A row of workers wearing elbow-length orange rubber gloves and large black masks stand near a conveyor belt, removing lead from electron-beam tubes.
At a construction site, other workers in orange overalls assemble wall frames for single-family homes until they drive nails into their knees with nail guns.
A cannery worker tries to solve a problem on the assembly line. Suddenly, his hand was caught by a car and almost cut in half.
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Because these workers are incarcerated, they are not entitled to compensation or benefits. And suing them is often very difficult and expensive.
This is a big advantage for the companies that hire them.
In the past, inmates could learn metalworking, mechanical skills, woodworking and furniture upholstering -- trades that are still useful in an American economy where industrial jobs have gone overseas.
But now Arizona Correctional Industries -- the state company that eliminates inmate labor -- is leasing hundreds of inmates to private companies, double the number it did 10 years ago.
It was thanks to Brian Radecki, who headed the ICA in 2010, that the best way to make a profit for prisoners was not to teach them to make goods in prison shops, but to outsource their work to private companies.
© Courtesy of The Arizona RepublicBrian Radecki, CEO and Deputy Director of Arizona Correctional Industries
Photo illustration / Arizona Republic; Photo: ACI.AZ.COM
The former marketing director justified the change by saying that selling inmates instead of products allowed ACI to make a profit without incurring any costs.
Since then, with the exception of a few high-tech sales and manufacturing operations, ACI has sent inmates to monotonous, backbreaking, and often dangerous jobs while injuries and lawsuits abounded.
Rehabilitation of prisoners comes second to the pursuit of profit.
ACI made millions except when profits fell during COVID and private companies benefited. They may enter the captive labor force, which is required by law to work and does not have the same rights as civilian workers. Prisoners cannot submit official reports to the state about poor working conditions. If they are injured on the job, they will not receive financial assistance, and they will be punished for trying to refuse it.
The Arizona Republic and KJZZ News reviewed thousands of subpoenas, emails, invoices, bill payments, annual reports, lawsuits and state audits over a 15-month period to examine how inmate labor is used in the state. Journalists interviewed more than 100 prisoners who currently work at the enterprise or have worked in the past. Reporters also spoke with executives of private companies employed by the ICA and several civilian ICA employees who could lose their jobs if caught talking to the media.
Although the analyzed data provided the first insight into the inner workings of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, the Republic and KJZZ could not answer all the questions. That's because the Department of Corrections has gone to great lengths to hide documents from the public, even going so far as to deny reporters public information about inmates, including how the state handles inmate money.
In response, "Republika" sued the Department of Corrections. And the matter did not stop there.
The newspaper also developed a computer program that downloads inmate profile information from a government website. The tool allowed reporters from two news organizations to collect employment, crime and demographic data on people incarcerated from 1980 to 2022 and assess trends in admissions over time.
As a result of these efforts, Republica and KJZZ discovered the following:
- ACI and its private partner companies have benefited enormously from the changes made by Radetsky since he took over as CEO in 2011. ACI's profits doubled and its partners gained an affordable and reliable workforce.
- The ICA has long made the rehabilitation of prisoners one of its main goals, but since Radecki took office, rehabilitation has become increasingly difficult, according to both prisoners and ICA staff. Unlike the work done in ICA's manufacturing facilities, the jobs offered by ICA's private sector partners are repetitive jobs that require a variety of skills that can help prisoners find employment after release. When qualified positions become available, ICA strives to fill them with inmates who need training, rather than inmates who need training.
- Most jobs offered by private companies are insecure. The Republic and KJZZ documented at least 45 incidents in which inmates were injured while working under Radetsky. It's far from a complete list, and it's unclear whether it's an increase from Radetzky's predecessor, since the Department of Corrections won't release medical complaints filed by inmates, citing privacy rights. Prisoners do not have the same rights as other workers. More often than not, if they are in danger, they cannot file a report with the state security department. Meanwhile, the Department of Corrections says all work is voluntary, but punishes inmates for not resigning or leaving ACI.
- When the coronavirus pandemic began, ACI's profitable inmate leasing business was shut down. More than a dozen private-sector customers have suspended operations, forcing ICA to restore production capacity at Arizona prisons. Both sales and production decreased. Customers experienced long delays in receiving their products. Sales representatives left, complaining that their commissions had been drastically cut.
- Top leaders are looking for ways to circumvent federal trade laws that prohibit prisons from selling products made by inmates who make less than the federal minimum wage through private companies doing business outside the state. According to emails obtained by The Republic, Radecki and ICA Deputy Director Gail Fenkel were selling products across the country at an Arizona prison through MyPillow, a bedding company promoted by the Keefe Commissioner Network and Mike Lindell. Conspiracy theorist that the 2020 election was stolen.
