COVID-19 ripped through California’s oldest prison, San Quentin, after 121 men were transferred from the California Institution for Men in Chino in May. The outbreak became the deadliest in a California prison, leading to more than 2,200 infections and at least 28 deaths.
Graphic artist, comic book creator and self-described illustrative journalist Orlando Smith documented the terror that he and other inmates experienced during the outbreak, which collided with last summer’s uprisings.
Smith, 54, has been incarcerated more than 20 years, serving a 241-years-to-life sentence after a jury found him guilty of eight counts of second-degree robbery. During the pandemic lockdowns, inmates could not leave their cells, were fed boxed meals for weeks and showered once every few days.
The Michigan Department of Corrections reached a grim milestone this week, surpassing 100 prisoner deaths associated with COVID-19.
As of Wednesday, 103 people incarcerated at the state s 29 prisons have died since the coronavirus pandemic began.
Michigan ranks second for COVID-19 prisoner deaths per capita after New Jersey s prison system, according to the Marshall Project, a nonprofit newsroom that’s tracking infections in state correctional facilities across the country.
Those who ve succumbed to complications of the virus while incarcerated include a juvenile lifer who was weeks away from freedom after nearly 44 years in prison. There was a 74-year-old woman who d sought relief from a life sentence, and a man whom relatives described as the glue that kept his family together from behind bars.
A troubling tactic spreads with another noisy sidewalk rally at a state official s home after dark. Robert Gordon is a tyrant, one person yells during a video Tuesday night s demonstration, taped by participants and reported by The Detroit News, which says more than a dozen people gathered. The state health director last month issued an epidemic order, renewed through Sunday, that requires masks inside public spaces and limits some business and recreational activities. Gordon, a father of two, says protesters were screaming through bullhorns, scaring my children and trying to intimidate me.
Robert Gordon: People came to my home in the dark of night, screaming through bullhorns, scaring my children.
sschulwitz@thealpenanews.com
News Photo by Steve Schulwitz
Alpena County Sheriff Steve Kieliszewski on Wednesday shows off the new lockers in one of two locker rooms in the new county jail under construction now.
ALPENA The new Alpena County jail on M-32 is in the final phase of construction and keys to the new facility should be turned over to the county in early February.
Road patrol staff are expected to be the first to move to the new office, followed shortly by corrections employees and inmates.
The county will likely have to hire additional employees to properly man the facility, but how many new hires are needed is not yet known.
Protesters gather at night outside home of Michigan s health director
Lansing A group of protesters held another nighttime gathering at the home of a Michigan official Tuesday night as they demonstrated outside the house of Robert Gordon, director of the state s Department of Health and Human Services.
The health department director, who works for Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, has been in charge of issuing restrictions in recent weeks to stem a surge in COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations. The epidemic orders have drawn praise from some public health experts but criticism from some businesses.
A 40-minute video posted on Facebook Tuesday night shows a group of more than a dozen people gathering in a parking lot before walking to Gordon s home, where they yelled into bullhorns and chanted. They also sang Christmas carols, and one voice can be heard on the video describing the event as a house call.