An inmate awaiting trial on a murder charge is suing the county, complaining he has lost more than 100 pounds because of the jailhouse menu.
Broderick Lloyd Laswell says he isn't happy that he's down to 308 pounds after eight months in the Benton County jail. He has filed a federal lawsuit complaining the jail doesn't provide inmates with enough food.
According to the suit, Laswell weighed 413 pounds when he was jailed in September. Police say he and a co-defendant fatally beat and stabbed a man, then set his home on fire.
"On several occasions I have started to do some exercising and my vision went blurry and I felt like I was going to pass out," Laswell wrote in his complaint. "About an hour after each meal my stomach starts to hurt and growl. I feel hungry again."
But Laswell then goes on to complain that he undertakes little vigorous activity.
"If we are in a small pod all day (and) do next to nothing for physical exercise, we should not lose weight," the suit says. "The only reason we lost weight in here is because we are literally being starved to death."
The suit also asks that the county be ordered to serve hot meals. The jail has served only cold food for years.
The meals, provided through Aramark Correctional Institution Services, average 3,000 calories a day, jail Capt. Hunter Petray told The Morning News of northwest Arkansas for a story Saturday.
A typical Western diet consists of 2,000 to 3,000 calories a day.
Laswell's suit was filed without a lawyer in U.S. District Court in Fayetteville.
Altogether now: W... T... F...
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shit...let him grow some 'ucking veggies in a small container garden on his cell window. Maybe next time he'll watch martha Stewart instead of burning homes.
__________________ "I'm growing older but not up. My metabolic rate is pleasantly stuck. So let the winds of change blow over my head. I'd rather die while I'm living then live while I'm dead."
Ok, so here I go playing devil's advocate just a smidge...
After reading books like The Innocent Man and watching documentaries like After Innocence based on work by the Innocence Project, I truly am appalled by our justice system and the prison systems. The amount of innocent people imprisoned by our justice system is amazing and heart breaking. We still have MAJOR trouble in our Houston crime lab...lying, cheating, forging tests. Really awful.
Offerring 3000 calories a day of stinkin', smelly dog poo doesn't make in nutritious, humane or let us off the hook.
I in no way want to let this man off the hook either. Beating someone to death, burning their house, weighing 400 lbs. Unexcusable. But let's not pretend that what he's living in are humane conditions.
Ok, so here I go playing devil's advocate just a smidge...
After reading books like The Innocent Man and watching documentaries like After Innocence based on work by the Innocence Project, I truly am appalled by our justice system and the prison systems. The amount of innocent people imprisoned by our justice system is amazing and heart breaking. We still have MAJOR trouble in our Houston crime lab...lying, cheating, forging tests. Really awful.
Offerring 3000 calories a day of stinkin', smelly dog poo doesn't make in nutritious, humane or let us off the hook.
I in no way want to let this man off the hook either. Beating someone to death, burning their house, weighing 400 lbs. Unexcusable. But let's not pretend that what he's living in are humane conditions.
+1, and far more articulately than I could have said it. Thanks Jamie!
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When you break the law, especially to the degree he did--hello, he killed someone, and rather brutally at that--you lose any right to complain. I'm willing to bet the prison lifestyle is a step up for the guy. Free food, free housing, free exercise, free cable, free laundry service. Please, if there's one thing the Soviets got right, it was their prison conditions (reasons for imprisonment notwithstanding).
Just remember that our tax dollars--this was filed in US District Court, so it's a federal affair now--are not only supporting this worthless pile of crap, but they will also pay for this litigation process. I agree there are inherent problems in our judicial system, but the only problem in this case is allowing this guy a voice. As Dean Wormer said, "Drunk, fat, and stupid is no way to go through life, son."
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I think we ought to use the opportunity to do some checking, some investigation. I have eaten Aramark food before, as a college student, and where it wasn't a steaming pile of poo, it wasn't very good and so over cooked there was nothing nutritive (did I just make up a word?) about it.
After being exposed to the sources I listed above, there seems to be so much corruption (the DA in Grisham's book refused to ever apologize for the life he'd ruined even when DNA completely exhonerated the man...not to mention that the DA had not one shred of evidence to convict in the first place. not only did this DA get a conviction he got the death penalty) that to me it doesn't seem unlikely that what this inmate is complaining about is actually untrue.
