This article is more than 7 months old

This article is more than 7 months old

Shortly after Mississippi’s newly elected governor vowed to close parts of the state’s most notorious prison, officials announced on Tuesday night that another inmate had died in the system – marking the 13th state prisoner death since late December.

Mississippi’s ageing and underfunded network of prisons has come under renewed scrutiny in recent weeks after a spate of unrest over the new year led to multiple stabbing deaths and a statewide lockdown.

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Most of these deaths have occurred at the notorious Parchman penitentiary, a sprawling prison farm complex constructed in the Jim Crow era and modelled on an antebellum slave plantation, situated in the north of the state.

Much of the unrest occurred in the prison’s most dilapidated and violent quarters, unit 29, where state health inspections combined with contraband cellphone images have documented numerous instances of decay including vermin, mould, overflowing toilets and broken bathroom installations.

During his first state address on Monday, Mississippi’s governor, Tate Reeves, pledged to move towards closing the unit after he toured the facility last week.

“We have to turn the page. This is the first step, and I have asked the department [of corrections] to begin the preparations to make it happen safely, justly and quickly,” Reeves said.

He added: “We will do better. We will right the wrongs of the past, and we will do everything in our power to protect the dignity of every Mississippi life.”

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As governor’s annual state speeches are usually focused on economic and legislative priorities, Reeves’s focus on the prison system highlighted just how deep the current crisis has become.

Just a day after the announcement, corrections department officials confirmed that 28-year-old Limarion Reaves, an inmate at Kemper-Neshoba regional correctional facility, a medium-security prison and jail in the east of the state, had collapsed and died on Tuesday.

The prison’s warden, Johnny Crockett said the inmate, who was serving a three-year sentence for aggravated assault, had been talking on the phone to a relative when he fell ill in the early afternoon. An autopsy was set to determine the cause and manner of death.

Like other facilities in the Mississippi prison system, Kemper-Neshoba has been accused of prisoner neglect on multiple occasions. In October 2019 a lawsuit was filed against the warden and jail staff members by the family of Robert Wayne Johnson, who killed himself at the facility in 2018. The family claim jail staff ignored clear evidence that Johnson, who had a long history of mental health problems intended to kill himself.

Mississippi is in the midst of a prison funding and staffing crisis, as widespread shortages of corrections officers have led to extended lockdowns in multiple prisons, with proposed funding cuts likely to make the situation worse.

Although Reeves has pledged to close unit 29 at Parchman, questions remain about where those inmates will go. The state has the third highest rate of incarceration in the US, and disproportionately imprisons African Americans.