Neither Radecki, Fenkel, nor officials from the Department of Corrections will accept phone or sit-down interviews and will only respond by email.
An agency spokesman said the state complies with all federal laws, including safety, labor and trade regulations. They denied any wrongdoing in the payment of low wages or excessive wage deductions and denied allegations that prisoners were kept in unsafe conditions in prisons or workplaces.
The Department of Corrections said ICA's work for inmates addresses the state's labor shortage by giving inmates valuable skills and money they can spend abroad after their release.
"ACI builds on the expertise of our departments through ongoing experience and broader knowledge, and provides our departments with a wide range of available positions," the department said. "ACI inmates also gain valuable job skills in a variety of in-demand jobs in the construction industry, including drywall installation, truss and wall system construction, and steel beam, lumber and metal fabrication."
© Tom Tingle/The Republic Prisoners interviewed for this report say they know they are being exploited. But they said working at the ICA was better than sitting in a cell all day or collecting cigarette butts in the prison yard for 10 cents an hour.Under the Thirteenth Amendment, which outlawed slavery and involuntary servitude, states could still force prisoners to work without paying them a cent. In fact, eight states do so - Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Texas. Arizona is a state that pays inmates, but on average they are well below the federal minimum wage.
Many of the prisoners interviewed said they knew they were being exploited by public and private companies seeking to save on wages, insurance and taxes. Still, they say working at the ICA is better than sitting in a cell all day with nothing to do or collecting cigarette butts in the prison yard for 10 cents an hour. And many inmates lucky enough to land $12-an-hour jobs at the ICA say they were able to walk out of prison with thousands of dollars in savings, the first step toward getting out of prison. . house, car or driver's license payments.
However, there is almost universal condemnation of the state among the prisoners. He says the ICA didn't give them the skills they needed to do it in the open. But most of all, they say ACI should pay fair wages.
"It's really hard to use and use and use," said Marla Kobilar, an inmate who has worked at ICA for a year. “And that's bad because it's supposed to be for good, not for more profit. But that's all. It's just profit."
AFTER
"Everything was quiet"
When Arizona became a state in 1912, it imprisoned about 100 people a year. At the time, they were all busy building a state penitentiary in Florence.
The goal was to save the government money, and unlike the Deep South, using prisoners as labor for private companies was considered serious extortion.
Even before Arizona became a state, the idea of giving inmates to companies for day labor was rejected. When the territory's governor proposed an earlier version of the practice, it was never voted on.
But people saw an advantage in the fact that prisoners work for the state. So they plowed fields for their sustenance, built railroads, built railroad depots, built schools and courthouses, built highways, and built state prisons.
As the state's prison population grew in the 1980s and beyond, Arizona assigned inmates to work in prisons and set their wages to keep the prisons self-sustaining. Prisoners cooked, did laundry, and cleaned toilets for 10 to 35 cents an hour.
Initially, the select few who managed to get jobs at the ICA produced products mainly in prison workshops. They made beds, fences, and clothing for other prisoners; school desks, chairs and lockers; sofas, ottomans and mattresses for universities; desks and cabinets of law enforcement agencies. Their wages ranged from 50 cents an hour to the state minimum wage.
But in 1995, ACI itself began selling prisoners to meet the labor needs of prominent private companies such as Hickman's Family Farms, the used car dealer Manheim and the marketing firm Televerde.
Although the number of inmates working for private entrepreneurs increased in the following years, in the early 2000s the majority of inmates – 60% – still worked at ACI's production facilities.
At the time, farms and factories still relied on migrant labor or had to pay workers above the minimum wage to stay afloat. But that changed quickly between 2008 and 2011, when migrants began fleeing Arizona due to the state's anti-immigrant rhetoric and strict immigration laws.
"After (Sheriff Joe) Arpaio did the raids, there was a huge exodus from the state," said Salvador Reza, a civil rights leader in the Phoenix area. "It was a few hundred thousand, but it could have been more."
Labor shortages have forced companies to seek low-wage workers to work in agriculture, construction, canning and manufacturing, Brian Radecki believed when he joined ACI in 2010 and took over as CEO the following year, company officials said.
"Work is always hard work, and I'm sure (using inmates) was a way to make it easier," said Patti Emmert, director of marketing for Duncan Family Farms, which began using inmate labor two years before Radecki arrived. . . Convicted farm workers harvested fields of crops that could not be sold or had seeds that ended up being donated to food banks. “It was easier to use inmates rather than dealing with a staff member who had never been there before. come back, he said.
