Activists Call For Workhouse To Close After Another Inmate Death

ST. LOUIS, MO — Some in St. Louis are calling for the city's medium security jail, called the Workhouse, to close after the death of an inmate there last week. Authorities have not released the man's identity, but family members have revealed him to be 49-year-old Louis Payton, St. Louis Public Radio reports. Payton died at the jail on August 2, after collapsing. His family say they still don't know his cause of death.

Payton's death isn't the only one at the controversial jail. In May, a 30-year-old inmate, Andre Jones, hanged himself there with a bedsheet. And protesters targeted the facility last year after reports of inmates enduring a 100-degree heat wave without air conditioning. Critics say many of the inmates housed at the facility are there awaiting trial, unable to afford the cash bail to secure their release.

"Virtually every single person suffering in the Workhouse right now is innocent under the law yet being punished because of poverty," said Thomas Harvey, executive director of Arch City Defenders, a legal advocacy group.

A lawsuit against the facility, filed last year, cited mold, rodents and heat as some of the inhumane conditions prisoners were forced to endure.

A spokesman for the mayor's office said the population of the Workhouse has declined over recent months, and that a portion of the proceeds from Proposition 1, a bond referendum approved by voters this week, would be used to improve conditions at the facility.

For activists, that isn't sufficient. They say the Workhouse should be closed.

Read more from St. Louis Public Radio.

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