DOJ: Fulton County Jail 'fails' to protect prisoners from violence, 'atrocious conditions'

A Justice Department official said Thursday that a 16-month investigation found that the Fulton County Jail in Atlanta “fails to adequately protect incarcerated people” from violence.

The probe also found “inhumane, violent and hazardous conditions" for inmates.

“Our investigation finds longstanding, unconstitutional, unlawful and dangerous conditions that jeopardize the lives and wellbeing of the people held there,” said Kristen Clarke, assistant U.S. attorney general for the department’s civil rights division.

“We cannot turn a blind eye to the inhumane, violent and hazardous conditions that people are subjected to inside the Fulton County Jail,” she also said.

Attorney General Merrick B. Garland said the "unconstitutional and unlawful conditions at the Fulton County Jail have persisted for far too long, and we are committed to working with Fulton County and the Fulton County Sherrif’s office to remedy them."

Clarke described detention in the county jail as a "death sentence for dozens of people who have been murdered or who died as a result of the atrocious conditions inside the facility."