Imagine enduring long hours on a cramped bus, shackled and with no idea where you’re going or when you will arrive, surviving on cold bologna sandwiches. You find yourself transported through seemingly random routes, only to be confined in dark holding cells where you may spend weeks at a time, cut off from the outside world. Your family is left helpless, unable to reach you or receive updates about your well-being. Your attorney, too, cannot locate you for weeks or even months. This is the grim reality for inmates in the federal prison system—an experience commonly referred to as "diesel therapy," notorious for being one of the most cruel and difficult aspects of incarceration.
Or consider being charged by the DOJ for online speech, becoming a political prisoner who disappears without a trace. This chilling scenario highlights the disturbing lack of accountability and transparency in a system where individuals can vanish. The inability to locate an inmate or find any information about their status raises urgent questions about how those caught in this system are treated and reveals the profound emotional toll on families left searching for answers.
Lack of Transparency in Incarceration
In recent weeks, I’ve observed an alarming lack of location information available on two incarcerated federal inmates. The first case involves an inmate in pre-trial detention at a CoreCivic facility, a private prison operator that contracts with the federal government. Despite attempts to find a searchable database of inmates, including the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) website, the Southern Nevada detention facility has maintained that such information is not available. Even with a federal ID number, inmates at this facility cannot be located in any online database. Without being tipped off about this inmate’s location, I would not have found it on my own. This lack of transparency complicates efforts to locate individuals and creates an environment where political prisoners effectively disappear without accountability.
The second case involves a high-profile January 6 inmate who has been missing for over three weeks during a transport process from Kentucky to Virginia. Last heard from in Atlanta on September 21, this route is particularly problematic, as Atlanta is not in the direct path between Kentucky and Virginia. Concerns have arisen that this erratic transport may serve as a means to psychologically torture the inmate, especially ahead of an election that could potentially result in their pardon. The lack of communication has left families in distress, with no updates on their loved ones' conditions, and no end in sight to their uncertainty.
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Ethical Failures in the Justice System
It seems intentionally cruel that, in a time when we can easily track mail packages, the federal prison system often fails to provide location information for its inmates. We live in a technologically advanced society where you can receive notifications about how many stops away your Amazon delivery is, yet your family member can disappear for over a month with no available information. This disparity demonstrates an ethical failure within the justice system.
If there is a silver lining to the January 6 prosecutions, it’s that we have learned a lot about the DOJ and the federal prison system. I’m not suggesting high-end luxury conditions for federal inmates—just basic information about their location at any given time. We must also ensure that seemingly endless transport, or "diesel therapy," isn’t used as a punitive measure, as psychologically torturing inmates is cruel and unusual. The impact of these policies extends beyond the inmates themselves, causing significant distress for their families, who deserve clarity.
Curiously, many supporters of criminal justice reform on the left seem hesitant to discuss these problems, even as we've gained insight into the system through the experiences of the Biden administration's numerous political prisoners. This reluctance leaves it to Republicans to advocate for necessary changes. It is our shared responsibility to push for transparency and accountability, ensuring that no one disappears through the intentional cracks in a system that should be grounded in justice.
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