Storm leaves Tower Street inmates without home-cooked meals

There was frustration and confusion outside the Tower Street Adult Correctional Centre yesterday, after visitors turned up with food for their incarcerated relatives, only to be turned away by prison authorities at the gate.

Yesterday, Joyce Stone, deputy commissioner for the Department of Corrections, said the “privilege” was suspended due to the inclement weather. Food drop-off, she said, should resume next Wednesday.

“Persons dropping off food at the prison is a privilege. It is not a right; the government provides three meals a day for inmates,” Stone told The Gleaner. “A number of staff have been out because of the weather so we did not have the staff to accommodate that at this time.”

“It should resume by next week,” added Stone, noting that up to yesterday morning one staff member called to inform her he could not make it in to work due to the effects of the heavy rainfall at his residence.

The Gleaner understands that the severe rainfall in recent days caused damage to sections of the prison, but Stone was not prepared to speak on the extent of that damage, noting that rehabilitation work “has started since Hurricane Beryl but we are not 100 per cent completed as yet”.

Yesterday, one elderly mother was particularly frustrated after travelling from Bethel Town in Westmoreland with goods for her son incarcerated at Tower Street. She said she wasted time and transportation fees and will have to find those again next week.

“I carried some food for my son and they said ‘no food’; and I called last week and they told me that it is this Wednesday I am to come. Why them never call me and tell me don’t bother come,” she said. “I got up early this morning and cook the rice and peas. What me must do now?”

Yesterday, other visitors protested their predicament openly, cautious, however, that their complaints may spell trouble and victimisation for their incarcerated loved ones. A sign marked “No food food today” was hung on a grille at the facility in view of the visitors.

“When you talk, dem damage the inmates. When you talk, as dem slip, dem slide. Dem nuh business. But I would go out to St Thomas for them, you see!” shouted one infuriated relative, calling for the resignation of one male prison official who she claimed declined to take the food or to officially address the gathering of mostly women.

“This morning them put up the sign. We never know anything about that. Last week we came, they turn we back. We come this week and then they turn us back again. It is wickedness! A borrow we borrow the bus fare,” shouted another female visitor.

corey.robinson@gleanerjm.com