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As the concern and fear over the spread of COVID-19 continues to grow everyday. Civil rights advocates are raising concerns over the conditions in the Los Angeles county jail system, one of the nation's largest.
Social distancing is impossible to implement in over crowded jail systems that at best keep bunks three feet apart from each other.
Inmates have also gone on the record and said that their conditions are rarely being cleaned down because there are a lack of cleaning supplies.
“This is worse than a cruise ship,” Kristopher Howard, an inmate who has been in jail for almost a year and a half, said in a phone interview from Twin Towers. “Everybody’s on top of each other. … I’m scared. I’m scared for what could happen.”
The Sheriff Department has not responded to comment, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Earlier last week, Sheriff Villanueva did say this though in regards to his jails, “All of the high-traffic areas and surfaces are constantly being sanitized. We have a lot of inmate crews, and they have all the protective gear necessary, and they are scrubbing everywhere they can.”
Inmates say his words are different than the departments actions.
“We ask almost every day to watch the news, and they never let us,” Howard, an inmate, said. “We want to see what’s going on.”
“I feel like I’m gonna die in here,” he said.
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