Note: This is a developing story. We’ll update as we receive new information.

Updated 8:07 p.m. April 1 to clarify timeline of original lawsuit and the filing of the amendment.

An Oklahoma Department of Corrections Director of Nursing’s report alleging 200 toe tags were added to a routine supply shipment to her prison is now part of a March 30 amendment to a federal lawsuit filed by 23 inmates against Scott Crow, Director of the Oklahoma Department of Corrections. The amendment alleges inmates are “subjected to inhumane conditions of confinement due to prison overcrowding and inadequate staffing violating the Eighth Amendment” by failing to protect them.

A report from a director of nursing at a state prison in Oklahoma.

Debra K. Hampton, an Oklahoma attorney specializing in criminal law and civil rights violations, reposted the nurses’ story on her Facebook page.

A report from a director of nursing at a state prison in Oklahoma.

The lawsuit, originally filed April 4, 2019, in the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma, had previously been dismissed, but the court granted the plaintiffs leave to amend their complaint and the judge denied a defendant’s motion to dismiss claims related to Eighth Amendment violations on November 18, 2019. Hampton files new new amendment, containing allegations from the ODOC nurse, on March 30 of this year.

Plaintiffs have stated an Eighth Amendment claim based on the state’s alleged deliberate indifference to a substantive risk of serious harm to plaintiffs. Accordingly, defendants’ Motion to Dismiss … is DENIED as to that claim, which remains for resolution.” Order signed by U.S. District Judge Joe Heaton.

The federal lawsuit cites as evidence of the state’s failure to protect inmates the September 14-15, 2019 fights that “erupted in prisons throughout Oklahoma” and resulted in one death and injuries to several inmates and officers before the statewide lockdown; a March 29, 2019 fight at Dick Conner Correctional Center; 2013, 2015, and 2016 riots at Cimarron Correctional Facility, a private prison managed by CoreCivic; and reports that Oklahoma has the highest prison homicide rate in the nation.

In the lawsuit, ODOC spokeswoman Terri Watkins states:

There’s absolutely no question it’s a bad number, and it’s absolutely an issue that we’re looking at and one that no one wants to have, but it exists in the prison system. We’re doing everything in our power… but bad things happen when you’re dealing with bad people.” Statement by Oklahoma Department of Corrections spokeswomen in the proposed second amended complaint filed in federal court on March 30.

ODOC has also released a pandemic guide prominently featuring plans for how to protect staff and what to do with the bodies of deceased inmates.

Oklahoma Department of Corrections Pandemic Planning Guide , dated March 18, 2020, includes all the usual talk of responsibility to staff and inmates, providing resources and maintaining safety, the guide also includes “provisions for storage of dead inmates,” and “infection control when handling the deceased.”

Regarding medications and vaccines, the guide states:

Even if antiviral medication is effective, they will be in extremely short supply. A vaccine for the pandemic viral strain will not be available for some time following the emergence of the pandemic virus. Once a vaccine becomes available, it will be distributed and administered by ODOC based on direction from and in accordance with prioritized groups as established by the OSHD.” Read more at DOC.OK.gov (PDF).

I think we can all guess what it means by “prioritized groups established by the OSHD,” which seems to be a reference to the Oklahoma State Department of Health.

Notice that ODOC not only acknowledges that their prisons are giant petri dishes, but that their responsibility is to “manage” individuals who are “ill or possibly infected and who may be non-compliant.” How chilling is that?

In the event that the above links stop working, you can view the Pandemic Planning Guide here.