He's awaiting trial, they haven't convicted him yet.
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Feed him all he cares to eat as far as I am concerned. Let him get to be 500#. At that weight he should be dead before he gets a chance at parole. This is based on the assumption that he is guilty, of course.
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Of course it would be better to have healthier and more nutritious food, but no one's specifically trying to screw the inmates with bad food. Look at school and hospital cafeterias as an example of places where we love people, want them to do well, and still screw them over, nutritionally.
Of course it would be better to have healthier and more nutritious food, but no one's specifically trying to screw the inmates with bad food.
I disagree. A former correctional officer is in my unit. I am often appalled by his stories.
They would often leave an inmate they did not care for in solitary without any access to bathroom facilities. Then, they would purposefully throw his food (food that he describes himself as disgusting at best) into the inmates urine or feces, just to fuck with him.
There is no excuse for the things he and his fellow CO's have done.
Also, if this guy is yet proven guilty, nobody here has any right to call him a murderer.
Check yourself before you wreck yourself!
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You guys (with the exception of Jamie and Sal) keep speaking as if he's a convicted murder. 1. he's not, and 2. even if he was, he might not have actually been guilty, and 3. even if he was, we do not treat people as less than human here in America. Or we shouldn't, anyways.
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You guys (with the exception of Jamie and Sal) keep speaking as if he's a convicted murder. 1. he's not, and 2. even if he was, he might not have actually been guilty, and 3. even if he was, we do not treat people as less than human here in America. Or we shouldn't, anyways.
Thanks for the support... I didn't say he was presumed innocent, so I think he's guilty? I'll try to be more outspoken on those aspects when that's not really the subject at hand.
All I'm saying is that, from what he said, he's not given enough food and the food is all cold food (the style).
Quote:
Originally Posted by BeachHead
I disagree. A former correctional officer is in my unit. I am often appalled by his stories.
They would often leave an inmate they did not care for in solitary without any access to bathroom facilities. Then, they would purposefully throw his food (food that he describes himself as disgusting at best) into the inmates urine or feces, just to fuck with him.
There is no excuse for the things he and his fellow CO's have done.
Also, if this guy is yet proven guilty, nobody here has any right to call him a murderer.
Check yourself before you wreck yourself!
He's not complaining about any of that type of thing.
You guys are projecting here. It's like if my son complained that the school put him in time out and I started yelling about how schools beat kids. Maybe they do, but my son's school doesn't beat kids. The two subjects have nothing to do with one another.
You guys are understandably angry at the justice system, but that's not the subject. He gets cold-style food that's not enough to support his overweight body. Do you think he deserves hot food? Do you think he deserves more food?
Lots of places have poor nutrition plans and supply crap. No one thinks that evil administrators are trying to screw the kids at local schools, do they? They think they make poor choices and waste money, more likely.
The hand of evil may truly be at work here, but the man hasn't indicated anything like that yet.
And your projecting that every thing is hunky dory in the guys prison experience and that he's just a big fat complainer.
Maybe the article didn't do his situation justice. Have you read/seen any of the things that I mentioned? Have you been in prison...I have not, so my references are all I have to go on.
Anger maybe a bit of a stretch to label my feelings. All I am saying is that it seems premature, based on my reading, to totally disregard his complaint.
Police say he and a co-defendant fatally beat and stabbed a man, then set his home on fire.
Shark while I agree with your sentiment in principal what would you suggest that we do with all the people that we have out there commiting crimes like this and worse. I have always been torn on this subject because when you look at it from one side of the coin you don't want to stoop to the criminals level and treat anyone disrespectfully. Then you look at it from the victim's (or victims family) point of view and they see someone still breathing and often with a chance of parole while their loved one has long been buried.
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Lost Dog, I was actually commenting on your statement that no one is trying to screw the inmates with bad food. I personally know a correctional officer who has particpated in doing just that. Is that technically a good argument on my part? No, personal references are crap. You can assume I'm lieing if you'd like. It doesn't really bother me any.
There is no projecting when it comes to innocent until proven guilty, either.
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afghanistan: such a shitty place, even Bono doesn't care about it.