Before Rodecki's arrival, the company's growth was slow to be taken over by private companies such as Duncan Family Farms; according to the annual reports, the sales force received only a few new contracts a year. But Radecki has doubled ACI's private sector clients in five years.
ACI workers said the change was necessary: while production was important, it was too expensive to maintain.
"We didn't have the infrastructure to figure this out," said Clark Desoy, ACI's former chief marketing officer when Radecki hired ACI in 2013 to market to private companies. "Operationally, anyone in the world can run a sign shop with a screen printer using large format digital printers, but those printers are expensive."
It was also expensive to hire trainers to teach a new group of inmates a new machine or technology. Prisoners and company officials said the ICA relies heavily on inmates teaching each other, turning training into a "game of telephone," as one ICA official put it, where quality and safety become the norm after years of relying on prisoners to teach each other. a related topic
It was cheaper to just sell the prisoners.
Before his arrival, deals with private companies were kept quiet: "Everything was quiet," said Desoy. His job was to bring ACI into the mainstream as a viable competitor in the job market.
"You can make more money," said Desoy, selling prisoners to companies.
© Mark Henle/Republic The dining room in Clark Desoy's Scottsdale home was renovated by ICA.Private companies that contract with ACI pay inmates minimum wage. But ACI pays inmates only a portion of what it receives from the companies, pocketing the rest to cover profits and expenses.
As part of this, the companies pay ACI an 11% service fee and an hourly wage for corrections officers who come to work with inmates.
Private companies get a reliable workforce and save money by not having to pay inmates for vacation or injury time if they are injured on the job. They don't have to pay federal and local taxes, and in some cases even have access to low-cost prison facilities instead of renting a warehouse.
To spread the word about his work in prison, Desoy began advertising.
Ads in the Phoenix Business Journal encouraged employers to hire inmates "if they can't afford costs like FICA, workers' compensation and health insurance."
Lawrence Williams, director of sales and marketing for Arizona Waste Connections in Apache Junction, said he's excited to have an "involuntary workforce." The free market worker he hired often quit or couldn't do the job. Even though they were paid well above the minimum wage, people didn't like the sloppy work of sorting the city's recyclables.
Radechkin's strategy was immediately more profitable than that of his predecessor. As more prisoners were shipped from ACI warehouses to private companies, ACI made millions in profits. According to the company's annual reports, sales grew from $31.9 million before Radecki took over in 2009 to $42.1 million in 2015 and $48 million in 2019.
Meanwhile, the average annual salary rose to $4 million from $1.7 million a year a decade before Radecki and $6.7 million in 2019.
"I thought education came first"
Tianna Bowser arrived at Hickman's Family Farms tired and cold. It was April 2020 and the weather had turned cold after a storm hit the California coast. На палях за Феніксам уздоўж Зайчынай сцежкі паветра ўсё яшчэ было халаднаватым без гарадскога асфальту і сталі, якія штучна награвалі зямлю.
Некалькімі гадзінамі раней Боўзер сядзеў у сваёй камеры ў турме штата Пэрывіль і спрабаваў паспрачацца з супрацоўнікам папраўчай калоніі. Перавялі, але папрасілі застацца ў турме, каб атрымаць дыплом. «Вы працуеце на Хікмана», — памятае, як сказаў яму лейтэнант. – Усё роўна, вучышся ў школе.
«Я сказаў ім, што думаю, што адукацыя ў турмах адрозніваецца. Маўляў, калі вы робіце адукацыйныя праграмы, гэта ў першую чаргу», — сказаў Боўзер. "Але мне сказалі, што праца Хікмана больш важная".
ПАСЛЯ
Гэта было відавочным доказам новага спосабу працы ACI. Зняволеныя заявілі, што галоўнай задачай кампаніі з'яўляюцца карпаратыўныя прыбыткі, а затым рэабілітацыя зняволеных.
Ён сказаў, што калі б Боўзер пакінуў школу і выбраў школу Хікмана, ён сутыкнуўся б з вялікім білетам. Гэта азначала б страту правоў наведвання, тэлефонных прывілеяў, ці яшчэ горш: магчыма, забарону на працу на працягу трох-шасці месяцаў — надзвычайнае пакаранне ў турэмнай сістэме, дзе зняволеныя не маюць магчымасці зарабіць некалькі дадатковых даляраў кожны месяц. галодны
Цяпер ён стаяў перад сваім домам у агляднай будучыні: металічны склад з ложкамі ад сценкі да сценкі, спраектаванымі і ўсталяванымі іншымі зняволенымі.
Боўзер і 139 іншых жанчын змагаюцца ў цьмяным святле, шукаючы свае рэчы і кідаючы іх на ложкі, каб вызваліць месца.
