COLUMN ONE

Doing Timeand Drugsin Chowchilla
Inside the nation's largest women's prison, even the
specter of AIDS can't
slow down a thriving heroin trade that includes the sale
of used infirmary
syringes.
By MARK ARAX, Times Staff Writer

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NEXT STORY HOWCHILLAThe heroin underground here at the largest
women's prison in America never stops scheming, a nimble supplier of
drugs and hypodermic needles and butane lighters, each commanding a
swindler's price. Officials at the Central California Women's
Facility say they have tried to upset the flow, but the drugsblack
tar heroin, crack, speed, marijuanakeep finding a way past the
walls of this sprawling compound amid the farm fields of the San
Joaquin Valley.

Even in the face of AIDS, they concede, the heroin black market has
defied their reach. To shoot the dope, inmates say, they often use
dirty syringes stolen out of medical waste bags from the prison
infirmarythe same infirmary that treats AIDS patients. The theft of
potentially infectious syringes is taking place even as the prison is
beefing up its model AIDS prevention program in which inmates talk
straight to other inmates about the perils of dirty needles and other
risky behavior. "It's just like the free world. There's no problem
getting plenty of dope or needles," said Deborah Frazier, an inmate
with AIDS released last month after serving two years for petty
theft. "Instead of throwing away the needles, the inmate janitors are
stealing them and selling them on the main yard for $50 or $100 a
pop." Warden Teena Farmon does not dispute that there is a
substantial drug problem and that heroin and other narcotics are
flowing into the prison through a variety of means, including food
packages, sent from outside, inmate visits with family and friends,
and an occasional correctional officer willing to smuggle for a price.

This monthaug, in an attempt to slow the supply, the prison began
restricting food packages mailed to inmatesa large source of hidden
drugs. No longer can inmates receive candies and other goods sold in
the canteen, thereby reducing the material guards must inspect. "Just
like the federal government has had a problem stopping drugs from
coming over the border, I've had trouble keeping drugs from crossing
my border," said Farmon, a 29year veteran of the state corrections
system who is known for her candid, headon style. "Every time we
plug one hole, the inmates figure out how to make another one." Drugs
have long been a fact of life inside the nation's prisons, but
corrections officials concede that the problem is especially acute at
this remote penitentiary built on an old almond orchard in Madera
County. One major reason is the institution's sheer size. The prison
houses nearly 3,500 inmates, fully half of whom are held incarcerated
for drug crimes and thefts related to their addictionsa much larger
proportion than in a typical men's prison, corrections officials say.
This burgeoning population is partly a consequence of crack and
heroin seizing the inner city and hitting women as hard as men, and
partly the outcome of tougher sentencing for drug crimes. "I was in
Chowchilla twice, and this last time there were a lot more girls
using heroin," said Frazier, a longtime heroin user who said she got
AIDS by sharing a needle outside prison. "I was surprised by how
young a lot of them are. Heroin's definitely made a comeback."

Numerous Complaints While syringes are prized items in the prison's
black market, Warden Farmon said she had no reason to believe that
large quantities are being stolen from the infirmary. "Can I sit here
today and tell you that no dirty needle has made it out of the
infirmary? I wish I could. But I don't believe there's some rampant
theft going on."

Farmon conceded that neither she nor her medical staff has
investigated the situation. Inmates and prison watchdog groups say
even a cursory look reveals a number of gaps in the disposal of used
syringesgaps that are betraying the prison's goal of slowing the
spread of AIDS. "You can go out on the main yard on any weekend
afternoon and at least a fourth of the inmates are glassyeyed,
scratching and sniffling from a heroin high," said Janine Biagi, who
was released from Chowchilla this month after serving a sixyear term
for conspiracy to manufacture and distribute speed. "The women know
these needles are dirty, and they're trying to clean them with prison
bleach. But the bleach is powdered and cut with detergents. It's not
strong enough to kill the virus that lives in the barrel of the
needle." The theft of syringes from the prison infirmary should come
as no surprise, according to prison watchdog groups. Over the years,
the infirmary at the women's facility has been beset by the lack of a
chief physician and trained staff, and there have been numerous
complaints about inadequate care. Last month, in a victory for
Chowchilla inmates who brought a classaction lawsuit, the state
agreed to pay $1.2 million in fees for attorneys representing the
women. The state also agreed to improve care for AIDS and other
patients who complained about gaps in receiving protease inhibitors
and other medications. "I've talked to 300 inmates over the past four
years, and they consistently tell me that women are getting loaded on
the yards," said Catherine Campbell, a Fresno attorney who
represented inmates in the lawsuit. "It's common knowledge that
inmates are using dirty needles and contracting AIDS inside
Chowchilla." Many inmates were reluctant to talk publicly about the
heroin underground for fear of angering the gangs that control the
traffic. Some drug abusers said they depended on the easy flow of
narcotics to numb prison life and didn't want to say anything that
might curtail the supply.

