Sweltering weather in St. Louis sent protesters to a city jail for a second night Saturday after inmates could be heard crying for relief from the triple-digit heat.
Earlier in the day, the city agreed to order five portable air conditioning units to keep inmates in the Medium Security Institution cool as temperatures soared throughout Missouri.
But those A/C units won’t arrive until Monday at the earliest, and city officials estimate it could be the end of the week before they’re installed.
The units will drop the indoor temperature to at least 78 degrees in the facility’s oldest units, Mayor Lyda Krewson said in a statement Saturday.
“I support air conditioning at MSI for the health and safety of everyone who is in jail,” Krewson said.
Ahead of her decision, about 150 people protested the facility’s lack of air conditioning as inhumane Friday, prompting police use of pepper spray as some tried scaling the jail’s fences.
Demonstrators faced off with riot gear-clad cops again on Saturday night as bands of muggy rain storms passed over the city.
A video from the latest protest showed officers dragging at least one person away from a group of demonstrators during a brief scuffle.
The protests were prompted by an alarming video shared to Facebook on Tuesday, where inmates can be heard crying, “help us.”
“We ain’t got no A/C,” one inmate hollers.
The number of arrests both nights was not immediately clear.
The National Weather Service detected a record-breaking temperature of 108 degrees at the St. Louis Lambert International Airport, about 10 miles from the jail, on Saturday. The heat wave is expected to continue through the weekend, according to meteorologists.
The 50-year-old jail facility — known locally as “the workhouse” — has a capacity of about 1,100 people. Most of the inmates are awaiting trial and are unable to afford bail.
Krewson said the facility already has air conditioning in units for women and inmates with medical issues.
Similar heat-related issues have been reported in Texas prisons.
A federal court on Wednesday ordered the state’s Department of Criminal Justice to install air conditioning for inmates sensitive to warm temperatures, such as the elderly and disabled, and to develop a heat wave policy, according to the Houston Chronicle.
Judge Keith P. Ellison ruled that current conditions detailed in testimony appear to violate the U.S. Constitution’s Eighth Amendment on cruel and unusual punishment.
With News Wire Services
