'Rejected': How federal prisons stonewall grievances and deny care for years
For any problem in an incarcerated person's life — from not getting enough toilet paper to extreme physical abuse — the grievance system is the primary way to speak out. But in the vast majority of cases, those efforts go nowhere, according to an analysis of federal data by The M
For any problem in an incarcerated person's life — from not getting enough toilet paper to extreme physical abuse — the grievance system is the primary way to speak out. But in the vast majority of cases, those efforts go nowhere, according to an analysis of federal data by The Marshall Project and NPR. Michelle Mildenberg Lara for The Marshall Project hide caption
A federal prison doctor first found the mass on Terri McGuire Mollica's uterus in 2016. According to a lawsuit , the fibroid was small, and could be removed with a simple, noninvasive surgery.
But officials at FCI Aliceville, a low-security prison for women in west Alabama, never scheduled the procedure, court and medical records show.
Mollica, then 50, started fainting during heavy periods that lasted nearly two weeks. She used five menstrual pads at a time, she said, with blood often soaking through her prison khakis. The pain was an "8 out of 10," she wrote on multiple sick call forms. In 2018, the same doctor determined the fibroid had grown to the size of a grapefruit. Her uterus swelled as though she were nearly five months pregnant.
Mollica had just one path for recourse: the prison's antiquated administrative remedy system. She would have to fill out a stack of carbon copy forms, following a list of specific rules, and submit them to the warden, then the Bureau of Prisons' regional office and, eventually, Washington, D.C. While she had just weeks to file her complaints and appeals asking for treatment, officials would likely take months to respond.
She would do all that knowing the answer was almost always no.
It has always been difficult to get help inside federal prison. But in recent years, it has become nearly impossible, according to an analysis of federal data by The Marshall Project and NPR. The rate at which the bureau granted grievances has fallen from just under 7% in 2000 to less than 2% in 2023, the last full year of data available.
For any problem in an incarcerated person's life — from not getting enough toilet paper to being subject to extreme physical abuse — the grievance system is the primary way to speak out. But in the vast majority of cases, those efforts go nowhere. Many are rejected without consideration for the content of their complaint, for arcane reasons such as including too many pages or not filing enough copies.
