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Illinois Lawmakers Decry Prison’s ‘Gut-Wrenching,’ ‘Heartbreaking’ Conditions
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The Marshall Project
After The Marshall Project found scores of fires set by men at a Joliet prison, legislators want improved fire safety and mental health treatment.
Illinois lawmakers are calling for changes at the Joliet Treatment Center, after a Marshall Project, Chicago Sun-Times and WBEZ investigation exposed an epidemic of fires that resulted in two deaths at the prison.
In the last three years, there have been more than 70 fires at the prison, including a dozen cases of self-immolation, the investigation found.
The state opened the Joliet Treatment Center in 2017 to provide treatment to people in prison who have serious mental illnesses.
“A facility built to provide treatment and hope should not be the subject of findings like these,” she wrote.