This story is told by a person incarcerated at Corcoran.
UCI: Oh, okay. And what has the COVID situation been like at your facility?
Caller: Well, in my facility, when the outbreak started it was crazy. They came through, they already had an outbreak in part of the section of the prison that I was housed in. Knowing that there’s an outbreak in our unit and knowing that they already got us on quarantine, they still came and took us, cuffed us up, no masks, nothing, took us out and put us in holding cages where we were all on, the cages are, maybe three feet apart, and left us out there for hours, man, while they searched our building.
And they had already came in and tested us the day before and said, we got an outbreak in there. The medical did, they tested us on, like, a Saturday night. They put us all on quarantine, and that’s, you know, 120 guys in our unit. And then, the next day they came after they tested us and told us there was an outbreak.
They took us all out in handcuffs and put us in cages right next to each other and stripped us out. And then, it was pretty bad, man. I’m doing life without parole, I didn’t want to get put on a ventilator. I got high risk medical conditions. I’ve got end stage liver disease.
Man, I wouldn’t come out of my cell for nothing. I wasn’t going to let them check my vitals. I wasn’t coming out of my cell because I was afraid once I’m in handcuffs, you know, I was having problems breathing in my cell.
I got pretty sick. I was sick for, like, two weeks. And everybody in my whole unit got sick, man. We got the vaccine. They finally came with the vaccine. I got my vaccine shots. My first one was in February, my second one was in April of this year.
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: And my poor neighbor, man, that was next to me, he got sick. They transferred him to SATF next door. He got the same vaccines I did, the Pfizer vaccine, and I just got off the phone with his mom, she’s down in San Diego, man, and she hasn’t heard from him in three weeks. He got, what you call it when you get sick again? What you call a breakthrough infection?
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: They haven’t heard from him in three weeks, man.
UCI: Wow.
Caller: And I tried to tell him when I was over there to fill out the medical release things for his family in case he gets sick again. Because CDCR won’t release no information to nobody out there on your medical care unless you’ve signed a waiver.
I took care of mine because of my pre-existing medical care, my medical conditions, my cirrhosis. And now, you know, they gave our contact visits back. We have to sit, you know, six feet apart, wear masks.
You only get two hours a visit. But, at least you can see your two visitors, you know. They only let two people come in to see you.
Now, two days ago, now they’re talking about transportation and brought some guys in from outside, from the hospital, from the streets out there on a medical thing. And they got sick and now they got quarantine over on facility B. So, now we’re like, man, this Delta virus is going to be coming.
We’re all kind of just dreading it, you know?
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: And that’s pretty much it, man. It sucks that, you know, everything you see on TV about the virus, man, everybody’s afraid, you know, figuring, you know, this is it, we’re going to die, you know. It’s like you just wait for it to hit you and ride it out the best that you can, you know.
UCI: Mm-hmm, yeah.
Caller: On another note, my daughter’s a professor. So, when I seen this, I haven’t, I’ll talk to her this weekend. I haven’t shared this with her yet, but I’m going to let her know that I touched bases with you guys.
UCI: Mm-hmm. Would you want to answer a few more questions, if that’s okay?
Caller: Yeah, I just think it’s pretty good what you guys are doing and I wish you guys the best in your endeavor, man.
UCI: Thank you so much for sharing.
Caller: Hey, how long are you guys going to be, and that’s funny if that isn’t your name. I don’t care if the public knows my first name, man I don’t care. You might be a moniker.
I’m saying, if it is a moniker, you picked a good one. Coincidence, man. [Unintelligible], you know.
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: Hey, I noticed when I first read this, right, I was kind of, I was a little skeptical, so I pulled out some of my files and I see professor [redacted]. I’ve purchased a couple of her books and read a lot of her stuff. I looked at the 949 area code, because that’s her area code, too. I said, “Oh, yeah, it’s legit.”
UCI: Yeah, we really appreciate that you’re sharing with us.
Caller: Do you know who professor [redacted] is?
UCI: I’m not sure I’ve heard of them.
Caller: She’s right there at UC Irvine man, she’s UC Irvine. Do you guys got a law department over there?
UCI: Yeah, we do.
Caller: Yeah, she’s over there. Been there quite a while.
UCI: Oh.
Caller: Yeah, she’s a good professor of law, man. She specializes in criminal justice and she’s written a couple of books, man.
