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MARCH 10, 2001, FINGERNAILS APPEARED IN THE FOOD Viewers may follow the horror trail at Fluvanna Correctional Institute by keeping up with The Tallahassee Project in our Projects section. This report from Lorilee Leckness comes in two parts, dated March 10 and March 11 this year. The March 10 part follows. It is addressed to a Ms. Martin, evidently a federal Bureau of Prisons official who visited the Fluvanna facility to inspect conditions. Lorilee Leckness was sentenced to 9 years in federal prison for a non-violent drug offense. On December 18, 2000 she was shipped from the relative security of the Federal Correctional Institute in Tallahassee to Fluvanna Correctional Institute, an involuntary participant in the Bureau of Prison's program of "selling" federal prisoners to state authorities to relieve overcrowding. Her story as told in the forthcoming book "The Tallahassee Project" begins: I met my soulmate in high school, we were married shortly afterwards in 1982. In 1998, we were arrested on drug charges. Before we were found guilty, the state took our property. A deputy sheriff had told us we had stepped on some toes when we put money down on it. He said local officials planned on building a new fire department on the site. The attorney hired by our family told us we would be looking at less time had we killed someone. He told us we would be old and grey before we would ever get out of prison. He told us we should leave town and never look back. We're from a small town in Iowa and are extremely close to our families. They had no idea we planned on taking the attorney's "bad" legal advice to leave town. They couldn't believe our laws are so severe. Lorilee now writes: March 10, 2001 Dear Ms. Martin, My name is Lorilee Anne Leckness and I am a federal inmate being housed at FCCW - Troy, Virginia. I was really hoping to speak with you and the other B.O.P. staff while you were here doing Interviews on the 28th of Feb. and the 1st of March, 2001. I signed the list and stayed in the unit but did not get called. I do have issues and concerns that I have addressed to Pam Marescalchi and John Evers on or about the 17th of January of 2001. I would like to also inform you of these issues, for I feel that my faith in the above-named persons is extremely low. From speaking to inmates that were interviewed by you and or your staff, I believe that the following issues have already been documented, but I'll hit briefly on these just in case and then add what I feel may have been left out: 1. The food
Even if the substitutes weren't made, there still exists the problem of not eating most items out of fear for the following reasons: AIDS and Hepatitis victims are allowed to work in the kitchen unlike in the federal BOP system. Many state girls do not like us housed here, and there are some who work in the kitchen. One or two of the state girls often yelled to the back in a code that we figured out meant to alert the kitchen workers we fed. girls were in line. Fingernails appeared in the food, soup tasted like dish soap, and still does at times, and only God knows what else has been in our food. No gloves are worn by the food preparers. The kitchen staff (officers) cannot and do not watch to make sure the inmates wash their hands after bathroom use etc. Homosexual relations take place while the inmates are working in the kitchen. Do they wash their hands afterwards? We can't be sure. To take a chance on eating the food is a matter of life and death if they have not. We are all women and have periods. One guard took an untouched apple off of an inmate's tray before the inmate put it in the discard after eating. The guard took one of the fork/spoons and chunked a piece of the apple out and told her if we do this it would be served to the next inmate. Hepatitis germs live in the open for 9 hours (nine). I am afraid to eat any thing in the kitchen, as others are, except for milk and pre-made foods such as hot dogs and hamburgers. I still do not feel safe with these but I cannot get by on the junk food served at the commissary alone. I probably eat on an average $25.00 to $30.00 every 10 days in junk food, Ramen Noodle Soup and Beef Sticks. I always bought vitamins and juices at Tallahassee and rarely did I buy junk food. A sign in the preparation part of the kitchen was taken down before your arrival. It informed that the uncooked chicken was not to be washed off, feathers and fat was not to be pulled off (the chicken is to be placed in a pan of water and the water dumped off then cooked). If too much chicken is placed in the same water, it could be spreading salmonella germs. I believe it should be individually rinsed after it is soaked to ensure safety. I bit into a piece of bloody chicken meat. I got mildly sick. Another girl got very sick. We were called liars when we brought it to the attention of a staff member here that I am afraid to mention by name at this time. Every day, people on the staff here have informed us that we do not want to get on anyone's bad side (meaning certain staff members), because they can make our lives a living hell. At this point I do not think I can take much more without going crazy. Upon arriving here and going to the kitchen to eat before becoming aware of the dangers, I and the group of girls I hung around with noticed how unhealthy the majority of state girls look, dark circles under their eyes, sunken in faces, and a lot of the women with very thin hair and some even balding. We kept our opinions to ourselves, then other feds started to talk about the same thing. We didn't say anything to the state girls but they openly commented to us on how healthy we looked. Not any more. The same inmates I began friendships with now have the dark circles under their eyes and we've all lost weight and gotten pale. I've been told my face is much thinner, and sunken in I expect. We're all in a crisis here and nobody wants to hurt anyone's feelings, yet recently a comment was made by a state girl as a group of feds walked in, "Those aren't feds, the feds look good." I have sat on 2 different occasions and watched this little old state inmate so thin she looks like a malnourished citizen of a 3rd World starved nation try to eat. She gets part of her food eaten because she is slow, and then the officers tell her that her time is up. She does not talk, she does not look around, she just can't eat fast enough. I'm sure she is on lots of medication like the labeled slow walkers here. It is inhuman to tell this woman to leave when she looks so hungry and is sincerely trying to eat. I have timed the span from receiving my tray before the officers tell us to leave. A lot of time it is 12 minutes but has been as little as nine minutes. Some officers actually slam their fist on the table and scare us to death while they tell us to leave. 