APPENDIX I

A TYPICAL DAY

A day on death row  begins at 6 a.m. Prisoners are allowed  to shower  three times  per week.  “We’re permitted 10 minutes under  the water,” one inmate said.

“Upon returning to your  cell, you may then shave. You are  provided a disposable razor,  one for all 20  men.  Pity  the  last  few  men.  Now  you can understand why some men have grown a beard.”

Beside  convicted killers,  death row  is home  to “troublemaker  from the  general population.  They are  very disruptive.  They flood  their cells and the  water comes  down on  us. We  suffer from the smoke.    They’re   very    rowdy.   Several   are homosexuals.  We’re  bombarded  by  loud, obscene, filthy language.”

Food was described  as “not all that bad.  It is a balanced  meal.  Considering  the  number  of  men served, the cooks really  do an excellent job,” an inmate said.

Television  restrictions have  been eased. Inmates are now allowed access to psychological and social worker services,  correspondence education courses and the  privilege of borrowing up  to three books from the prison’s law library.

“Thursdays are laundry day.  Your sheets go to the laundry—or should I say sheet;  one is all we now have.

“Each  man is  permitted out  of his  cell for one hour, twice  a week. This is  the only time you’re out, except for the time  in the shower.” If it is cold or  foggy outside, they must  exercise in the cell block.

Residents  of death  row spend  their time reading books and magazines,  writing letters, reading and     re-reading   letters   from    their   wives   and sweethearts, children and relatives. Visitors are  spoken to through a  steel and glass cage with a small opening. Touching is prohibited. The prisoners are  strip-searched before and after each meeting,  as well as  being handcuffed during the visitation.

According to Ohio’s public defender, Randall Dana, “When  you  subject  a  person  to  that  type  of environment, I think it so damages their mind they won’t  be  able  to  function  in  a normal prison environment, much less anything else.”

State  officials have  defended these restrictions for security  reasons. “Our rules  and regulations are  fair,”  a  spokesman  for  the  Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections, said.

Elinor Alger of the American Civil Liberties Union of  Ohio  feels  the  lack  of  prisoner  exercise “approaches unconstitutionality.

“When you  talk about inmates who  may be on death row for as  long as 11 years, you  can get extreme physical degradation, simple  atrophy of muscles,” she  said.  “That’s  important  because  it  isn’t absolutely  true   that  all  death   row  inmates eventually die.”

“All  those people  aren’t going  to be executed,” Dana   continued,   “and   the   state   has   the responsibility to treat them  in a humane way that isn’t cruel and unusual punishment.”

“We don’t  say our rules and  regulations are cast in stone,” said  SOCF Superintendent Terry Morris. “They  are subject  to change,”  but he  also said there are no plans to make any more changes in the near future.

Alger didn’t see the  need for strip-searching the prisoner before and  after visits, especially when they are personally escorted  by an officer to and from the  visiting room. “One  can’t believe, that some of that isn’t harassment.”

Morris  defended  the   handcuffs  and  two  strip searches  because  of  the  possibility  a visitor might  be  able  to  smuggle  a  weapon  or  other contraband into the facility. Inmates cannot touch their visitors  but a small  opening in the  steel and glass  cage can be used  to pass something to the inmate.