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: So, if you don’t know her, I was going to say, if you see her tell her said hi and I appreciate all her hard work.
UCI: Thank you for–
Caller: That’s about it though. Really man, I wish you guys all the best over there, yeah.
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: How long are you guys going to be doing this for?
UCI: Hopefully until we see some sort of pause or some sort of breakthrough in the pandemic. But, I think our goal is to continue to monitor, like, how–
Caller: I do have a – I don’t mean to cut you off, but I do have a question for you.
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: I received in the mail an advertisement from a law firm down there, in Southern California. Actually, the law firm has offices, if I remember right. The reason I’m bringing this up is because I lost the damn paper.
I actually left it with some guys over there where I was locked up at. I was in ad seg when I got sick. The law firm, it offers to take prison pandemic COVID infection cases free of charge.
They get paid when you get paid, they get paid. And the law firm has an office in, Huntington Beach or one office in ‘Frisco, and another one over on the East Coast.
You wouldn’t happen to know what the name of that law firm is? Have you heard of it, by chance?
UCI: I don’t think I’ve heard of that one.
Caller: Well, I’m going to give you some homework to do. I assume you’re a student, correct?
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: All right, what are you majoring in?
UCI: Psychology.
Caller: Psychology, oh, that’s a good one, man. Well, I actually gave four hours of my time, when I plead guilty to my case, I actually gave four hours of my time with a student, criminal psych. She was majoring in criminal psychology up at UC – Sac State. And I told her my whole life story.
She did a thesis on my story. And I said, look, I’m going to sit here and share all this information with you about my life, I only want one thing from you, I want you to send me a copy of it. And she did. She changed my name, she changed all the names in my story that she recorded, and she was true to her word. There was no return address on the envelope, but she sent me a copy of the thesis. I have it there in my cell, man. It’s pretty cool.
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: So, I wish you all the best there.
UCI: Thank you so much. Yeah, thank you for participating in PrisonPandemic, and please consider telling your friends about us and seeing if they would like to call in.
Caller: Hey, I already got, look, just on a historical note.
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: The unit that I’m in, I’ve been in the same unit right here since COVID. It’s called [unintelligible].
It houses notorious people. I lived with [redacted] in here with me for, you know, until he got sick and died, man.
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: Currently in my unit there’s myself and six other guys including [unintelligible]. He’s in there with me. You have to be high profile or be in there for reasons that you can’t be put in a main line housing, you know. [Redacted] is in there. Are you familiar with those names?
UCI: Not too much.
Caller: Okay.
UCI: I’m sorry.
Caller: That’s all right, man. Hey, I did share this with one other guy in my unit and he said he’s going to give you guys, I don’t know when he’s going to call, but he got COVID too, man. He got, I’m surprised that he didn’t die.
I wasn’t here, I was over in lockup. I was in lockup for two years and they sent me back over here in April. But, he’s going to give you a buzz. He’s been down since the [redacted].
UCI: Wow.
Caller: He went outside right now, but he’s going to give you guys a buzz. And if I can talk to these other guys, they’ll probably call as well and share their story with you.
UCI: Thank you so much.
Caller: They got sick in there too, man.
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: It sucks, man. Hey, it sucks to be in here and to be helpless, man, and be at the mercy of other people. Let me tell you something that I think don’t make no sense.
UCI: Mm-hmm.
Caller: These employees that come in here, they test them for coronavirus and they still let them come into work before the test comes back.
Now they got the what you call it test, you know, do it right on the spot, but before they came out with that they test them every week, swab their nose, but they still let them come in until the results. Before they came out with that new testing that they have, before it took, like, seven days to 10 days to get the results back, and they were still coming in and working, man. You know what I mean?
Then, when the results come back then they say, “Oh, okay, you can’t come on grounds, you have to go home and quarantine.” But, they already came in and, you know, passed the seed around to everybody, you know. All right, have you been infected?
UCI: I have not, fortunately.
Caller: All right, man, you stay – I’m glad for you, man. You stay safe, man, all right.
UCI: Thank you.
Caller: Phone’s going to hang up, man.
UCI: Okay.
Caller: Good luck to you, man.
UCI: You, too. Bye.
Caller: All right, have a good night.
UCI: You too, take care.
Caller: All right, bye-bye.
UCI: Bye.
Caller: Bye-bye.
