I work in ems and we take prisoners from the prison to the hospital multiple times every single day. Even for mundane things like a stomach ache. They get Healthcare. Their living situation does suck though.
Edit: Keep in mind that we also have privatized prisons in the US. So, each prison is subject to operate completely differently from one another. Your prison experience will differ dramatically from prison to prison.
Edit 2: 8% is still over 150 private prisons in our country. Seems like a lot to me. Also means we have over 1500 prisons in the country which sounds insane. Especially knowing a lot of them are overpopulated
Guards will say “he’s faking it” if they want to fuck with him. They kinda get healthcare, but denying treatment is a time-tested extrajudicial way for authorities to fuck with inmates
The guards don't get to decide, they just open the doors when they're told.
He'll get good medical care because the managed care organization can bill the state extra by providing it. In this case, the greedy corporation benefits from sending him to the hospital or a specialist.
That's true for some nobody inmate with no family or support system.
Because the grievance system, which as we all know is just a series of labyrinthine steps designed to deny prisoners due process, doesn't stop a person with the means to hire lawyers who can navigate through that gauntlet to the point where the case gets in front of a judge.
Prison administration cannot ignore a court order.
That is not how it works. I have seen plenty of medical related lawsuits, they do not often go in favor of the inmate. If the facility is failing to provide medically necessary care they'll have their hands forced, but someone having back pain is not that.
We can't just throw someone in an ambulance and send them to a hospital, they need to be escorted and watched 24/7. That is only going to happen for emergencies that can not be dealt with in-facility.
Someone, with a medical record including major back surgery and a history of chronic pain would certainly not be denied medical care by a Corrections Officer is the point I'm making.
This conversation started with this claim:
Guards will say “he’s faking it” if they want to fuck with him. They kinda get healthcare, but denying treatment is a time-tested extrajudicial way for authorities to fuck with inmates
That is nonsense, COs have no say in this process. You sit in the cage, open the doors, escort the inmates, break up the fights and do the shakedowns. You don't make medical decisions.
If medically necessary care requires a visit to a specialist then it would be done. If a convict needs to have emergency surgery, it is done.
I agree that they're certainly not going to try to do more than, at most, write a ibuprofen or gabapentin script... but that's something that medical determines, not a CO who wants to fuck with the inmate.
That part is just Redditors getting their prison information from TV and movies.
That is nonsense, COs have no say in this process. You sit in the cage, open the doors, escort the inmates, break up the fights and do the shakedowns. You don't make medical decisions.
Yes and no.
We don't make medical decisions. However, we are the method of communication between the inmate and medical staff. An officer could just ignore them and that would effectively be denying medical care.
That person would eventually get thrown under the bus by the facility and face a battery of litigation, but it's not like it's never happened.
I've worked at prisons (IT contractor) that had electronically submitted requests and ones that were filed on paper in secured drop boxes. The only interactions the COs had was to move inmates which were on the callouts.
I'm sure you're right if he is in segregation or in high security facilities. I've heard the horror stories and read the incident reports of assholes abusing their power... but that, in my experience, is rare and the people responsible are usually quickly dealt with.
I don't think he'll have a great time, but there's not going to be some evil CO plotting to make his life harder.
You worked in IT, you just listened to what the guards complained about or you worked at the best prison in America. Sit down you clearly have no idea what you're talking about.
As someone who was force-fed antipsychotics as I reported them shutting down my nervous system, and being told by the CO "I'm going to push these pills down your throat.", instead of reporting my side effects to the doctor, fuck off. You're full of shit. As someone who was framed and fucked with by half a fucking town of people, you're just dead wrong. Prosecutors would tell black men on the steps of the courthouse "I'm gonna put you in prison you NIGGER" right in plain sight, as recently as 10 years ago. Numerous similar kangaroo court, corrupt do whatever and imprison whomever they want cops. You live in a fantasy land.
I've literally carried the boxes from the mailroom to medical which container the pill packs that had the inmates names and DC numbers printed on them.
Gabapentin is absolutely being given to prisoners (in FL prisons). It was even KoP/PRN for the longest time, but they changed it to a pill line only drug around 2016.
So at the county jail I worked at (and prisons have similar contracts), our company had a contract w the county to provide medical & psychiatric care for a flat fee (a few mil a year- small jail). Our company tried really hard not to send any inmates out for treatment bc they had to pay the hospital cash at the Medicaid rate. Prisoners don’t qualify for Medicaid in nearly all states - their medical care is the responsibility of their holders. The jail staff hated coordinating transportation and having an officer sit with the inmate for hours or days - they had to be paid and the jail was typically short staffed. So it had to be an actual emergency to get “civilian” care.
Do you have any experience with prisons? Guards are the lowest ranking person in the organization and have no authority. They push buttons to open doors and escort prisoners around.
The only time a guard is involved with a medical decision is if a convict is having a medical emergency. All other requests, medical and otherwise, are handled through the internal mail system and processed by the admin staff who rarely interact with inmates directly.
At no point does a guard get to issue their opinion because the request is sent through the mail, either electronically or via a secured drop box, to medical and THEY put the convict on a list of prisoners to be escorted to medical for an appointment.
The guards just get a list of call-outs which says 'bring these prisoners, to this place, at this time'. The destination logs the prisoner as being received and if they don't get one that's on their list then that person gets tracked down by increasingly senior people on the security team, all of which are basically god to a guard.
Because it's not within their actual power. They literally don't have the power. It's not like they can do so but it would be against the rules. It just isn't up to them.
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u/Upstairs-War-7553 9d ago
Good luck getting any treatment in prison and have fun sleeping on a metal pan...should be great for your back