FORT WORTH, Texas _ Sandra Shoulders feels like she's living in a horror movie.
Every day, prison staff at FMC Carswell, a federal medical prison in Fort Worth, take about a dozen people out of her unit to get tested for COVID-19. Some of them come back; others do not.
When a woman tests positive for the virus, her mattress is dragged from the room she shares with three other people and stacked in what used to be the TV room. Every day, the mountain of mattresses grows. Shoulders tries to avoid walking past it.
The number of cases at the prison has swelled from three to 130 in the past two weeks. Inmates said they have not been allowed to leave their rooms since last week, cells are not immediately sanitized after someone tests positive, and there's a shortage of cleaning supplies and personal protection equipment.
Out of the 1,373 women at the prison, 645 have been tested and 465 are awaiting test results, according to Bureau of Prisons data.
The women who test positive for COVID-19 are quarantined in solitary confinement, said Steven, whose wife is at Carswell. He asked that he not be identified by his full name out of fear the staff would retaliate against his wife.
"She thinks that she might die and she thinks nobody in that place cares," he said. "And she watches people holding up signs at the men's prison when that (outbreak) happened, and she's saying, 'Why does no one care about what's happening here?'"
The executive assistant for FMC Carswell directed all questions to the Bureau of Prisons. The bureau did not respond to a list of questions sent by the Star-Telegram, which compiled information about the bureau's response to coronavirus based on information posted on its website.
After recording two cases of COVID-19 in April, Carswell saw its third on June 29.
"After that, they started dropping everywhere," said Shoulders, who is serving five years on a 2016 conviction for dealing heroin. "It's like a scary movie."
Carswell is in the only federal medical prison in the country for women. Many inmates have serious medical conditions. Shoulders fears she will die from COVID-19 because she has diabetes and kidney problems.
Multiple women in the prison who did not want to be named out of fear of retaliation wrote the Star-Telegram to describe the conditions. When an inmate tests positive, her belongings are not removed from the shared living space for hours. Inmates are responsible for cleaning the infected rooms but often do not have the proper PPE, two inmates wrote. One inmate who tested positive was allowed to use a shared bathroom, which was not cleaned for hours after she used it.
The inmates are primarily responsible for cleaning the showers, phones and computers the women share, Shoulders said, even though they have not all been tested and do not have the proper cleaning supplies.
The Bureau of Prisons provides inmates with cleaning supplies and has increased sanitation measures in each prison, according to its website.
The commissary, where inmates can usually purchase hygiene products and other items, closed once inmates started testing positive for coronavirus but reopened on Monday.
In a letter Steven shared with the Star-Telegram, his wife wrote that her unit ran out of toilet paper and cleaning supplies. Two other inmates who requested anonymity also said they are running short on cleaning supplies.
Women at Carswell are afraid the virus will spread quickly, multiple inmates told the Star-Telegram.
The women have been on lockdown since March 31. That limits their contact with other units and the outside world, but also traps them in close quarters with one another.
They have been given cloth masks, common areas are sanitized multiple times a day and cells are cleaned at least once a day, according to the bureau.
Staff bring inmates cold sandwiches in paper bags for lunch and dinner, Shoulders said. Video and in-person visitations have not been allowed since March. Steven said he and his daughter have not seen or touched his wife in a year.
"It's constant that she has a fear that she won't ever see us again," he said.
Caroline, a former inmate who asked not to be identified by her full name because she is violating her probation by speaking to people with criminal records, said her friends tell her they may use the phone once a day for 10 minutes. With other communication cut off, women are emailing so much that the computers' keys have started to break off, she said.
"They have not had fresh air in over a week," Caroline said. "The door is never opened for them to be able to go outside. Inside, there is still no air circulating and it is extremely hot."
Steven said his wife fears she won't make it home alive. She is serving a 40-month sentence on a fraud charge. He agrees she deserved to go to prison, but that she and the other women do not deserve the horror that's happening to them.
"That woman is my everything. My best friend," Steven said. "And I got her calling me, crying constantly, fearing for my life, fearing for her life. And she has guards acting like it's a joke."
On Monday, Caroline's friend emailed her to tell her she wants to be cremated if she dies.
In the email, which Caroline shared with the Star-Telegram, the woman told Caroline that she asked her dad "to bury my ashes with my Aunt Sadie and Grandma Helen."
"If it comes to that, he may not have the strength, so please ensure that it gets done," she wrote.
A doctor told Steven and his wife that her medical conditions put her at high risk of becoming seriously ill from COVID-19, but their lawyer has told them a compassionate release is unlikely.
To alleviate crowding in response to the spread of coronavirus, Attorney General William Barr directed the Bureau of Prisons on March 26 to identify and release inmates to temporary home confinement if they have COVID-19 risk factors.
Shoulders said very few women have been granted home confinement. The prison did not respond to questions about how many women have applied for or been granted home confinement.
Inmates do not need to apply to be considered for home confinement, according to the bureau's website, and case management staff are "urgently reviewing" all inmates to determine which ones meet the criteria for it.
