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Amid blistering summer temperatures, a federal judge ordered Louisiana to take steps to protect the health and safety of incarcerated workers toiling in the fields of a former slave plantation, saying they face “substantial risk of injury or death.” The state immediately appealed the decision.

U.S. District Judge Brian Jackson issued a temporary restraining order Tuesday, giving the state department of corrections seven days to provide a plan to improve conditions on the so-called farm line at Louisiana State Penitentiary, otherwise known as Angola.

  • worldwidewave@lemmy.world
    44·
    4 months ago

    Seriously

    Last year, several men incarcerated at Angola along with the New Orleans-based advocacy group Voice of the Experienced (VOTE) filed a class-action lawsuit alleging cruel and unusual punishment and forced labor in the fields of the maximum security prison, once a former slave plantation that spans some 18,000 acres. The men, most of whom are Black, said they use hoes and shovels or stoop to pick crops by hand in dangerously hot temperatures as armed guards look on. If they refuse to work or fail to meet quotas, they can be sent to solitary confinement or face other punishment, according to disciplinary guidelines.

    • Boddhisatva@lemmy.world
      461·
      4 months ago

      Seems like a good time to point out that slavery was not really abolished by the 13th Amendment.

      Section 1

      Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

      Emphasis mine. Former does not belong in that sentence. That is a current slave plantation and those are slaves.