DOJ: Alabama prisons are 'cruel and unusual punishment'

The Department of Justice released a report on Wednesday following an investigation into Alabama's prison system, which the department says is in violation of the Constitution's Eighth Amendment. The state, per the report, has failed to adequately protect inmates from violence and sexual abuses and houses them in unsafe conditions.

The DOJ's Civil Rights Division worked with the U.S. Attorney's Offices for the Northern, Middle, and Southern Districts of Alabama to reach the conclusion. Per The Associated Press, the report condemns "virtually every aspect of prison operations." Poor staff training, a free flow of contraband, a high suicide rate, and widespread violence — including reported 600 inmate-on-inmate sexual assaults between late 2016 and April 2018 — plague the 13 state penitentiaries, which house around 16,000 inmates in overcrowded conditions.

DOJ officials have given Alabama 49 days to correct the prison operations, after which the state wold possibly face a federal lawsuit.

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Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey (R) said that the state will work with the DOJ to find a solution.

"This massive undertaking alleges constitutional troubles in the Alabama Department of Corrections which are serious, systemic, and in need of fundamental and comprehensive change," U.S. Attorney Jay Town said in a statement. "That being said, I have great confidence in the State of Alabama's resolve to correct the prison system's problems." Read the report at the Department of Justice.