Праз некалькі дзён пераносныя прыбіральні побач з жаночым інтэрнатам пачалі запаўняцца. Экскрыменты тушацца ў акварыуме некалькі дзён, перш чым выйсці на волю. Калі жанчыны спалі, яны накрывалі галаву дадатковай бялізнай, каб не было пахаў.
Следчыя ўвялі вентылятары для цыркуляцыі свежага паветра, але замест таго, каб даць перадышку ад паху і цяпла, вентылятары толькі падымалі пыл, бактэрыі, бруд і курыны памёт. Што яшчэ горш, піць ваду ў гэтым раёне заўсёды было рызыкай, бо зняволеныя казалі, што на фантанах была вялікая шыльда з папярэджаннем, што яе нельга піць і што яе нельга ўжываць, калі вы не цяжарныя.
Хікман адмаўляў існаванне праблемы з вадой, а супрацоўнікі папраўчай службы адказалі, што "ўсе работнікі, у тым ліку тыя, хто працуе на сямейнай ферме Хікмана, маюць доступ да свежай, чыстай пітной вады". Але некаторыя зняволеныя сцвярджаюць, што гэта няпраўда, і многія скардзіліся на праблемы са страўнікам падчас працы на ферме.
"Гэта быў кашмар", - успамінаў Баўзер.
Перамяшчэнне ў турмах не з'яўляецца чымсьці незвычайным; людзей часта цягаюць у розныя двары ці турэмныя блокі. Але ў той час пандэмія спыніла працу па ўсім штаце. Зняволеныя мелі толькі рэдкую магчымасць хадзіць паміж камерамі і калідорамі сталовай, займацца спортам на свежым паветры або хадзіць у сталовую, каб прыняць душ або купіць рэчы першай неабходнасці.
Каранцін выклікаў у турмах напружанне, трывогу і страх. Уладальнікі Hickman's Family Farms, якія выкарыстоўвалі сотні асуджаных у якасці таннай і надзейнай працоўнай сілы, турбаваліся аб сваіх зберажэннях: ім былі патрэбны асуджаныя неадкладна для працы на фермах.
За зачыненымі дзвярыма ўладальнікі фермы і супрацоўнікі дзяржаўных папраўчых устаноў выпрацавалі рашэнне, паводле якога зняволеныя самі будуць жыць на ферме, што кампанія хоча зрабіць пастаянным да мая 2020 года, згодна з электроннымі лістамі, атрыманымі KJZZ News.
Гэтае абавязацельства было зроблена праз рэабілітацыю зняволеных, некаторыя з якіх былі вымушаныя працаваць, хаця Дэпартамент выканання пакаранняў сцвярджае, што праца з'яўляецца добраахвотнай.
Зняволены Пэрывіля, які адмовіўся назваць сваё імя, нават не падаў заяўку на справу Хікмана. Яна сказала, што ёй прыйшлося звольніцца праз тры месяцы, таму што кампанія не будзе працаваць у дзённую змену, каб яна магла працягваць навучанне ва ўніверсітэце.
Але калі яна выйшла, жанчына атрымала пакаранне, якога баяўся Боўзер: «Яны трымалі мяне на працягу шасці месяцаў, каб я не магла знайсці іншую працу», — сказала яна. Запісы, атрыманыя Рэспублікай, пацвердзілі, што ён не прымаў іншую працу ў ACI праз пяць месяцаў пасля свайго ад'езду.
Зняволеныя ведаюць наступствы непрацы, і многія не вяртаюцца.
"Адна рэч, якой не хапае нашым зняволеным, - гэта кантроль", - сказаў іншы зняволены, які зараз працуе ў ICA і папрасіў не называць яго імя, баючыся расправы. «Увогуле, мы не кантралюем тое, што мы ямо, дзе мы спім або асноўныя рэчы ў жыцці, якія можа кантраляваць звычайны дарослы чалавек. Такім чынам, калі такая арганізацыя, як ICA, дае вам сапраўды добры кантроль і льготы - працу за сталом з камп'ютарам, кавай, прыгожымі крэсламі - вы будзеце рабіць усё, што яны хочуць, каб захаваць вашу працу ".
ПАСЛЯ
Але ўсё ж ёсць тыя, хто здымаецца. З 2010 года Corrections прыцягнула да дысцыпліны 177 супрацоўнікаў ACI за страту працы або адмову ўдзельнічаць у праграме. Верагодна, гэтая лічба малая, таму што Дэпартамент выканання пакаранняў адмовіўся даць афіцыйную інфармацыю аб дысцыплінарных справах Рэспубліцы і KJZZ.
