Guilty Until Proven Innocent
- Lawson
- Sep 7, 2021
- 5 min read
I'm going to tell you a story. I'd like to say it has a happy ending, but it's a nightmare, and it continues to unravel.
In 2017, my then 39-year-old sister (Keri Burroughs) was convicted and sentenced to 12 years in Federal Prison for a first offense. That being said, it was just the beginning.
My sister is a lifelong type II diabetic who suffers from hypertension, anxiety, ADHD, borderline COPD, and exogenous obesity; most of them hereditary conditions. She now has PTSD to add to her ever expanding constellation of issues.
In June 2020, Keri was released on the CARES Act from the Coleman facility in Florida, to be processed through City of Faith halfway house in Little Rock, and to be released on an ankle monitor to come home to Hot Springs. However, City of Faith took it upon themselves to keep her in their facility (oddly against the BOP’s orders for her to go home). Due to their gross mismanagement and negligence of the residents’ medical needs, Keri had to have a toe surgically amputated from her right foot due to complications of a diabetic ulcer. Shortly thereafter, upon learning Keri was still in the halfway house, the Bureau of Prisons demanded the halfway house release Keri on an ankle monitor to go directly to our mother’s house in Hot Springs; to be monitored by the halfway house.
Understand, Keri had a job less than a month after arriving at the halfway house and continued that job until she had an automobile accident in November while driving back and forth. She then began working at a similar facility in Hot Springs. At no point did she violate any laws; neither federal nor state, as she reestablished herself as a community member and continued to contribute to the gross national product.
Keri did not leave our parents’ property unless she was specifically given permission by the halfway house. She called when she left the house and called upon arrival to her destination, called when she left the destination, and called again when she got home – religiously.
Occasionally, the halfway house would send Mr. Trigg to take a photo of Keri standing on our mother’s front porch, just to prove she was where she was supposed to be. It was like a random drug test, which she had to drive to Little Rock to have once a week as well.
The ankle monitor was causing a pressure ulcer on her leg so it had to be moved.
In May 2021, Keri developed another diabetic ulcer on her left great toe and had to be hospitalized. Due to the fact that she had to have permission from the halfway house to go to the hospital, medical care was delayed and it nearly cost her at minimum her toe, at most her life, because upon admission her kidney functions were elevated to dangerous levels. Keri was septic. Had she been able to go to the hospital immediately when she noticed the ulcer, the care might’ve been started before the damage accelerated.
While in the hospital, her ankle monitor was cut off for imaging (MRI). When she was discharged from the hospital, the halfway house placed a new ankle monitor – a replacement, and possibly a defective one.
June 23, Mr. Trigg came by the house to check on Keri and she was in the storage trailer at our mother’s property. Same land, same property, but in a storage trailer. Mr. Trigg saw her coming out of the building and gave Keri a written violation for not being in her approved residence. Then she was called to the halfway house to have her device interrogated. If you’ve ever been to Hot Springs, you know GPS doesn’t work accurately here. The device (new from the last week of May) showed from June 1 to date that she was in several locations on McFee Street, two of which are foreclosed homes that are padlocked. They issued her the harshest violation possible, an “escape” charge, and held her for the federal marshal to escort her to the detention center.
One of the neighbors, whose home was on the list of addresses, signed an affidavit stating Keri was never at his home. Yet, the halfway house did not reverse their decision and the BOP is holding Keri at Pulaski County Detention Center until she can be moved to a federal prison.
A month into her stay at Pulaski, Keri called me and told me her COVID test came back positive. Keri received the vaccine while she was at home. She has also had headlice in the facility. She is not being allowed to walk around, against CDC recommendations for those with COVID. Her conditions are deplorable and they are not giving her anything like a diabetic diet; they’re feeding her cake and insulin shots. They do not provide blankets or make any accommodations for people like Keri who have medical conditions that existed prior to incarceration at PCSD. She’s cold and miserable and her doctor prescribed that she have a special orthopedic mat for sleeping – yet, she is on a cot and cannot leave it.
As of our most recent conversation, they've decided these humans cannot leave their bunk to void their bowels and bladder. If they do so out of physical necessity, the guards write them up. They are also getting their limited drinking water from the bathroom sink.
Keri is on a diuretic and has already had damage to her kidneys this year from the infection for which she was hospitalized. She has to use the restroom, but that is now being restricted.
The halfway house cited Keri for being on her approved property. The GPS monitor was inaccurate and they aren’t considering that. She was given no trial/hearing where she could assert her proof, and her civil rights were violated and she’s being held while prisoners convicted of MURDER are being sent home because of the COVID outbreak at Pulaski County Detention Center.
We need help – and I have contacted Congressman Bruce Westerman’s office for assistance with the BOP. We need yours to attend to the ongoing suffering of inmates at these facilities. The BOP seems to be trying to kill my sister and that is not acceptable. For her crimes, I’d say losing a toe, almost losing another one and contracting COVID is punishment enough, and not being inside her home is not a worthy enough crime for her to be sent back to prison.
These are human beings, criminals or not, and they're being stripped of all dignity while incarcerated; yet the system expects them all to leave their structured hell and reenter society a better person. The system is geared for failure. When you destroy a person's sense of self, with guilt trips and threats, a misdemeanor goes in but a felon comes out.
Sign up today to help fight for these people!
https://www.thedreamcorps.org/
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