals."
In 1987, Amnesty International (AI) condemned Marion conditions, saying:
"In Marion, violations of the (UN) Minimum Standard Rules (for treating prisoners) are common. There is almost no rule in the Minimum Standard Rules that is not broken in one form or another."
In 1988, AI called conditions in Lexington, KY's Maximum Security Unit for women "deliberately and gratuitously oppressive."
The same holds for all federal and state maximum security facilities and many others, prisoners routinely abused, especially political ones. Earlier articles explained, accessed through the following links:
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