Rancid, unsafe water at Illinois prisons threatens health, violates human rights, groups allege

Brian Harrington remembers the water in prison.

Sometimes it was brown, or maybe it had black particles. Sometimes it smelled bad, he said.

“You would wake up, and it smelled like a sewer,” he said.

Harrington was 14 when he was sentenced to 25 years for murder. He served just over half that time before Gov. J.B. Pritzker granted him a rare clemency in 2020.

Now Harrington advocates for more humane treatment and better conditions for those incarcerated in the state prisons.

He’s part of a coalition of groups that Monday petitioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, asking that officials there step in and require the Pritzker administration to provide clean water to prisoners.

The petition alleges “chronic and systemic shortcomings” within the state’s departments of corrections, public health and environmental protection.

“A prison sentence is not a license for the state to deprive people of basic necessities,” the groups said in their petition.

Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times

The allegedly rancid water at Illinois prisons violates the federal Safe Drinking Water Act, and the U.S. EPA should step in, the groups led by the Coalition to Decarcerate Illinois said.

The issues have been going on for decades at some prisons, the groups said, adding that there were examples of problems reported even in recent weeks and months.

In January, Legionella bacteria was found at the Joliet Treatment Center, leading to “health conditions like diarrhea and throat irritation,” the groups said.

In March, prisoners complained that the Centralia Correctional Center reported that water service was cut off and that sewage was flowing out of drains and flooding floors.

At one downstate institution, Pontiac Correctional Center, prisoners “report a black oily substance in their water so significant that they use mattress stuffing, sheets and T-shirts to filter the water,” the document to EPA claims. Complaints from incarcerated people date back at least six years at Pontiac, the petitioners said.

At Pontiac and elsewhere, inmates have complained about high blood pressure, headaches and other health issues, the groups said.

Pritzker spokesman Alex Gough said in a statement that the EPA receives water-quality data for prisons from the state, and Illinois environmental officials separately inspect the institutions.

“The most recent drinking water quality data did not reflect any violations of applicable state or federal law,” Gough said.

Problems with water were discovered last year, however, and are being dealt with, he added.

Following inspections in 2022 and 2023, state corrections officials “developed plans to enhance its drinking water infrastructure” and entered into agreements with Illinois environmental regulators.

After complaints, state officials look into the matter, he said, adding that “recent complaints have included concerns regarding cloudy water, discolored water or odor.”

A state consultant’s report last year noted that the Illinois Department of Corrections had $2.5 billion in deferred maintenance, the advocacy groups said.

Last month, the governor announced a plan to rebuild the Stateville Correctional Center, a maximum-security facility near Joliet, and Logan Correctional Center, a women’s prison just north of Springfield.

Harrington, an artist who calls himself King Moosa, is thankful to Pritzker for freeing him from prison.

Now, he hopes the governor will act to help others who are incarcerated.