This story was told by a person incarcerated at New Folsom.
Caller: So once we got this COVID, so when COVID was finally being brought up and stuff like that, you know, that’s when I started to be suspicious because my celly, he was, I often find him you know, having respiratory problems in the cell, you know.
And I have to, you know, help him up the stairs when we go out to dayroom and things like that. And, you know, I just noticed his health was kind of deteriorating in the cell because usually, we’re playing cards, we’re playing pin-up, or we’re playing poker. You know, he’s usually upbeat even though, you know, he was old, but he still had some pep in his step.
So I noticed that, you know, when we get up in the morning when they come from, you know, when they bring our breakfast, you know, he used to get up and things like that, and I noticed he had just He won’t get up and things like that. So I started, you know, being worried about him. So I told him, you know, “You might want to,” you know, “See what’s going on.”
He kept saying he was all right, you know, it’s old age, you know, things like that. I’m like, I was like, “Are you sure?” He was like “Yeah,” you know, “I’m old,” you know. I say, “Usually,” you know, “You up, what’s going on? Are you depressed?” You know, “Was something going on?”
So you know, he assured me that it wasn’t anything. So me being the person that I am when I went out, you know, to – I had a nurse appointment for myself because I’m asthmatic. So we get a checkup every now and then. So when I was down at the nurse’s station, a nurse that, you know, I’m familiar with, that I’ve known for a long time.
I’ve been at this prison for 10 years now. So this nurse, you know, she’s been knowing me for a while. So I asked her I said, you know, “Can you – can you, you know, check on my celly? Can you call him down for an appointment? You know, check on him ’cause I think something’s wrong” you know.
“Can you just -” you know and she asked me, you know – you know, what was going on with him, you know – you know. So I kind of just laid a little bit out for her, you know, and she’s like, “I’ll send him down for an appointment” and what not. So he gets a ducat and I was like, “Oh,” so when he got the ducat in the mail, I was like, “Oh, you got -,” I play it like I didn’t know what was going on.
I said, “Oh you got a ducat in the – ducat for medical. You might want to go see, you know, just, you know, get a checkup just to see if you are all right,” you know, but the whole time I was behind it.
So he goes, I talk him into going, he goes down, they check his vitals or whatnot. So he takes some lab results and things like that. So basically, this is what happened, he didn’t come back from medical because usually program shuts down, like if all movement in prison shuts down, actually before 4:00 because it’s count time.
