Thread by @JimmyJenkins

BREAKING: Inmates at the Yuma prison say they were threatened with violence and ordered by prison officials to refuse COVID-19 testing to keep outbreak numbers artificially low kjzz.org/content/161160…

The Arizona Department of Corrections recently began conducting mass testing of all inmates across the entire state prison system, resulting in a rapid increase of COVID-19 positive cases being reported. kjzz.org/content/160686…

But before testing was scheduled to begin at the Yuma prison, inmates say prison administrators and staff, working with informal inmate leaders called “Heads,” led a campaign of threats and intimidation to keep the rest of the inmates from submitting to the mandatory nasal swabs

Stephanie Hale-Perry’s husband is incarcerated at the Yuma prison. She says he called her with concerns when the testing was first announced:

“The inmate leaders in his yard said that all inmates were to refuse the test, otherwise they were going to get a beat-down"

Hale-Perry said the threats came after inmate Heads met with the deputy warden, correctional officers, and members of the special services investigation unit at the Yuma prison.

2 correctional officers who work at Yuma confirmed the meeting took place. One of the officers said they believed the administration was encouraging the inmate Heads to get the rest of the inmates to refuse testing, so there would be fewer positive results

Inmates ultimately accepted the testing, because so many of them, including Hale-Perry's husband, are concerned about their health:

“I’m extremely upset,” Hale-Perry said. “The Department of Corrections is playing politics with my husband’s life.”

Suzanne McMillan’s son was also threatened against getting tested for COVID-19. He watched the inmate Heads meet with the Department of Corrections employees before all of the inmates were told not to participate in the testing.

“The heads came into the inmate bays where they live with an SSU officer, and they told everyone ‘Do not test,’” she said. “They were told, if they tested, they would be shipped off to a different yard, lose all their possessions, and not be able to contact family members.”

“I’m just so disheartened in the way ADC is responding to this crisis,” McMillan said. “I don’t trust what they do. I don’t trust what they say. I don’t believe they have the inmates’ best interests at heart.”

A woman KJZZ is calling Avery Contreras says her husband, an inmate at Yuma, was also threatened to refuse testing:

“The inmates were told by a correctional officer that if they agreed to the testing, they’d be moved to another yard and lose their bunk."

“They felt like it was a scare tactic, because ADC was listing all these repercussions that would happen if they complied with the testing," Contreras said. Her husband believes they were told not to test so that "their numbers wouldn’t look as bad as they actually are.”

“He was very uncomfortable with the situation,” Contreras said. “He and his friends decided they were willing to take any backlash that might come because they are fearing for their lives.”

Arizona Department of Corrections spokesperson Bill Lamoreaux confirmed 4,500 inmates were recently tested at the Yuma prison, and that eight inmates had refused the testing. Lamoreaux called the allegations of threats against testing “unsubstantiated.”

“ADCRR takes such allegations seriously,” Lamoreaux said. “If you have any information about credible threats, we ask you to forward them to us so they can be investigated.”

Was your loved one threatened against COVID-19 testing in an Arizona prison? Contact me [e-mail]