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The state probably gets a huge portion of the 60% of wages they didn't steal outright back in overpriced commissary too.
Fast food chains use Alabama prison inmates as slave labor, lawsuit alleges
Updated: Dec. 12, 2023, 4:07 p.m.|Published: Dec. 12, 2023, 3:38 p.m.
By Amy Yurkanin | [email protected]
A federal lawsuit filed Tuesday said prisoners in Alabama have been denied parole and forced to work jobs at fast food restaurants as part of a “labor-trafficking scheme” that generates $450 million a year for the state, according to a press release.
Ten former and current prisoners and labor unions that represent service workers filed the lawsuit Tuesday against Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey, Attorney General Steve Marshall, a beer distributor and several fast food companies. The lawsuit alleges the prison system makes money by deducting fees from the wages of prisoners. Private companies such as KFC, Wendy’s. Burger King and McDonalds get a steady supply of workers from the prison system, the lawsuit says.
The lawsuit claims the arrangement resembles convict leasing, a system that followed slavery in the South. Prisoners, many of whom were Black and had been arrested for violations of Jim Crow laws, could be forced to work dangerous or grueling jobs for private employers.
The governor’s office did not respond to requests for comment.
Parole reforms enacted in 2015 had reduced the number of work-release inmates by 40 percent in 2018, according to the press release. That year, Gov. Kay Ivey began targeting the parole system and rates dropped. The number of prisoners granted parole declined sharply between 2020 and 2022. The rates among Black inmates dropped even further and wait times increased, the lawsuit said.
“Labor coerced from Alabama’s disproportionately Black incarcerated population is the fuel that fires ADOC’s extremely lucrative profit-making engine,” the suit reads. “ADOC enforces express rules that severely punish incarcerated people both for refusing to work and for encouraging work stoppages.”
Violence and extortion are common in Alabama prisons, which are understaffed. Inmates often take work-release jobs to get out of the dangerous environment and earn money to buy clothes and extra food, the complaint says.
“This case seeks to abolish a modern-day form of slavery,” the complaint says. “They have been entrapped in a system of ‘convict leasing’ in which incarcerated people are forced to work, often for little or no money, for the benefit of the numerous government en ies and private businesses that ‘employ’ them. They live in a constant danger of being murdered, stabbed, or raped that is so profound that the federal government has sued Alabama for inflicting cruel and unusual punishment, and if they refuse to work, the State punishes them even more. They are trapped in this labor trafficking scheme.”
One inmate, Lakiera Walker, was incarcerated from 2007 to 2023. Her parole hearing was rescheduled from 2020 to 2023, and Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall opposed her application even though her victims supported her release, the complaint said. Walker had to perform long hours of work inside the prison that included stripping floors and caring for sick and disabled inmates. She also did roadwork for Jefferson County, where she endured sexual harassment, and worked at Southeaster Meats. She often spent time inside the freezers with inadequate clothing, the lawsuit said.
“On one occasion, Ms. Walker was so ill that she had to be carried to the healthcare unit and could not work; she was approached by an ADOC job placement officer who told her she had to ‘get up and go make us our 40%,’” the complaint said. “There is no reasonable argument that Ms. Walker posed a threat to public safety for more than a decade before she was released, given her history of performing work both inside and outside prison walls without incident.”
State Rep. Christopher England, D-Tuscaloosa, said he has been watching the parole board since 2019 and was aware of racial disparities. Many people denied parole for being threats to public safety do work outside of prisons several hours a day, he said.
“They work jobs every single day for eight to ten hours unsupervised,” England said. “So, saying they are a threat to public safety is only a convenient excuse to deny them parole.”
More than 500 companies have contracts with the Alabama Department of Corrections to obtain work from inmates, the complaint said. The inmates are not allowed to refuse work or protest dangerous conditions or long hours. Prisoners who engage in work stoppages can be punished with transfers to a higher security prisons and loss of privileges. They can be sent to solitary confinement.
In addition to private employers, the lawsuit also names the City of Montgomery, City of Troy and Jefferson County as agencies that have benefited from inmate labor.
The Alabama Department of Corrections deducts 40 percent from inmate wages. Workers must also pay for transportation and clothes, the complaint said.
Michael Campbell, an inmate at Childersburg Work Release Center, said he works five to six days a week at a local KFC. He said inmates have begun to lose hope they will ever qualify for parole.