Кампутарная праграма, распрацаваная The Republic, выявіла, што чалавека, які адмаўляўся працаваць у дзвюх рэдакцыях, часта адпраўлялі ў дысцыплінарны двор, дзе ўспыхвалі бойкі. Яшчэ адну жанчыну не дапусцілі да працы за тое, што яна адмаўлялася працаваць цягам 60 дзён, не дазваляючы ёй набываць у турэмнай краме прадукты ці прадметы гігіены. Яшчэ адзін мужчына сказаў, што яго суткі трымалі ў адзіночнай камеры пасля таго, як ён адмовіўся працаваць на пякарні.
Турма як працоўнае асяроддзе
Калі ACI патрэбны чалавек з такімі асаблівымі навыкамі, як зварка, уменне паправіць турэмныя дзверы або вырабіць мэблю для ўнутранага дворыка на заказ, перад зняволеннем яны правяраюць, ці валодаюць зняволеныя гэтымі навыкамі.
У той жа час праца, якая лічылася кваліфікаванай прафесіяй — рамонт вентыляцыйных сістэм, электрыка або сталяр — пры Радзецкім паступова замянялася некваліфікаванай працай у прыватных фірмах, напрыклад, сартаваннем смецця і разлажэннем небяспечных матэрыялаў на канвееры. рэмень або кансервы.
За дзесяць гадоў да таго, як Радэцкі далучыўся, паводле запісаў дэпартамента, толькі 1400 зняволеных працавалі ў ACI, большасць з іх у прадуктовых крамах. Толькі каля 540 чалавек працавалі ў прыватных кампаніях, такіх як Hickman's Family Farms або Televerde.
Да канца 2019 года, амаль праз дзесяць гадоў пасля пачатку працы Радэцкага, колькасць зняволеных, якія працуюць у ICA, вырасла амаль да 2000, прычым больш за 1200 працуюць у прыватных кампаніях.
© Шэрыл Эванс/Рэспубліка Большая частка цяжкай працы Ногалеса выконваецца зняволенымі з Каталінскага аддзялення турэмнага комплексу штата Арызона ў Тусоне.Запісы паказваюць, што ў 2019 годзе 439 зняволеных былі выгадаваны або апрацаваны і расфасаваны для прыватных кампаній. Яны збіралі памідоры, дойныя каровы, кардонныя пакеты ад яек, кансерваваны перац і фасаваны корм для хатніх жывёл.
Яшчэ 322 зняволеныя працавалі на перапрацоўцы і лёгкай вытворчасці. Адзенне або смецце раздзяляюць па канвеерах. Яны зварвалі металічныя прычэпы, здавалі патрыманыя аўтамабілі на аўкцыёны і ратавалі запчасткі да самалётаў.
Больш за 150 зняволеных працавалі на будоўлі, дапамагалі ўкладваць гіпсакардон або рабіць драўляныя фермы.
Большасць астатніх працавалі ў тэлефонных банках, стваралі гандлёвыя лініі для высокатэхналагічных кампаній або збіралі сродкі для ветэранскіх груп і іншых арганізацый.
Але партнёры ICA з прыватнага сектара атрымалі па кантракце танную стабільную працоўную сілу, і хоць ICA зарабіў мільёны, зняволеныя рэдка атрымлівалі тое, што ім было патрэбна. Па словах некалькіх супрацоўнікаў ACI, якія звольніліся ў мінулым годзе, набыццё навыкаў або навучанне на працы было магчыма толькі ў тым выпадку, калі гэта не перашкаджала рэнтабельнасці.
Так гаварылі нават зняволеныя.
Чад Лоўрэнс, зняволены турэмнага комплексу Эймана, правёў у ICA ўсяго пяць тыдняў, але сказаў, што гэтага часу было дастаткова, каб зразумець, што "гэта месца, дзе я не хачу быць".
Насуперак настойлівым патрабаванням ICA, што зняволеныя звяртаюцца і не прымушаюцца да працы, ён сказаў, што не падаваў заяўку на працу. Фактычна, Лоўрэнс сказаў, што ён не мае права працаваць у кампаніі, таму што яны лічылі яго рызыкай уцёкаў. Зняволеныя, класіфікаваныя як ахоўнікі, лічацца занадта небяспечнымі для працы ў кампаніі, і ў 2009 годзе Лоўрэнс быў абвінавачаны ў турэмным зняволенні.
Лаўрэнцій не хацеў займацца фізічнай працай. Ён сказаў, што мае «вялікі досвед» у такіх адміністрацыйных сістэмах, як Excel, апрацоўцы заказаў на куплю, планаванні мерапрыемстваў і іншых тэхналогіях. Што ж, падумаў ён, ён можа развіць гэтыя навыкі або навучыцца новым, каб уладкавацца на працу пасля звальнення.
