The news that 24-year-old inmate Shawndre Delmore died in custody this past week at the Fulton County Jail prompted Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga) to share a letter she wrote in April and sent to Fulton County Sheriff Pat Labat after learning about the September 2022 death of Fulton County inmate LaShawn Thompson, who Greene says was “eaten to death by bed bugs and insects.” (Greene cites Fox News for the description).
[NOTE: The Fulton County Sheriff’s Office confirmed that Delmore died in custody on September 3 after being found unresponsive in his cell on August 31 and taken to the hospital. Delmore is the 10th inmate to die in the jail since January 2023.]
The letter shows Greene in the highly unusual — and perhaps politically uncomfortable — position of being on the same side of an issue as Attorney General Merrick Garland, whose Department of Justice opened a civil investigation into the conditions at the jail in July, prompted by the same event — Thompson’s death — that drove Greene to demand accountability.
As seen in the letter below, Greene claims “it is no secret that Fulton County Jail has a history of neglecting and abusing inmates.”
“Shame on the Fulton County Jail,” Greene writes in her caption, “for their inhumane and deadly conditions.” Greene reminds her followers that she sent the letter “before Trump was ever forced to be arrested there.”
When the DOJ opened its investigation, Attorney General Garland — in agreement with Greene — wrote: “People in prisons and jails are entitled to basic protections of their civil rights.”
A 10th inmate has died inside the Fulton County Jail just this year.
— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@RepMTG) September 7, 2023
Shame on the Fulton County Jail for their inhumane and deadly conditions.
I wrote this letter to Sheriff Labat demanding answers before Trump was ever forced to be arrested there. pic.twitter.com/qxw4u15rqq
When the DOJ investigation was launched, Sheriff Labat said it was welcome, writing:
I have publicly, privately, and repeatedly raised concerns about the dangerous overcrowding, dilapidated infrastructure and critical staffing shortages at the jail. The best possible outcome of the report from the Department of Justice is that it will confirm the findings of the Jail Feasibility Study completed in March of 2023 – that the Rice Street Jail is not viable and a replacement jail is needed.
Fallon McClure, deputy director for policy and advocacy for the Georgia ACLU, said: “The majority of the people who have died in custody have been in custody for a significant amount of time and a lot of them on some particularly small charges.” (Delmore was arrested on April 1 on a burglary charge.)
McClure suggests that the Attorney General “indict people at 90 days… (and) do cite and release on misdemeanors.”
I’m exhausted by the fact that I’m doing interview after interview about people dying in the Fulton County Jail.
— Fallon 🦄 (@FallonMcClureGA) September 7, 2023
I can only imagine how exhausted the human beings housed in the horrific conditions are. The cost is entirely too high. Being arrested shouldn’t be a death sentence pic.twitter.com/ehdriuoYOC
Chairman of Fulton County Board of Commissioners Robb Pitts has another idea: he suggests that Sheriff Labat move some of the inmates from Fulton County to private for-profit facilities, which are about four or five hours outside of Atlanta.
Pitt says: “We’re now considering proposals from two firms, one within the state of Georgia, another outside of the state [in Mississippi], that can accommodate three, four, 500, up to 700 of our inmates.”
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