The guy didn't complain that his food was being thrown in his own urine, or that he was thrown into solitary confinement just because the guard didn't like him.
He's not complaining that conditions in prison are terrible (RW, this is for you). I only read what Phaedrus quoted from the article but from that he isn't claiming innocence or wrongful imprisonment. He isn't speaking about being beaten or tortured or anything else.
This once 400lb man is complaining that the prison made him go on a diet.
You can talk about other conditions inside the prison all you want, and you may be right in your opinions, but that's not what is being discussed here. You're stretching it bigtime.
He's upset that he had to go from grossly obese to just plain obese (assuming he's not like that 400lb strongman competitor, I forget his name).
Like I posted earlier he's awaiting trial, which means he may be innocent. That's a fair enough argument. But is being forced to go from >400lbs to 308lbs really that much of a punishment?
Almost sounds like they're doing him a favour.
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-Dave Tate
Ok, so here I go playing devil's advocate just a smidge...
After reading books like The Innocent Man and watching documentaries like After Innocence based on work by the Innocence Project, I truly am appalled by our justice system and the prison systems. The amount of innocent people imprisoned by our justice system is amazing and heart breaking. We still have MAJOR trouble in our Houston crime lab...lying, cheating, forging tests. Really awful.
Offerring 3000 calories a day of stinkin', smelly dog poo doesn't make in nutritious, humane or let us off the hook.
I in no way want to let this man off the hook either. Beating someone to death, burning their house, weighing 400 lbs. Unexcusable. But let's not pretend that what he's living in are humane conditions.
+2. If he was being fed a nutritious diet and was trying to lose weight while incarcerated, then his ~4 lbs/week loss wouldn't be a problem - it would be commendable. The fact that he is involuntarily losing this weight says something is not balanced. He may eventually come to appreciate the weight loss, but until that point, something is not right. This guy is under state care - they have a duty to keep him fed.
The guy didn't complain that his food was being thrown in his own urine, or that he was thrown into solitary confinement just because the guard didn't like him.
He's not complaining that conditions in prison are terrible (RW, this is for you). I only read what Phaedrus quoted from the article but from that he isn't claiming innocence or wrongful imprisonment. He isn't speaking about being beaten or tortured or anything else.
Okay world, lets work on not misquoting me or putting words in my mouth.
I was responding to one statement, only.
It went something like, "nobody is trying to screw the inmates with bad food."
I was just adding my .02 cents in that I know CO's that do just this. End of statement.
My second statement was in reference to the fact that he is innocent until proven guilty. So please do us a favor and treat him the way the justice system is setup to protect the accused. If you were accused of something, you'd want the same respect.
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afghanistan: such a shitty place, even Bono doesn't care about it.
Shark while I agree with your sentiment in principal what would you suggest that we do with all the people that we have out there commiting crimes like this and worse. I have always been torn on this subject because when you look at it from one side of the coin you don't want to stoop to the criminals level and treat anyone disrespectfully. Then you look at it from the victim's (or victims family) point of view and they see someone still breathing and often with a chance of parole while their loved one has long been buried.
Just 90 miles south of you is a living example of why we assume people are innocent and why, even when they are convicted to death row, we still wonder and give them a chance to appeal. I was always a staunch supporter of capital punishment - until I saw a system that was so fucked up that college journalism students were able to start a process that caused a moratorium on all executions and the release of many convicted 'murderers' who were actually innocent.
Shark while I agree with your sentiment in principal what would you suggest that we do with all the people that we have out there commiting crimes like this and worse. I have always been torn on this subject because when you look at it from one side of the coin you don't want to stoop to the criminals level and treat anyone disrespectfully. Then you look at it from the victim's (or victims family) point of view and they see someone still breathing and often with a chance of parole while their loved one has long been buried.
Latter posts by Kaiser, RedWifey, et al do my feelings far more justice than my own words could (i'm not 100% articulate today). I'll refer you to those posts.
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I don't get it. I agree with those of you who say the prison system is bad, that there are bad guards, and that some systems screw the inmates. But, except for cold food and not enough of it, I don't see his complaining about all those other things.
