This letter was written by a person incarcerated at Metropolitan Detention Center.
I was placed in a cell by myself in a quarantine pod with no access to the usual amenities such as the book castor, hot water for noodle soups, coffee, tea, etcetera, which is normally made available in a shared coffee pot either on a table, plugged into an outlet, in an open pod, or on a cart wheeled from cell to cell at certain times of day.
I was able to make phone calls and take showers during my out time, though as usual, the ability to actually reach people on the phone depended on their availability whenever out time happened to be. It could be in the morning, afternoon, or evening.
We couldn’t order commissary but every week we were given a small number of pencils, stamped envelopes, and sheets of paper, honey buns, Ramen noodle soups, single-serve coffees, dehydrated refried beans, tuna pouches, mayonnaise packets, tortilla wraps, hot Cheetos, honey barbeque twists and chili-flavored Fritos.
Our entertainment consisted solely of whatever was on TV, with whoever had out time at the moment getting to control the channel and volume, except when the jail staff put on DVDs such as “Final Destination” or “Game of Thrones”. We watched a lot of “Court TV” and “Jerry Springer”-type shows and sometimes the news.
