Lockdown In Lockup: A Prisoner At Sing Sing On Life During The COVID-19 Crisis

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«What makes this pandemic so scary is all the unknown factors, writes 40-year-old Mohammed Monsuri.





Lisa R. Cohen



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Lisa R. Cohen





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A guard tower and barbed wire fencing stand outside Sing Sing prison, on Feb. 16 in Ossining, N.Y.





Mark Lennihan/AP



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Mark Lennihan/AP



The Coronavirus Crisis
As COVID-19 Spreads In Prisons, Lockdowns Spark Fear Of More Solitary Confinement

Commissary was one of the few things still running, and very quickly, they ran out of vitamin C and garlic, aka jailhouse penicillin. As the media described the symptoms of COVID-19, I started to worry about infections. I knew the mess hall had to be dangerous, so I started limiting my visits and tried to portion out my store-bought food items.

Other guys tried to petition the administration to require masks for at least the officers, and to allow masks to be sent in from home. The administration did start to take the officers’ temperature.

But because masks were limited at the time, they couldn’t require the officers to wear them. They would not let prisoners receive masks sent from home.

On March 30, Juan Mosquero became the first casualty in the New York state prison system to die from complications of COVID-19.

The next day, Sing Sing posted New York State Department of Health protocols, which included the following: «Personnel required to interact with individuals within 6 feet should wear a face mask while working for 14 days following the last exposure. The officers were now wearing masks.



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During this time, more people started developing symptoms that indicated possible infection with the coronavirus. A housing block was turned into a makeshift quarantine recovery area, as more and more people started testing positive.

One gentleman from my block was quarantined after he tested positive. A few days later, I witnessed guards carrying another man with respiratory problems out of his cell late at night.

Other guys started talking about feeling weird, losing their sense of taste and sense of smell. I put up sheets in front of my bars in an effort to block the errant coughs and sneezes that were happening all around me.

Another guy I know started to have trouble breathing in early April.

«I woke up in my cell … with a shortness of breath and night sweats. I called the officer and he escorted me to the hospital, he told me. «I lost my sense of taste and smell, and I was constantly fatigued. They put me on antiviral drug treatment.

He lost more than a dozen pounds during his time in the infirmary and, later, in quarantine.

I was able to interview him because he eventually recovered. As for the two people in my block, one of them also recovered. I don’t know yet about the other one.



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What makes this pandemic so scary is all the unknown factors. After guards emptied out one inmate’s cell, a rumor began circulating that he had passed from COVID-19. In fact, he had to be admitted to hospice, because he was so ill. I still don’t know about his well-being.

On April 22, I read the New York Daily News and learned that Leonard Carter died on April 14 of COVID-19 while in Queensboro Correctional Facility. Mr. Carter, as I used to call him, taught me to really play chess. I didn’t even know he was in another jail, and now he’s dead, too.

As the weeks turn into months, not knowing becomes the new normal. The courts are closed, and the only thing running in here is the rec yard. Nerves are frayed as we adjust to a new normal in here.

Thankfully, kind souls donated masks for us, and now we are required to wear them when we use the phone or go to the hospital. There has been an attempt at social distancing, but how does that really work in an enclosed environment?



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As we are all doing this as individuals and as a nation, George Floyd is murdered.

«Did you see the news? somebody asked me. «They killed another unarmed Black man.

We almost forgot while dealing with the coronavirus that there is another virus: systemic racism. There are those who say there is no problem of systemic racism. Some of them may have also downplayed the severity of COVID-19. The cost of this denial is carried by Black and brown bodies.

As I head into the summer of 2020, I know there is a lot that I don’t know. I don’t know where my friend is, or how he is. I don’t know when we’ll get our visits back. I also don’t know if the people who I see on TV, who commit the same crimes that some guys in here are doing serious time for, will ever be brought to justice.

The world now seems to me a place of endless unknown variables. The only thing I can do now is to mirror what I believe the whole world is now engaged in: bearing witness.

This audio story was produced by Daniel A. Gross for Radio Diaries, with help from Sarah Kate Kramer, Joe Richman and Nellie Gilles. It was edited by Deborah George and Ben Shapiro. We also had help from Connor Donevan.