A Brooklyn, N.Y. federal detention center that houses 1600 inmates has reportedly been without heat for almost a week.  There has also been no hot water or hot food.  The last several days in the New York area have seen temperatures well below freezing and wind chills below zero.  Conditions are apparently so bad inmates are now banging on windows and crying out in hopes they can get people to help them. They haven’t been allowed to see visitors or make phone calls since the partial power outage began. Some are calling it a “dystopian scene.”

The New York Times reports:

Federal defenders said they were flooded with calls from inmates this week as temperatures began to drop. “Our phone was ringing off the hook,” said the lead federal defender in Brooklyn, Deirdre von Dornum. She said inmates, using a dedicated line that connects the jail to federal defenders offices, had gathered around the telephones on their floors to report poor heating, little to no hot water and no lights in their cells.

On Thursday, Rachel Bass, a paralegal at the Brooklyn office of the federal defenders, said that she had fielded calls from about 15 inmates. “In the past hour I have gotten 11 calls,” she said. “People are frantic. They’re really, really scared. They don’t have extra blankets. They don’t have access to the commissary to buy an extra sweatshirt.”

Several lawmakers are now demanding something be done. Some are even trying to gain access to the jail today.


The NY Daily News writes:

Rhonda Barnwell, who works in the jail’s medical station, said the facility has no electricity and is now on a generator.

“They’re just waiting for a disaster to happen,” she said. “There’s only heat in the afternoons since we’ve been complaining today … It’s been really bad … It’s been very dangerous.”

WABC adds:

Lawyers for several inmates at the jail have filed motions asking the courts to intervene, citing health risks to clients.

A motion filed Thursday in Brooklyn federal court on behalf of inmate Dino Sanchez by the Federal Defenders says that Sanchez, who suffers from asthma, “has been left to freeze in his short-sleeved jumpsuit in the dark.” The court papers say that jail officials have taken no steps to provide Sanchez with “an oxygen mask, clothing, blankets, or access to a habitable location that will mitigate his health risks.”

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