'The Workhouse': activists celebrate decision to close 'hellish' St Louis jail

[Nevilledog]

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/aug/03/st-louis-workhouse-jail-legislation-close

It has been called an “unspeakably hellish” extension of a racist and classist criminal justice system where those locked up inside live with rats, roaches and black mold.

Known as the Workhouse, the medium security institution in St Louis, Missouri, has gained a reputation as a notorious debtors’ jail, where incarceration was used for decades as an answer to minor technical and fine-related violations, and where large bond fees were extracted from many people detained pre-trial.

Yet this month, galvanized by the Black Lives Matter movement and mass anti-racism protests that reignited after the police killing of George Floyd, Close the Workhouse campaigners are celebrating. On 17 July, the St Louis Board of Aldermen unanimously passed legislation to close the jail by year’s end.

“Today, there’s less than 90 people inside,” Inez Bordeaux, an organizer at ArchCity Defenders, said. “It’s clear that no one can say the Workhouse, this hellhole, is still needed.”

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