Замест гэтага ён быў вымушаны працаваць з парашковым пакрыццём на заводзе металу.
"Лёгка паставіць чалавека на працу падымаць рэчы або шліфаваць ручной шліфавальнай машынкай", - сказаў ён. «Тэарэтычна ICA павінна прадастаўляць «прафесійную рэабілітацыю», але калі вы на самой справе не ведаеце навыкаў, неабходных для таго, каб зарабляць на жыццё, у іх не будзе часу навучыць вас».
Лоўрэнс сказаў, што ён прасіў людзей стаць вучнямі і сачыць за людзьмі, якія выкарыстоўваюць праграмнае забеспячэнне для распрацоўкі планаў для праектаў, над якімі яны працуюць.
«Mén ondan ışıtım ki, bunu kızını takışımı ınının ının edıdık ən məhbuslardan birını şeşen salmaq ının halmu gün ınşın ışemmərdi» «О, üzr ışıtın, amma onun att ışılı ılə redaktor pıştımədılır».
О, ACI ប្រ្រ្ន្រ្រ្រ្រ្រ្រេ
"Onlar meni ogutmədikcə pul szülüməgılər" Лурэнса.
Гэта працягваецца з некаторымі зняволенымі, якія кажуць, што іх прымушалі працаваць у адпаведнасці з вытворчымі патрэбамі ACI. Прамая карэкцыя запісаў аддзела zabitlarını ınışırını ən kızılı ve veght duyduğılı yərəməkı məkışırır: Mühəndislələrandislələrandislələrandislələrəndıslər elektryn; குர்கு sexinä aşpazlar vä ya será aşpazlar zaştın edilir; dülgarır dağ emalı ılı ışık üllar.
Other məhbuslar Respublikaya sırıt yazıblar ki, bolala ACI anbarlarında preparing masa, park sorting, baking ve ya erülüştərn edilüştərn mənarn mək ının other productions islərı şekirılırərıdən bağır. Калі працуюць, то кажуць, што не працуюць.
"Dolanışığını zağıtırı bilməkəcəm"
Cermeyn Pledger dülgər dülgərdi перад Häbsxanaya dümezdən. Häbs olunmazdan övet o, geðutini müşaoli väatletieki kimi ibraştında.
"İndi əriştə kimidir", - сказаў ён.
Кампанія ACI выкарыстала сваю моц і гісторыю бізнесу, каб сабраць каркасы для Superstition Components, кампаніі па будаўніцтве насценнай пліткі для жылых дамоў. Lakin 2019-cu ılda o, iş lişti bicepsini cırıb vä tibbi kılımələ töğət özökını var.
Dovlet kepet dinda Pledge tibbi gabymanla taksili nalabi olsa da, o, yêli ökurö olunmadığını сказаў. Bu şatının federal hakim şatıta çışın bir ış ışıpın şatışıb ki, şıtat tıbılılarında tibbi xidmət o kaçın ızımdir ki, mahbusların constitutiya ınıklarını pozur.
«Я за горадам, я не ведаю, як гэта зрабіць».
Закладчык kızımın kızışını talın tən ən Superstition Components-ə vəgəy idə həltıdı. Oh, ışışınin südışın keçdiyın keçdiyin çıkışın ola talığın bir khalı məhbusdan dırır.
Залогадаўца-ў болсама кöзю ідыларына çаваб уçюк кöзüлüк közülü süzük üçük üçük.
NÖVBÄTİ
Дэпартамент Düzəlişek патрабуе выканання ўсіх федэральных правілаў бяспекі ў сваіх кантрактах з кампаніямі і заявіў у заяве па электроннай пошце, што ў яго ёсць працэдуры для забеспячэння выканання правілаў бяспекі. Baina sailak ezin izan du saksana seguri seguru seguri seguri delaha ikuskapenak egin delala.
Ezin da know how many людзі атрымалі раненні diren ACIren szukurietan edo negozio privateotean. Lan-guneetan zadzijak izdenanean saksati sakti sakti saktiween iz dira beti salatzen.
Eta presoek beste langileek dituzten eskubide berberak ez dituztenez, ezin dute segurtasun kexarik aurkeztu Arizonako Laneko Segurtasun eta Osasun Sailean.
Hala ere, ACIrekin negozioak egiten dituzten gutxienez zortzi enpresek isunak jaso dituzte eta osasun- eta segurtasun-hausteengatik zitazioak jaso dituzte, lanean hiltzen ari den norbaiten zitazioa barne. Zitazioetako batek ere ez du presoek parte hartzen.