“It seems like they’re not even really looking to anybody’s record, they’re just standing over them and denying every one of them.”
The state probably gets a huge portion of the 60% of wages they didn't steal outright back in overpriced commissary too.
Last edited by baseline bum; 12-13-2023 at 12:37 AM.
Absolutely disgusting.
TDCJ has programs that are supposed to be about getting ex-cons into business. What it really does is loan them money on a poor success rate and leaves ex-cons who already struggle to reintegrate with unmanageable debt. You can imagine how that works out.
...those living in a gated community alright. Otherwise, SOL.
Texas abolished convict leasing in 1910, not surprised to hear Alabama still has it.
Wouldn't be surprised to hear Texas still had it too
Now that it's in the news I'm guessing Paxton's team is hard at work trying to figure out how to reinstate it.
It's what Jesus would do
semantics are a , but yeah
the 13th amendment provides the loophole of forced labor as punishment for convicts.
https://www.texasstandard.org/storie...n-labor-texas/
fify
The regular jew Jesus was too woke
Forced labor is a still a motif in the most carceral country in the world, the USA.
https://apnews.com/article/prison-to...625d00014ac080The AP found that U.S. prison labor is in the supply chains of goods being shipped all over the world via multinational companies, including to countries that have been slapped with import bans by Washington in recent years. For instance, the U.S. has blocked shipments of cotton coming from China, a top manufacturer of popular clothing brands, because it was produced by forced or prison labor. But crops harvested by U.S. prisoners have entered the supply chains of companies that export to China.
While prison labor seeps into the supply chains of some companies through third-party suppliers without them knowing, others buy direct. Mammoth commodity traders that are essential to feeding the globe like Cargill, Bunge, Louis Dreyfus, Archer Daniels Midland and Consolidated Grain and Barge – which together post annual revenues of more than $400 billion – have in recent years scooped up millions of dollars’ worth of soy, corn and wheat straight from prisons, which compete with local farmers.
The AP reached out for comment to the companies it identified as having connections to prison labor, but most did not respond.
Cargill acknowledged buying goods from prison farms in Tennessee, Arkansas and Ohio, saying they cons uted only a small fraction of the company’s overall volume. It added that “we are now in the process of determining the appropriate remedial action.”
The convict-leasing period, which officially ended in 1928, helped chart the path to America’s modern-day prison-industrial complex.
Incarceration was used not just for punishment or rehabilitation but for profit. A law passed a few years later made it illegal to knowingly transport or sell goods made by incarcerated workers across state lines, though an exception was made for agricultural products. Today, after years of efforts by lawmakers and businesses, corporations are setting up joint ventures with corrections agencies, enabling them to sell almost anything nationwide.During the six-year period the AP examined, surplus raw milk from a Wisconsin prison dairy went to BelGioioso Cheese, which makes Polly-O string cheese and other products that land in grocery stores nationwide like Whole Foods. A California prison provided almonds to Minturn Nut Company, a major producer and exporter. And until 2022, Colorado was raising water buffalo for milk that was sold to giant mozzarella cheesemaker Leprino Foods, which supplies major pizza companies like Domino’s, Pizza Hut and Papa John’s.
But for many states, it’s the work-release programs that have become the biggest cash generators, largely because of the low overhead. In Alabama, for instance, the state brought in more than $32 million in the past five fiscal years after garnishing 40 percent of prisoners’ wages.Incarcerated people also have been contracted to companies that partner with prisons. In Idaho, they’ve sorted and packed the state’s famous potatoes, which are exported and sold to companies nationwide. In Kansas, they’ve been employed at Russell Stover chocolates and Cal-Maine Foods, the country’s largest egg producer. Though the company has since stopped using them, in recent years they were hired in Arizona by Taylor Farms, which sells salad kits in many major grocery stores nationwide and supplies popular fast-food chains and restaurants like Chipotle Mexican Grill.
Some states would not provide the names of companies taking part in transitional prison work programs, citing security concerns. So AP reporters confirmed some prisoners’ private employers with officials running operations on the ground and also followed inmate transport vehicles as they zigzagged through cities and drove down country roads. The vans stopped everywhere from giant meat-processing plants to a chicken and daiquiri restaurant.
Mornin', Winestein.
I can see Yam s working at Orange Julius or at MacDonalds.
He made President though.
tee, hee.
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