I never said everything was hunky dorey. I didn't project any of that. I merely gave other examples of where we love and cherish the people under our care and still give them bad food. That indicates, lacking other evidence or complaints, that we're not trying to screw the guy by giving him cold food and not enough.
You've made this into an emotional issue and taken what most of us have said (or not said) and twisted it around like we are supporting a system that may be corrupt.
When we say that prisoners don't have a right to enough food to keep them obese (which is what we could debate here) or that they need to have hot-style foods, rather than cold-style foods, you're taking that to assume that we support all sorts of other cruelties in the prison system.
RW--Yes. I've read about all that stuff and I think it's horrible and something should be done about it.
Sal--Those guys are evil and deserve to be punished. I never indicated that you were lying or that I didn't believe you. I do.
BTW, I don't have a problem if the thread goes the way of a discussion on the horrors of the prison/justice system. But, don't assume that because we think 3000 calories of cold-style food is not horrible, that we are okay with letting all the rest slide, too.
I'm not even accusing the prison system of bad food. All I am saying (or at least trying to) is that b/c of all the other GROSS neglence that it deserves a look.
I don't have an desire to keep an obese man obese. I really don't have any reason to force anyone to feed him hot food. I am just asking that we not totally blow off this presumed innocent man's concern because of his weight. Just consider it.
LD, where I got sucked into this convo was at the point that people were saying "oh big deal, an obsese murderer is losing weight". As we've already discussed, he has not been convicted of anything yet, so he may or may not be a murderer. And until such point, we have an obligation to feed him enough that he does not lose 100 lbs just by virtue of his caloric intake.
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Okay world, lets work on not misquoting me or putting words in my mouth.
I didn't quote you in my post at all. And I didn't put words in your mouth. My point was that you were talking about someone else, someone who isn't this man, and as right as you may be, what those CO's did is irrelevant to the topic at hand (that this man is not getting enough food).
No one ever starved eating 3000 calories a day. Losing 100 lbs in eight months isn't "starvation" when you weigh over 400. If he weighed 200 and he lost 100 lbs, then yes, there would be a problem.
Hot food is not a necessity of life. I honestly don't care if he has to eat cold food. I eat cold food 95% of the time.
Isn't obesity supposed to be unhealthy? So technically, aren't they helping him out of an unhealthy state?
If he went in with a fever and got over it while he was inside, could he charge them for that?
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And major action will certainly make you feel a bit uncomfortable, which is absolutely fine. You've gotta get excited about feeling uncomfortable, you've gotta love feeling slightly uncomfortable, because you know that you're stepping outside the boundaries that you used to create.
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-Dave Tate
I'm not even accusing the prison system of bad food. All I am saying (or at least trying to) is that b/c of all the other GROSS neglence that it deserves a look.
I don't have an desire to keep an obese man obese. I really don't have any reason to force anyone to feed him hot food. I am just asking that we not totally blow off this presumed innocent man's concern because of his weight. Just consider it.
I'm on the fence. I don't know that we have an obligation to feed the guy enough to keep him obese--innocent or guilty--but I don't want to investigate even more (go looking for things) because of two lame complaints (assuming only 3000 calories is a lame complaint) added to "the system's" poor track record.
I'll give the guy his props for not coming up with some really bad stuff, just because. Although, that would've been more likely to start up an investigation.
Quote:
Originally Posted by shark
LD, where I got sucked into this convo was at the point that people were saying "oh big deal, an obsese murderer is losing weight". As we've already discussed, he has not been convicted of anything yet, so he may or may not be a murderer. And until such point, we have an obligation to feed him enough that he does not lose 100 lbs just by virtue of his caloric intake.
I agree on that his status was taken lightly. He was presumed guilty. That's bad.
If we gave him 4158 calories per day (roughly the amount that it would have taken him not to have lost all that weight, based on the math from his time so far), would we not be enablers? What if we did the math wrong and he gained weight? Couldn't he sue us?
I'm being purposely pessimistic here. I'm not sure what responsibility we have. I don't think he should be able to sue and win for gaining, and being "an enabler" to an adult is bad, but not illegal, and not even horribly bad, since he should have some self-control.
Once he's convicted (if we assume guilt), then we don't need to feed him 4158 calories anymore?
AR inmate sues over alleged starvation
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