But concern over AIDS prompted 10 current and former inmates to
provide an unusual peek at the durability of the drug culture, even
behind bars and in the face of death. For the same reason, Warden
Farmon allowed The Times to view a team of AIDS peer counselors as
they addressed a group of new inmates, a graphic presentation laced
with prison slang and dire warnings to "trust no one." It is
difficult to determine the overall number of HIVpositive inmates,
much less the number who may have contracted the disease from dirty
prison needles. The state requires reporting only when an inmate's
immune system deteriorates to fullblown AIDS. "The extent of the
problem is hard to pinpoint. A lot of the women see no advantage in
getting tested because there's no confidentiality and no continuity
of medical care," said Judy Greenspan of the Catholic Charities
HIV/AIDS InPrison Project, based in Oakland. "They prescribe new
drugs and the treatment goes on for a while, but then they run out of
the drug. A lot of the women with HIV feel it's best to wait until
they're released so they can seek medical help on the outside." State
health officials and prison authorities say 14 inmates are being
treated for AIDS here while 50 others have been diagnosed with HIV, a
caseload that has doubled over the past few years. Farmon said she
believes that most cases were contracted on the outside. But inmate
AIDS counselors and prison watchdog groupswho estimate that at
least 150 Chowchilla women may be infected with HIVbelieve a number
contracted the disease from used syringes inside prison. In the early
1990s, inmate Joanne Walker looked at the prison's growing population
of needleusing addicts and saw an AIDS crisis waiting to explode. A
heroin addict fighting the last stages of the disease, she pushed for
an education program that would wash away the ignorance and stigma
and provide basic health information.

When the prison administration balked, Walker set up her own
makeshift program, counseling women that the first step was to get
tested. Over time, the warden became an advocate of an
inmatetoinmate education program, and Walker became one of the
first peer counselors. "Joanne fought and fought, and it took the
strength of the last of her life to make AIDS an issue at
Chowchilla," said former inmate Cynthia Martin. Walker died in 1995.

Successful Program
The peer counseling program, now operating at
seven state
prisons, takes its raw style from the streets. On
a recent morning, a
team of three inmate mentorsone black, one
Latino, one
whiteaddressed new inmates in the prison's
orientation unit.
Denise Belmontes, a former drug addict from
Santa Fe Springs
doing 10 years for carjacking, opened the session
in a voice that
quieted all chatter. She moved seamlessly from
intravenous drug use
("fixing") to homosexual activity ("homosecting")
to tattooing
("tacking").
"There's not supposed to be drugs in prison,
but let's be real,"
she told the group. "Drug activity is here,
tattooing is here. We've
got a gang of Mexicans who can tattoo their butts
off and give you
the virus for free. I've seen HIV people get
tattooed with my own
eyes.
"They have no [liquid] bleach in here, and
that needle is
contaminated. They've stolen contaminated outfits
from the
infirmary. From little contaminated bags. . . . No
one gives a damn
about you."
Alicia Taplett, a Sacramento native serving
16 years to life for
murder, wanted the inmates to know that she too
used to heed that
inner voice that whispered, "Not me." "I know what
you're saying. 'I
don't use drugs. I don't tack. I'm not gay.' I'm
here to tell you that
you never know what you're going to be when you
leave this
[orientation center] and hit the main yard.
There's a lot of temptation
in here, ladies. Trust no one. No one."