Presoek aurkeztutako kexak —eta espetxeko funtzionarioek kaleratu dituztenak— erakusten dute preso dauden langileek saiakera ugari egin dituztela zenbaitetan langileei lan-baldintza ez-seguruei buruz ohartarazteko, besteak beste, zerra-orriak askatuta egotea, makina arriskutsuak erabiltzen dituzten bitartean eskularruekin lan egin ez izatea edo makineria arriskutsua erabiltzen duten bitartean. ez erabili eskularru astunak pala elektrikoak maneiatzen dituen bitartean.
"Marraztean gure arazo handiena iltze-pistolekin lan egiten dugula da, baina inoiz ez zuten klaserik eman pistola hau behar bezala nola erabili jakiteko", esan zuen preso batek, zuzenketa-ofizialak segurtasun-arriskuei buruz ohartarazten saiatzeagatik bere frustrazioak azalduz. «Hau da, mutilak etengabe tirokatzen ari dira euren buruari, gehienbat eskuan. Irailean, tipo batek bere buruari tiro egin zion belaunean».
© Tom Tingle/The Republic Giza baliabideetan MBA egin arren, Katie Wesolek dio espetxetik atera ostean ezin zuela lanik aurkitu.And while prisoners, like Pledger, can file civil lawsuits to get compensation for their injuries, filing fees and other court costs are prohibitively expensive.
Only 17 prisoners have been able to file civil lawsuits against ACI businesses since 2013. That's still three times as many as were filed during the 10 years before Radecki took over. The recent lawsuits included one by a prisoner who alleged that he fell from the top of a SWIFT Transportation truck after he had to climb a homemade ladder in 2019.
SWIFT in court records denied that workers were required to use a homemade ladder, and would not comment on other allegations until further discovery was made. The case was eventually dismissed in favor of SWIFT.
Another prisoner's entire arm got pulled through a grinder at Fiesta Canning Co., owned by Macayo's Restaurants. A female prisoner lost her finger while working at Hickman's Family Farms in 2020.
Both Hickman's and Fiesta Canning Co. denied all the allegations, but eventually settled their cases out of court.
None of the prisoners in the lawsuits are entitled to workers' compensation benefits, and they are not eligible for unemployment or disability if they end up not being able to work upon release.
Dozens of other prisoners have said they have been injured on the job. Records show that four smashed their hands or nearly cut off their fingers. One dislocated his shoulder, another dropped a pipe on his foot. One worker fell off a roof and landed on cement, injuring his hip and head. And a half-dozen reported accidentally jabbing needles into their fingers, arms and chests while trying to vaccinate flapping chickens at the Hickman's Family Farms.
Yvette Gamez, who worked at Hickman's, said she lost feeling in her left hand completely since working at the farm. She said the “numbness in my hands I was experiencing was not subsiding. It was so bad.”
Meanwhile, private companies that contract with ACI have been vigilant in trying to ward off litigation. The state Legislature is entertaining a bill that would limit payouts to prisoners injured or killed at an ACI job by limiting the evidence they are permitted to present.
Among the bill's supporters is a nonprofit group Partners to Reduce Recidivism, in-part run by Billy and Glenn Hickman, who are among the owners of Hickman's Family Farms.
The egg ranch, alone, had nine civil injury lawsuits filed against it since 2019, all brought by prisoners who described suffering from injuries as a result of their jobs while incarcerated.
When DesSoye, ACI's former chief marketing officer, was told of some of the claims by workers at Hickman's, as well as the company's attempts to lobby against workers' rights, he said he was unaware.
“That does trouble me,” he said. “I'm disappointed to learn that.”
Promises not kept
In March 2020, Radecki's lucrative prisoner leasing business came to a sudden halt when COVID-19 forced prisoners to stay in their cells.
By the following year, ACI had lost 17 clients and 600 fewer prisoners were working for private companies.
Revenues and profits would have plunged immediately were it not for a $16 million contract between ACI and its authorizing agency — the Department of Corrections — to refurbish prison doors. But once that contract terminated in 2021, ACI revenues sank from $46.5 million to $32.3 million and profits from $5.5 million to $695,000.
In an effort to reboot the prison's manufacturing shops, Radecki hired Fenkell as ACI's deputy assistant director in charge of sales and she immediately conducted an overhaul.
© Provided by Arizona RepublicGail Fenkell, deputy assistant director for Arizona Correctional Industries
Photo illustration/Arizona Republic; Photo: ACI.AZ.COM
Fenkell ordered salespeople to bring in new clients just as businesses were being forced to shut down or reduce capacity because of the pandemic.
