What state is that? I had the same experience in AggSeg at two different facilities.
Automated lights? What's the torture there? It sounds nice. In fact the only real complaint I had (besides some behavior of the COs) was that in AggSeg, they don't turn off the lights at night. Something about safety and making their inspections easier. You have to devise something to cover your eyes to make it easier to sleep.
Your story about leaving your cell for free time in shackles and cuffs is also a little suspect. These facilities have remote locking cell doors in AggSeg units. Even the older facilities have this with pneumatic locks. They let you out into an area and give you commands over intercom. You are almost never in the same room as a CO. There is no reason for shackles. Getting an AggSeg customer into shackles and cuffs is a whole affair, and dangerous, no one is doing it on a routine basis just for free time, when they have remote locking doors. Also, this is also your time to use the shower, so shackles? no.
I was in a segregated housing unit in the early 2000s in a prison in the northeastern United States.
We interacted with COs, were in the same room as them, and were often directly in front of them.
There were no intercoms in the hole. In general population, these were only really used by inmates who were doing custodial tasks between units.
To leave our cell, our hands were cuffed, through the door hatch before doors were released via radio, prompted by the CO. After, the COs secured our legs with shackles this happened whenever you left your cell.
Shackles were removed to take a shower, hence being watched by a CO the whole time.
What you are calling AggSeg is what they called the segregated housing unit, SHU, or "shoe". Having read others' experiences, this varies based on the prison.
It is interesting to me that you assume that this is a fabrication over considering that things are different in other administrative areas of the United States.
I have no reason to lie about my experiences while being in prison. Normally, I lie about ever having been there.
> Automated lights? What's the torture there?
I don't think I said it was torture, but it was incredibly annoying to me, having an abnormal sleep cycle. I slept with a shirt sleeve on my head, covering my eyes, which would leave me with acne, often.
They went off at like 9PM and came back on at 6AM for breakfast.
Well, I sympathize with your experience. There are some easy parts of the system and a lot of nasty parts. I prefer any type of isolated security housing, just for the safety aspect. Though I met a handful of slightly cool people in GenPop, I was never really interested in socializing with 99% of the people you find inside. GenPop can get really dodgy and dangerous with politics and COs looking the other way, and the COs like to get violent too.
> Normally, I lie about ever having been there.
Same. Somehow HN is the only place I talk about it occasionally.
Automated lights? What's the torture there? It sounds nice. In fact the only real complaint I had (besides some behavior of the COs) was that in AggSeg, they don't turn off the lights at night. Something about safety and making their inspections easier. You have to devise something to cover your eyes to make it easier to sleep.
Your story about leaving your cell for free time in shackles and cuffs is also a little suspect. These facilities have remote locking cell doors in AggSeg units. Even the older facilities have this with pneumatic locks. They let you out into an area and give you commands over intercom. You are almost never in the same room as a CO. There is no reason for shackles. Getting an AggSeg customer into shackles and cuffs is a whole affair, and dangerous, no one is doing it on a routine basis just for free time, when they have remote locking doors. Also, this is also your time to use the shower, so shackles? no.
You're right about incessant screaming though.