Federal lawsuit aims to force Texas prisons to have mandatory air conditioning

Marci Marie Simmons says she gets hundreds of letters from Texas prisoners, scared of the extreme heat.

Simmons says in one letter a Texas inmate writes, "it gets so hot in the dorms the fan literally feels like a blow dryer is blowing hot air on my face."

"These folks, that are dying because of the lack of climate control in Texas prisons, didn't get sentenced to death," Simmons said.

Simmons, along with several advocacy groups, are suing the Texas Department of Criminal Justice for cruel and unusual punishment.

Their lawsuit says Texas prisoners and guards are "being cooked to death." It alleges un-air-conditioned inmate housing units "caused or contributed to 14 deaths per year" from 2001 to 2019.

Simmons spent 10 years in those same prisons.

"Water that came out of the sink was warm, but if you flush the toilet several times, that water would get cold. And in the summer months, it was common practice for anyone in there to splash toilet water on our bodies or even onto the floor to sleep on that," Simmons said.

The TDCJ confirmed to Scripps News there are 14 units within its system with no A/C at all, 31 that are fully climate controlled and 55 that have partial A/C.

Depending on the facility the partial A/C can mean cool respite areas, cafeterias or cooling beds for inmates.

While TDCJ has tried to get this lawsuit dismissed, the executive director testified in court, installing A/C systemwide is "a key priority" but they don't have the money.

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But Texas Representative Carl Sherman says with a $30 billion state surplus, money isn't the problem.

"We spend millions of dollars trying to argue against being in compliance with what we mandate to the county jails," Rep. Sherman said.

In each of the last three legislative sessions, Sherman has proposed a bill to mandate every Texas prison be kept between 65 and 85 degrees Fahrenheit. He says he's never been given a vote in the Texas Senate.

Texas Governor Gregg Abbott has not publicly commented on calls for a special legislative session to address the heat in Texas prisons.

"The most consistent argument and rebuttal that I hear is, if you do the crime, you do the time, that's it. I know by law we have to have A/C for our animal shelters. These aren't animals that we're talking about," Sherman said.

"In the pig barn, there's climate control for the pigs that the Texas Department of Criminal Justice owns. And I remember going back into the dorm from working in this pig barn, feeling subhuman," Simmons said.

A federal judge in Austin is considering "emergency relief" for Texas inmates.

During the injunction hearing, Simmons was the first witness to testify.

Simmons cautioned, "We need something immediate. People are dying today, so we need something to happen today."

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