Commissions were slashed for salespeople who sold to old clients. Only those who brought in new contracts received higher compensation. Some salespeople said they saw their annual paychecks sliced by tens of thousands of dollars.
“She kept saying: 'We need new product! We need new clients!'” said a former ACI salesperson, who agreed to speak anonymously for fear of losing his current job.
He said it felt comparable to a door-to-door vacuum cleaner sales job, but he was trying to sell prison goods. “You need a table? We can do that. A chair? We can do that. A fence? We can do that!” he said.
Another current ACI worker, who also agreed to speak anonymously for fear of losing his job, described the office after Fenkell arrived as “uncomfortable,” and “chaotic.”
The upshot: a handful of salespeople quit under pressure, saying they felt demoralized in their jobs.
The Department of Corrections would not make Fenkell available for comment, nor comment on the accusations of a toxic work environment. Instead, they said in an email that, “since order-taking is an essential function of customer service representatives, organizational change was implemented for greater efficiency and the customer service team was specifically assigning order-taking responsibilities.”
For a few months in 2021 and for the first time in more than a decade, the number of prisoners working in ACI's manufacturing shops exceeded the number of prisoners farmed out to private companies. And while Fenkell pushed harder for new manufacturing sales, prison warehouses couldn't keep up with demand.
In one instance, Randy Rogers, a business owner who used ACI to make parts for furniture he sold at his store, Olde Mercantile in Gilbert, said it would take months to get small projects completed that would normally have taken a week or two. He eventually stopped using ACI.
An ACI salesman with knowledge of the contract said that he wasn't sure why there was a backlog, but that Olde Mercantile wasn't alone. “There was a whole bunch of orders that were outstanding for over two years,” he said. “ACI hadn't completed them, and had no intention of doing it because they didn't want to or didn't know how to.”
The Department of Corrections didn't acknowledge issues with supply chains, but it did say that the COVID pandemic caused issues with hiring, and it had to figure out a new way to restructure in order to be more productive.
Anxious to turn around ACI's deteriorating fortunes, Radecki and Fenkell discussed ways to get around federal trade laws by making products for businesses that sell outside Arizona.
Federal law allows prison-made goods to be sold to other government agencies, but ACI had been finding a workaround to that law for years by selling to private companies doing business with state agencies.
The US Department of Justice would not say if ACI's practice potentially violated federal law and the company says it complies with all applicable laws. But labor law professor Michael Selmi at Arizona State University's Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law, said that the contract he reviewed between ACI and another company goes against the intention of the federal trade law, which is to keep private companies from profiteering from out-of-state prison labor.
Among those businesses ACI considered doing business with, according to emails: Keefe Commissary Network, one of the nation's largest private suppliers of prison goods sold at commissaries, and MyPillow, the bedding company.
Department of Corrections officials deny doing business with MyPillow, and said that all business with Keefe is done within the state, or that they only sell prisoner-made pillows out of state to other state prisons.
But emails collected by The Republic show Fenkell actively pursued Keefe to do more business out of state as early as August 2020, and continued to push that business a year later.
© Arizona Republic An excerpt of an email from Gail Fenkell to Brian Radecki about partnering with Keefe Commissary Network to sell products out of state. Federal law requires that prison-made goods be sold only to other government entities. But ACI has been selling prison-made goods to other private companies, so long as they do business with other state agencies.Keefe was “open to distributing our products in other states," Fenkell wrote to Radecki, discussing a business call she had made with Keefe's team in St. Louis. "We need to identify when/how that is possible and they need to approach other state agencies for permission when the time comes. Our procurement team here will look into all the possible ways we CAN have Keefe sell outside of AZ."
A year later, emails showed that Fenkell and her team proposed partnering with MyPillow for a limited edition “My Prison Pillow.” That deal, according to the Department of Corrections, never materialized.
For many of employees and prisoners, the fallout from coronavirus has been a long due comeuppance for ACI's focus on profits over prisoner rehabilitation.
Prisoners say they were sold a program that claimed it would help them. Instead, they found a state-run company that took advantage of them, and punished them if they sought fair treatment.
Even former employees who have since soured on ACI still believe that many prisoners get a benefit from being out of their cells and enjoy being out in the free world. But there is a similar resounding aggrievement that the toll of the pandemic, along with treating prison labor as a commodity rather than a possible form of rehabilitation, pushed many to the brink of leaving.
“We market this as a training program, and reducing recidivism rates — that's our main sales pitch,” said an ACI salesperson who left the company last year. “But they're not looking at this as a training program anymore. They honestly don't care about the inmates, they're just using them as workers.”
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Arizona changed how it sells prisoners to companies. The state raked in millions, but workers were neglected
