PROTEST

A Bit About the case

In the hours following Alonzo Nathaniel Williamson's death from respiratory distress at Limestone Correctional Facility on May 8th, the Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) chose to adhere to its usual protocol of initiating a medical death investigation to determine the cause of death. Consequently, Mr. Williamson's grieving family is left in the dark about the circumstances surrounding his passing just five days before his 37th.

This situation arose after UAB Hospital ended its long-standing contract with ADOC for conducting autopsies and toxicology screenings on suspected natural and overdose deaths on April 22, 2024, as reported by ADOC to Appleseed.

“Since then, the department has made several inquiries but has been unable to secure another vendor to perform autopsies for ADOC inmates who died from natural causes or suspected overdoses,” the ADOC spokeswoman informed Appleseed.

Under the previous agreement, ADOC paid UAB Hospital $2,200 for each autopsy and $100 for each toxicology test, according to court documents from a lawsuit. This revenue may not have been sufficient to mitigate the repercussions of a recent lawsuit filed by families against UAB after discovering that the bodies of their incarcerated loved ones were returned without internal organs.

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Chase’s body was sent to the state’s lab at the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences for an autopsy, Mr. Mathis said. He was told by ADOC that the autopsy would be done because the death was under criminal investigation. 

ADOC first confirmed for Appleseed that autopsies would no longer be done by the state for suspected natural or overdose deaths. UAB Hospital terminated its longstanding agreement with ADOC to conduct autopsies and/or toxicology screens on suspected natural and overdose deaths on April 22, 2024, ADOC told Appleseed. Families recently filed a lawsuit against UAB after discovering that their incarcerated loved ones’ bodies were returned to them for interment missing internal organs. 

Mr. Mathis has signed up to speak at the upcoming public hearing during the Joint Legislative Prison Oversight Committee meeting on July 24th. He’s still not sure what he’ll say, but knows he wants to talk about the drug crisis in Alabama’s prisons. 

Mr. Mathis said he’d like to see a nationwide news agency come in and expose the crisis in Alabama’s prisons. “So the average person out here can see, because if we had a dog pound that was run like the facility my child’s been at, they’d be pitching a fit,” he said. 

National coverage of Alabama’s horrific prisons has been widespread at least since 2019, and sadly the humanitarian crisis persists. Reports have appeared in USA Today, The New York Times, CNN, Politico, Fox News and more.