2. Medical/Dental I have put in sick call slips and do not get called, also dental ignores me. I pay my money like the state girls, even though on or about the 17th of January Pam Marescalchi told a group of us that we were not supposed to be paying for medical care. I still have various pains in my chest and sinus problems, and have had since December. I've placed sick call slips in for back and neck problems plus a numbness in my thigh. I've never been called for these problems. In Polk County jail I was diagnosed with a spinal degeneration that I forgot I even had once being at Tallahassee for a few months, sleeping on something other than a metal slab with a thin vinyl covered pad on top of it. I cannot go on much longer on these beds here. I am in constant pain every day. I have a terrible time trying to sleep. Besides the sore hips that most everyone here has experienced from these beds. I have developed shoulder pains now. My shoulders pop and hurt when I move. To lift my arms above my head results in shoulder pain. All day every day my left thigh feels so bruised that it should look black and blue, though it doesn't. I need medical attention as to why this is happening. At night I awaken in pain that feels as though the outside of the skin is frozen, and when I move it feels like the muscles inside are ripping. Sometimes it takes 10 to 15 minutes before the pain eases and I can relax. I had an EKG here because I had experienced a terrible pain in my chest. I awoke thinking I was having a heart attack. I've read that arm pain especially in women can be a warning sign. I do not know if this pain is connected with the back pain problem, heart problem or is just on its own. It needs to be investigated. I have dental work that needs to be done. I put in a sick call slip after I had talked to a nurse who said I would be called in since the problems were recognized at Tallahassee. I still haven't been called in, not even an answer to my sick call for dental. I had work done years ago on a tooth that resulted in tightness that will not permit dental floss to be pulled down and out in the same manner that it is pushed up. I must pull it through once it is inserted between the teeth in that spot. Because this is a maximum security setting, I am not allowed the regular dental floss I had packed and brought with me. There are dental flosses on commissary, but they must be pulled downwards which cannot work. I have had several bouts of swelling in the gum area around the tooth because of this. I rinse with salt water, but I am worried about this problem. I have spent a lot of money on my teeth and do not want to ever lose a tooth. There is no excuse for a tooth needing to be pulled if proper care is had. 3. Religion I am a devoted Catholic. I was a regular attendee of Sunday mass which always had a priest at Tallahassee. On Wednesdays, I always attended the Legion of Mary Rosary services which had women volunteers who did a communion service after the rosary. Once a month, a Wednesday, and on special Catholic Holy Days we had another priest come in and do Holy Mass and also confessions. I was elected The President of the Legion by the volunteer women. I am a very spiritual person and these services are vital to me. Do you realize that I have not been able to attend Catholic Mass but once since December 18th, the day of my arrival here? It was the day after Christmas. The Chaplain here calls Catholic Mass a "class" and a "program." One must be on a list to go to this service but not for a general non-communion service. Do you know that in the Catholic faith it is a sin to miss Mass? Even though it is no fault of mine, it is still something that does not sit right with me. I was finally placed on the "list" for the month of March. I sat in the day room waiting for the call. The officer in the bubble called out the Baptist, then the Jehovah Witness attendees. I waited with my friends who were sitting with me until I would be called. I got up and went to the intercom in my room and asked the guard in the bubble if they were going to have Catholic Mass still. She said I missed it. I told her that I heard the calls for the other two service but she did not say for Catholic Service. She said she did. I went to the day room and approached the officer who was on duty in the pod. She said she did not want to get involved. Two women who I don't know real well overheard and told the officer that the bubble guard did not mention anything for Catholics. So the officer and I went to the door and she asked the bubble guard who again said she called it. The officer told me that I'll have to go next week. I returned to my room and sobbed. I keep having these feelings of doubt about my particular religion and even if the God above cares about me at all. It hurts me, Ms. Martin, and is complete evil! Our officer here told me that she thinks the reason is the Chaplain refers to Catholic Mass as a class or program because there is no priest. In one response I received from the Chaplain, it hints that there probably is not a priest the majority of the time. There is no Legion of Mary Service. I requested to start one but was told the volunteers come on Monday nights, so I guess that means there will not be any other Catholic services added. At a time in my life when I need God and to practice my religion the most, it has been taken from me. I am in more of a turmoil and sadness and shock in being warehoused here than ever before. I signed a plea bargain and was sentenced to nine years in prison. I had never been in trouble before, and at that time to think of being separated from my boyfriend/husband of 15 years seemed like the end of the world. Being placed in this maximum security setting along with the abuse and realization of the callousness of our government who have their hand in all this is etching my soul with an irretrievable bitter sadness never to be forgotten. I have seriously wondered if the gas chambers are the next step for us, and if there is really anyone that can make a difference, who really cares to what degree an inmate suffers. The March 11 section of this document should be posted shortly. |
