Deaths Of Four Convicts

Northern Advocate, 21 October 1938, Page 9

Deaths Of Four Convicts

SAN FRANCISCO, September 1

America has been shocked at prison barbarities disclosed in the investigation of the deaths of four convicts in the Philadelphia County Prison in stuffy cells. The four hunger-striking men were suffocated, and their roasted bodies subsequently found. Charles I. Engard. Secretary of Welfare, said that two men from his office and two State policemen would make a test and subject themselves to the same conditions the prisoners faced In the heated cells termed as “horrible as the black hole of Calcutta.”

“They plan to close the windows and ventilators,” he said, “just-as we understand they were closed on the Sunday night, and have the steam pressure in the radiators turned on to the same degree they were when the prisoners were in there.”

He said he wanted to know if big radiators in the cell block “were really needed just to heat the building in the winter, or if there was something else in mind.”

William B, Mills, superintendent of the prison, said if the building was deliberately planned as a “roaster” he was,unaware of it. Organised Revolt.

The coroner said the convicts suffocated in almost airtight cells, where they Were Confined during an organised revolt against a “monotonous” diet. Steam radiators were turned on full, he declared, arid “in two days’ steaming they (the convicts) literally baked to death.” He asserted “the like has not been seen in history.” Common Pleas Judge Gerald F. Flood placed the coroner and the district attorney in sole charge of the investigation after Coroner Charles A. Hersch charged that the arrest of the two guards by city police was “premature.”

The guards, Alfred W, Brough (39) and Francis Smith (43), were held in £ 500 bail for further hearings. Hersch said the arrests, ordered by Mayor S. Davis Wilson, were made without his knowledge. He declared the action temporarily halted investigations by himself, the district atiorney and the State, in as much as the two guards had volunteered information and that now they “don’t have to talk unless they want to because they are defendants.” 0 Mayor Wilson said he had a statement by a witness that these two men (the guards) turned the steam on, and added: “I did my duty under the law. So far as I am concerned, I shall do nothing more.” Warden’s Statement. Warden William B. Mills, who had claimed that “not a violent hand was laid on prisoners,” said: “Someone, as yet unidentified, closed the windows in the cell blocks and turned on the steam radiators.” The radiators are in a corridor outside the cells, he said, and could not be reached by any prisoner. Next day a group of “tough” guards, whose duties, Coroner Hersch said, included punishing unruly convicts, was blamed for the prison’s deaths. Hersch called this class of guards a “mob of terrorists,” and said; “We are going after members of the mob and find out how they operated.”

He said deaths of the four men indicated that the building had been used intentionally by some of the guards as

a “roaster” for disciplining prisoners. Ho said his investigation indicated that a “higher up” also was responsible for the deaths. It was this official, the coroner declared, who gave the order to “turn on the heat” in the punishment cells.

“We have definite information as to the identity of, the ‘higher up’ who was responsible for the incarceration, punishment and death of these men,” Hersch said. He added that the information concerning the “higher up” was given by four guards during six hours of questioning. Hersch was.convinced the temperature must have been nearly 200 degrees in the cells. One purpose in questioning the guards, the coroner added, was to determine “whether turning on the heat was a common practice” at the prison. Heat On and Off. “We have learned that Captain James McGuire, of the prison staff, returned from a vacation at Wildwood which he cut short on the Sunday,” Hersch said. “It was about 5 o’clock when he went to the isolation block. He found the windows closed and the heat turned on. He ordered guards to turn off the heat and open the windows. Some time later—we don’t know when —the heat was turned on again and the windows closed. What we want to know, in view of these facts, is whether turning on the heat was a common practice.” Of the 20 others incarcerated in the superheated cells, some of them were described as driven “stark mad” by the night of terror, and were ill from shock and fever. Five remained in the hospital in a. precarious state.

Assistant District Attorney John A.. Boyle declared that the four dead mefi had been “tortured intermitteniy for hree days.” Those who survived, he said, were not placed in the isolation cells until the second and third days. “Three days of that heat were more than human flesh could bear,” he said. “That is why four dead and 21 survivors were found by the guards the following morning.” Dr. Martin P. Crane, coroner’s physician, reported the deaths were caused by “heat stroke of the asphytic type.” He explained this meant that the men’s respiratory and circulatory systems, taxed to the limit in an effort to keep their bodies at a normal temperature, were overcome finally and no longer could utilise oxygen. This, he said, led to asphyxiation.