Lynn McCoy, a San Diego grandmother serving a 12year sentence for
kidnapping her grandson from what she contends was an abusive home,
ended the session with a plea to get tested. Of the 81 newcomers, 32
signed consent forms. "That's a little low. We normally get half,"
McCoy said. "There's 10 of us peer counselors, and we do this twice a
week, from here to the main yard. Our work is never finished." The
program's successmore than 500 inmates tested for HIV since
Januaryhas not gone unnoticed. State officials have agreed to spend
$250,000 to fund onsite HIV staff coordinators at Chowchilla and
four other prisons. "The peer counselors at Chowchilla are
incredible," said Kathleen Lofstrom, the state health specialist who
helps oversee the program. "With strong support from the warden and
the medical and custody staff, the program is serving as a model for
other institutions."

Constant Flow for Drug Users For all the program's success, however,
its major goal of AIDS prevention is subverted by the easy flow of
drugs and syringes, according to inmates and prison watchdog groups.
The drug paths are multiple and ever changing. They estimated that
more than half the heroin and other drugs comes in through visitation
and the mail. Visitors are allowed to sit with inmates in a
cafeterialike setting. Even though the inmates are later strip
searched, they say it is easy to pass and conceal drugs. Family and
friends are equally adept at finding ways past the mail room's Xray
machines, secreting drugs in cookies and candy, tennis shoe soles and
pant seams. Barbara Williams, a former Kaiser Hospital executive
imprisoned for embezzlement, said the stream of drugs was
astonishing. "Before I went to prison I saw prison on TV, and as bad
as it was portrayed, it came nowhere near the real thing." She was in
a dorm with eight other women, five of them drug abusers. She said
the room stayed dark most of the day, the women passed out on beds.
She said guards suspected what was going on but never searched the room.

"Heroin use went on all the time. It's a business. They make more
money in prison selling dope than they do on the streets. They stay
loaded all the time. I've never seen anything like it." Like
Williams, Cynthia Martin's middleclass assumptions were shaken by
what she saw in three years at the prison. "I'm not a drug user, but
I was educated in drugs in a way I never thought possible. There
wasn't a day that went by that I didn't see inmates involved in some
drug activity. "It was so rampant that women were shooting up all the
time in the laundry, right around the corner from the cop shop," said
Martin, who was convicted of arson. Inmates and prisoner rights
groups say some contrabandincluding marijuana, alcohol and butane
lightersis being brought in by officers. "I've seen guards handing
girls packages and passing drugs," Williams said. Jamie Peterson, a
Santa Clara accountant serving time for forgery, said she longed for
a fifth of Jim Beam whiskey to get her through the Christmas blues
two years ago. An officer, whom she did not name, sneaked in a bottle
in a lunch pail. She paid $50 in cash. "A lot of the drugs are
brought in the same way. You have organized crime on the outside and
organized crime on the inside." Farmon acknowledged that a handful of
correctional officers had left the prison for other posts after
questions were raised about drug trafficking. "Have I actually caught
any staff with drugs in seven years? No. Have staff left here while
there was the potential for concerns? Certainly."

Tackling Problem From Within Prisoner rights advocates, who
generally credit Farmon for her willingness to tackle problems,
contend the warden is downplaying the extent of the breakdown,
especially in the infirmary. They said their work on the medical care
lawsuit showed that inmate janitors were filching used syringes from
medical waste bags. They contend the practice is ongoing, despite
recent infirmary improvements.

"It's almost like deliberate indifference, ignoring a potentially
deadly situation," said former inmate Biagi. "How much would it cost
to get some device that would destroy the syringes like they do in
other states? It would be minuscule." Besides restricting goods sent
in quarterly packages, the warden says she is taking a number of
quiet steps to stem the flow of drugs and syringes. These include
tracking the lot number of any recovered syringe to determine if it
came from the infirmary. "Whenever I speak in the community, people
want to know why we can't stop drugs," Farmon said. "I tell them that
I understand their frustration, but we're dealing with a population
that has 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year to figure
out how to beat me."

The Prison at a Glance
Background: The Central California Women's
Facility opened in
1990 in Chowchilla, a San Joaquin Valley farm
community. It is the
nation's largest women's prison and is one of five
women's prisons
in California.
Inmate Population: Nearly 3,500 in 14 squat
dormitory buildings
and two moretraditional cellblock units. It
houses eight death row
inmates.
Staffing: Warden Tenna Farmon, a 29year
veteran of the state
corrections system, headsstaff of 500 officers and
administrators.
Location: 40 miles north of Fresno. It is one
of two relatively
new state pentitentiariesboth for womenin
Chowchilla, a
community with a population of 12,700.

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