A report released Wednesday found that Georgia’s prisons are beset with violence that is growing increasingly brutal.
Since 2010, Georgia prisoners have killed 33 other inmates and one officer, the report found. Created by the Southern Center for Human Rights, the report also found that Georgia in 2012 had more homicides in its prisons than some other states, including neighboring Alabama and South Carolina, did in the last 10 years.
That violence, the Center found, is getting worse. Three times as many prisoners were killed in Georgia’s prisons in 2012 than in 2002. According to the report, prisoners in Georgia are often left unsupervised, put in cells with faulty locks and given access to lethal weapons. One prisoner had to be airlifted to a burn center after he had bleach poured into his eyes and boiling water thrown over his face and genitals. Another lost three fingers to a fellow inmate who was in possession of a 19-inch knife at Wilcox State Prison. And just last week, a prisoner at Augusta State Medical Prison died after being stabbed.
Though the report acknowledges violence is a problem in all prisons, it finds that Georgia’s Department of Corrections “has shown a pattern of apathy in the face of security breaches and a failure to respond to known, dangerous conditions.” It also calls on the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the problem and find a way to end the escalating violence.
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