THOMSON, Ill. — Editor's note: The above video aired April 7, 2022.
In a letter sent Wednesday, June 1 to the U.S. Department of Justice, U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) and U.S. Rep. Cheri Bustos (D-IL District 17) called for the immediate investigation into allegations against U.S. Penitentiary Thomson.
USP Thomson, a high-security prison in Thomson, Illinois, was built in 2001 by the Illinois Department of Corrections, and the Federal Bureau of Prisons bought the facility back in 2012.
The Illinois lawmakers’ letter cites a report published Tuesday, May 31 by NPR and the Marshall Project which dares to say USP Thomson might be one of the deadliest prisons in the U.S. The report also includes allegations of staff abuse from the families of inmates who died while in custody at Thomson.
The letter acknowledges the death of seven incarcerated men, five of which were reportedly a result of homicides by fellow inmates and two of which were suicides.
In May 2020, the union for Thomson's staff, the American Federation of Government Employees Local 4070, said a staff shortage at the prison was resulting in unsafe working conditions as other workers - nurses, case managers, psychologists, counselors, cooks and more - were forced to fill in as correctional officers. Over 2,000 overtime shifts were being authorized every month just to keep up with daily prison functions.
Earlier this year, three staff members were hospitalized for drug exposure in the prison’s mailroom in a two-month timespan, causing the union to call for stronger protections to be put in place for mailroom employees.
“We have long fought to address the staffing crisis at USP Thomson and throughout the (Bureau of Prisons), repeatedly warning that failure to do so would result in catastrophe,” the letter reads. “We are deeply troubled that these warnings seem to have proved accurate.”
In addition to understaffing and inmate deaths, Durbin, Duckworth and Bustos drew attention to several allegations of staff abuse in the letter to Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz. Here are some of the allegations:
- Staff purposely stoked tensions between cellmates and paired together men they know would attack each other.
- Staff encouraged assaults against sex offenders and informants.
- Abusive shackling left scars known as “the Thomson tattoo,” sometimes in a room known as the “torture room,” where men would lie shackled to a bed for hours in their own urine and feces without food or water.
- Staff laughed and joked at the expense of a Jewish man as he lay dying in a hospital following an assault that occurred after staff placed him in a recreation cage with known white supremacists.
- USP Thomson had the highest pepper spray usage out of all facilities within the Bureau of Prisons.
- Staff punished men who refused to be housed with cellmates they believed would kill them.
“If these reports prove accurate," the letter reads, "they describe conduct that would almost certainly contravene numerous BOP policies, as well as infringing the civil rights of individuals in BOP custody and possibly violating federal criminal statutes."
AFGE Local 4070 President Jon Zumkehr issued the following statement in response to the Durbin, Duckworth and Bustos' call for an investigation:
We cannot comment on an ongoing investigation, but we have been fighting to fully staff USP Thomson. We are currently short 105 staff members, including 78 from custody. We are committed to fully (staffing) USP Thomson and we have hosted monthly job fairs to bring new staff to USP Thomson.
Find the full text of the letter from Durbin, Duckworth and Bustos here.