Growing WV outcry against quarantine plan at Hazelton, Gilmer prisons yet to produce results

“He understands the concerns we have raised and is sympathetic to the situation. Despite a court order requiring increased social distancing at BOP facilities in the D.C. region, I am hopeful the Department of Justice and BOP will take into account that these West Virginia facilities have no COVID-19 cases and that West Virginians have worked very hard to adhere to guidelines to slow the spread of COVID-19 in the state,” Manchin said.

“The safety of our brave correctional officers and their families, citizens and inmates during this health-care crisis must be our top priority,” he said.

Gov. Jim Justice said he has talked to some of President Trump’s “people” about the matter, adding, “We’ll try to stop it if we can.”

Justice noted that pushback in the past had stopped other unpopular federal plans, including burying spent nuclear fuel rods in Nevada and transferring Guantanamo Bay detainees to Illinois.

“I don’t like the fact in any way that our federal government is doing ... what’s happening here, and we’re pushing — the senators, all three congressmen and myself — we’re all really pushing on this in every way to try to stop this thing,” Justice said of the planned inmate transfer.

“So far, we’ve been unsuccessful. What we’re hearing is, ‘We’re taking every precaution; everything’s OK; we’ve double-checked, we’ve double-checked, we’ve double-checked. But that’s not good enough,” he said.

Added West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey late Tuesday afternoon: “We are working hard to convince the federal Bureau of Prisons to not proceed with their misguided plan. West Virginians should be commended for their practice of social distancing and efforts to keep the state’s incident rate of infection very low. They should not be asked to accept any federal proposal that would interfere with or reverse that progress.”

A union local president fighting transfer of the inmates agreed there’s one rapid solution to the matter: Intervention from President Trump, who received overwhelming support from West Virginians in the 2016 election.

Asked if stopping the proposed quarantine plan at the Hazelton and Gilmer facilities could be done at the Bureau of Prisons level or would need input from the president, union official Richard Heldreth said, “I really wish that [the president] would” intervene.

“I’d love to see that come from him. I’m sure he could stop it very easily,” said Heldreth, president of Local 420 of the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents workers at the Hazelton prison.

“I’m not confident so far that the BOP is going to do the right thing unless they get an order like that from above,” Heldreth said.

WVNews reached out to White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany via Twitter, but didn’t receive an immediate response.

Heldreth has been told that 10 federal prisons were chosen as quarantine sites, but he doesn’t have an explanation why two of them — 20% — are located in West Virginia, which has by all accounts been one of the success stories of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The other prisons are USP Thomson in Illinois, FCC Victorville in California, FCC Terre Haute in Indiana, FCC Yazoo City in Mississippi, FCI Ray Brook in New York, FCI El Reno in Oklahoma, FTC Oklahoma City, FCI Fairton in New Jersey and FDC Houston, according to the Bureau of Prisons.

WV News has learned that over 125 inmates are to be sent to FCI Gilmer’s quarantine unit.

The Bureau of Prisons set up the 10 quarantine locations as strategic sites for inmates received from the U.S. Marshals Service.

New inmates sent to the quarantine sites are only those who don’t have COVID-19 symptoms, and they are screened again once they arrive at the facilities prior to starting the 14-day quarantine period, according to the Bureau of Prisons.

Arrivals who test positive are placed in single isolation cells and monitored via CDC protocols. Once the quarantine period ends, inmates are moved to whatever prison they were designated by the Bureau of Prisons to be held in.

Staff, contractors and others who come to federal correctional facilities undergo a screening and temperature check on arrival, and those with a temperature of 100.4 Fahrenheit or higher aren’t allowed inside, according to Scott Taylor of the Bureau of Prisons’ Office of Public Affairs, Information, Policy and Public Affairs Division.

Taylor also said staff who have symptoms or who have been identified as a close contact of a COVID-19-positive person have a letter to present to local health departments to receive priority testing.

On Tuesday, Taylor said the Bureau of Prisons has limited “interstate movement as much as possible and has done so in cooperation with the U.S. Marshals Service. As a direct result of these steps, BOP movement nationwide is down 95% when comparing March 13, 2020, to April 23, 2020.”

But he noted the agency must accept inmates that courts have remanded to custody either pre- or post-conviction.

“This requirement is based in federal statute (see the Bail Reform Act, Title 18 U.S.C. § 3141); if a federal judge orders a pre-trial offender to be detained, the federal government, which includes BOP facilities, must assume custody and care of the inmate,” Taylor wrote. “To be clear, while the BOP can control and limit its intra-agency movements, we have no authority to refuse inmates brought to us by the U.S. Marshals Service.”

The quarantine sites are designed to “relieve population pressures at detention centers,” where pretrial offenders and newly sentenced inmates are sent, Taylor noted. The quarantine sites also are designed to “relieve population pressures at ... other key locations throughout the country.” The Bureau of Prisons didn’t elaborate further on which detention centers or “other key locations throughout the country” would be assisted by the West Virginia quarantine sites.

As for the prisoners potentially headed to Hazelton, Heldreth does have a theory: Federal inmates housed at the District of Columbia jail may be transferred from that facility, where a COVID-19 outbreak resulted in a federal judge issuing a blistering April 19 order involving social distancing, sanitation and health measures.

“I haven’t heard a real good excuse for this yet. I was originally told it was overcrowding. I’m not sure why it’s such an emergency all of the sudden to move these inmates here when it’s counter to everything the CDC wants us to do,” Heldreth said.

And he added: “Just from what I’ve read, I know there’s a lot of political pressure and public pressure on the D.C. jail system. I’m reading a lot about lawsuits and the ACLU being involved, actions being taken by a federal judge. So they have a lot of heat on them right now. So I’m thinking this is just a way for them to kind of let that die down, get them out of there and put their problem on us.”

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., and Rep. David McKinley, R-W.Va., also have expressed concern over the quarantine plan.

Preston County commissioners talked about the situation during their regular meeting Tuesday morning, with Commission President Samantha Stone saying she does not want to see these prisoners come to the Hazelton facility during the pandemic.

“We have infringed a lot on the rights of our residents with asking them to stay at home, practice social distancing and everything to flatten the curve, and then the federal government brings prisoners in here that aren’t tested until they get here,” Stone said. “I feel very strongly about this, and what is good for the goose is good for the gander.”

Commissioner Don Smith said the Bureau of Prisons plan doesn’t affect only Preston County, but also surrounding counties and states, as some of the prison employees live in Pennsylvania and Maryland.

“Every day we have been told not to travel, and then they want to move a block of individuals to the prison,” Smith said. “It is completely contrary to what they told us to do.”

Stone said the prisoners need to be quarantined where they are, have a negative test result and then transferred.

“My main concern is the citizens in this county,” Stone said. “We are putting people at risk. We will continue the wave of communication with the prison.”

Heldreth said the Hazelton prison workers are grateful for the support of elected leaders, along with community support.

The union plans a picket and protest from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday in Morgantown at Interstate 68’s Exit 7 to Pierpont Road and the airport.

“We’d like for as many people as we can to join us, get this message out that we’re not going to tolerate this ridiculous decision,” Heldreth said.

State residents also can express their concerns via phone, email or letter to their senators, congressional representatives, the governor’s office, county commissions, the Bureau of Prisons and even the office of the U.S. attorney general, since the Bureau of Prisons is part of the Department of Justice.

An attempt to reach the U.S. Marshals Service on Tuesday wasn’t immediately successful.