It was inside the now-shuttered Federal Correctional Institution in Dublin, California, that a Callahan woman, who asked Action News Jax not to show her face, said she felt helpless.
She said she was held there for 4 months after she was sentenced for defrauding FEMA involving Hurricane Irma.
“We were trapped inside with the monsters,” said the victim. “Couldn’t get help. Couldn’t get anybody to hear us.”
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The prison was known as the “rape club” because of rampant staff-on-inmate sexual misconduct.
The woman Action News Jax talked with said she was one of over 100 women who filed individual lawsuits against the Bureau of Prisons over their treatment at the federal prison in California. She said she received $1.2 million as part of a settlement, but she said the money will not repair the harm that she suffered.
“It’s like a cage,” said the victim. “You are caged like a dog, and you can’t get out.”
The victim stated that the abuse started when Corrections Officer Andrew Jones made these comments to her as she worked in the prison kitchen.
“You look good, and then turned around,” said the victim. “I ignored it and then walked on.”
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And the next day, she said he pulled her back toward an office where there were no cameras, where she said she was raped.
“I sat in my cell, I cried,” said the victim, “I didn’t know what to do.”
She reported it, but she said it was not until two years after she got out, her voice was finally heard.
Last year, the FBI searched the prison as part of a year-long investigation into sexual abuse of inmates by guards.
“People were subject to forcible sexual assault by officers,” said Attorney Amaris Montez, who advocates for prisoners.
The victim said there is one way to protect women in prison.
“If they would take the male guards out of the female prisons, it would stop it,” said the victim.
Jones pleaded guilty in Aug. 2023 and was sentenced to 8 years in prison.
The victim is encouraging those who have loved ones incarcerated to check in on them so that nothing like this happens to others.
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