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A lawsuit brought on behalf of a Vermont inmate has ended with additional Covid-19 precautions to prevent the spread of the virus at the privately run prison in Mississippi where he is currently serving his sentence.
Vermont’s Prisoners’ Rights Office, representing inmate Brian Butler, filed the lawsuit in April in Washington County Superior civil court against James Baker, the state’s interim corrections commissioner. A resolution in the case was reached earlier this month, with attorneys for both parties filing a “joint motion to dismiss” with the court.
“It’s not the case we always have to sue DOC to get their attention, but sometimes we do,” Emily Tredeau, supervising attorney in the Prisoners’ Rights Office, said Tuesday. “This is one of those situations.”
The Vermont Department of Corrections contracts with CoreCivic, one of the country’s largest private prison operators, to house inmates at the company’s Tallahatchie County Correctional Facility in Tutwiler, Mississippi, due to lack of space within Vermont’s correctional system.
The added Covid-19 preventative steps Butler had been seeking included the wearing of masks by staff at the Mississippi facility as well as providing alcohol-based hand sanitizer to the roughly 250 Vermont inmates serving sentences there.
Hand sanitizer had been provided, though it did not contain alcohol, which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends for killing the coronavirus. Corrections has been providing alcohol-based hand sanitizer to inmates housed in Vermont.
“It was filed because an inmate, Brian Butler, brought to our attention that the precautions being taken in Vermont to protect against the spread of Covid-19 in prisons were not being taken in Mississippi,” Tredeau said of the lawsuit.
Tredeau added that the prisoners’ rights office did reach out to the Vermont Department of Corrections before filing the legal action seeking information about actions being taken to address Covid-19 in the prison in Mississippi, but didn’t receive much in the form of a response.
“We were trying to get information about what steps were taken,” Tredeau said, “and getting very little.”
Rachel Feldman, a spokesperson for the Vermont Department of Corrections, said Tuesday that it was important to note it was a “stipulated motion to dismiss” the case.
“This was a dismissal, not a settlement,” Feldman added in an email. “TCCF and CoreCivic were already doing nearly everything asked by VT DOC, and agreed to complete (the) remaining steps.”
Amanda Gilchrist, director of public affairs for CoreCivic, said in an email Tuesday, “We will let the court documents speak for themselves and should you have additional questions about the settlement, we encourage you to be in touch with the Vermont Department of Corrections.”
Butler, 62, who according to the lawsuit, suffers from diabetes wanted to be protected from Covid-19 in the same way inmates in Vermont were being protected, Trdeau said. He is serving a prison sentence for convictions on several charges, including aggravated domestic assault.
Butler, through the legal action, was asking a Vermont judge to issue a total of eight directives related to Covid-19 precautions to the leadership at the Mississippi prison.
For those requests that were not already being implemented, the filing dismissing the lawsuit stated, the Vermont corrections department “made a courtesy request” to the leaders of the Mississippi prison to implement those remaining directives in the two “housing pods” holding Vermont inmates.
Those prison leaders in Mississippi determined they could do those steps without “infringing on the orderly operation of the facility or safety and security,” of other inmates housed at the privately run prison from other jurisdictions, according to the filing.
Those directives, the filing stated, that the parties agreed have been taken or would be implemented include:
— Providing Vermont prisoners and staff members assigned to Vermont units with alcohol-based hand sanitizer.
— Giving Vermont prisoners and staff members assigned to Vermont units comprehensive training on the donning and doffing of personal protective equipment;
— Training staff assigned to the Vermont housing units in temperature taking, and take the temperature of Vermont inmates daily;
— Educating Vermont prisoners on all symptoms of Covid-19;
— Requiring that prison staff assigned to Vermont units to wear face masks before entering the units.
The filing also stated the Vermont corrections department does not admit any wrongdoing or liability.
The Vermont Department of Corrections, in an earlier filing in the case, outlined steps CoreCivic had already taken to protect against the spread of Covid-19, from the screening of staff entering the facility to enhanced sanitation practices.
None of Vermont’s inmates housed at the Mississippi facility have tested positive for the coronavirus, though, according to corrections department statistics, only two have been tested.
There have been six inmates in other sections of the Mississippi prison who have tested positive for Covid-19, but corrections officials say they didn’t have contact with Vermont inmates.
In Vermont prisons, a total of 48 inmates and 20 staff have tested positive for Covid-19.
The Vermont corrections department has increasingly ratcheted up its coronavirus protocols over time at the in-state facilities, from restricting visitors to the facilities to “modified lockdowns.”
The corrections department is seeking a total of nearly $3 million through the federal CARES Act in the latest budget adjustment act to help cover its added costs in responding to Covid-19.
