Fulton inmate describes ‘sickening’ living conditions in state prison

FULTON, Mo. (KMIZ)

Like sitting in front of an oven.

That's how Fulton Diagnostic and Reception Center inmate Kenneth Golden describes summer afternoons lately.

"Once you get to the morning time, it starts to get a little rough and then by lunch, the hottest point of the day, it's like sitting in front of an oven with no airflow through the cell at all," Golden said.

Golden said he's witnessed many of his fellow inmates fall sick from heat-related illnesses.

Golden has been an inmate at the FRDC for two months now and calls the treatment of the inmates and their living conditions "sickening."

FRDC has air conditioning in its administrative, transitional care, infirmaries and segregated housing units.

However, the FRDC does not have air conditioning in its inmate housing. The Missouri General Assembly approved the funding for the installation during the 2023 legislative session and it is part of the state budget for fiscal 2024.

Karen Pojmann, a spokesperson for the Department of Corrections, previously told ABC 17 News that the installation is expected to be completed in January 2026.

Golden said that during the summer months nighttime is sometimes the only relief inmates are able to find from the heat. This summer in particular has seen several stretches of temperatures over 90 degrees and the past week saw several days with the heat index over 100 degrees.

Pojmann said to accommodate inmates in the meantime, FRDC has placed giant fans in all buildings, is giving inmates ice three times a day and water throughout the day and restricts physical activity when it is too hot.

However, Golden says the ice the inmates are given is kept in unsanitary coolers.

"They're falling apart full of mold, hair, bugs. When you got to wash them out in the shower where there's showers are full of mold and spiders and everything else," Golden said.

ABC 17 News received a call on Sunday about sewage coming up from the showers at FRDC. They claimed inmates had to clean it up with their bare hands. Golden said he was one of the inmates on cleanup detail.

"The walk men yeah, they have to clean it out of their hands me and one other guy, we’re the walk men in our wing," Golden said. "We're not allowed to have gloves, and they give us a bottle of mixture of bleach and water to clean it with."

When asked about the relationship between the inmates and the corrections officers, Golden said some of them are understanding and try to help the inmates but others have bad intentions.

"We get some of them that come in and they sit up in the AC room that they have and pretty much taunting us about it, and then threatening to lock our ice chest up from us if we're not listening," Golden said.

Kenneth's wife Crystal Golden tells ABC 17 she trusted the facility to take care of her husband.

“They did a crime, but they still don't deserve to live the way that they are living because they have dads in there, that got kids out here," Crystal Golden said. "This is people that you care about that's in there. It's horrible that you can't do anything about it. You're just stuck out here. They're stuck in there.”

ABC 17 News reached out to the Missouri Department of Corrections with these claims. Karen Pojmann a spokesperson for the DOC said in an email "There have been no reports of any issues with water, sewage or other utilities at FRDC."

Crystal Golden says she wants the FRDC to be held accountable for these conditions they have subjected the inmates to.