PULASKI STATE PRISON

Analysis written on June 21, 2026.

Pulaski State Prison, opened in 1994 in Hawkinsville, Georgia, is a medium-security women’s facility that, according to GDC records, holds approximately 1,182 women — nearly 2.4 times its original design capacity of 500. The prison has been the focus of sustained investigative reporting by Georgia Prisoners’ Speak (GPS) and other outlets, revealing a legacy of fatal medical neglect, systemic sexual violence, and gang extortion that the U.S. Department of Justice has declared unconstitutional. Since the appointment of Warden Wendy Jackson in 2025, families and incarcerated individuals have reported escalating retaliation, extended lockdowns, and a breakdown of the grievance process. GPS has tracked 26 deaths in custody at Pulaski, while the broader systemwide toll across Georgia’s prisons since 2020 stands at 1,819.

A Legacy of Lethal Medical Neglect

The most devastating chapter at Pulaski State Prison concerns medical care. GPS’s investigative reporting has identified at least 22 women who died under the care of Dr. Yvon Nazaire between 2005 and 2015. The doctor, hired despite a trail of malpractice deaths in New York, was praised by state officials for cutting costs by denying women medical care; GPS found that the state gave him a raise even as the death toll mounted. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that Mollianne Fischer was left in a vegetative state in May 2014 after failing to receive adequate medical attention, and Bonnie Rocheleau, who suffered from COPD, died of pneumonia in March 2015 when her condition went untreated. These cases exemplify a pattern of neglect that the DOJ’s later investigation would underscore.

The lethal toll extends beyond the Nazaire years. GPS’s independently maintained mortality database records 26 deaths at the facility overall. Recent fatalities include Deneica Randall, 28, who died in March 2026, and Ronika Carswell, 50, who died in December 2025. Across all Georgia Department of Corrections facilities, GPS has tracked 1,819 deaths since 2020.

Sexual Violence, Gang Extortion, and Federal Findings

The DOJ’s civil rights investigation, launched after the Ashley Diamond litigation, concluded that sexual assault was “rampant” and that GDC failed to protect incarcerated people, including LGBTI individuals. GPS reporting highlights DOJ-documented at-knifepoint sexual assaults at Pulaski. The October 2024 findings letter explicitly faulted GDC for placing “too much blame on gangs and insufficient emphasis on understaffing,” a dynamic that has allowed security threat groups to control housing units, phones, and food across the system.

At Pulaski itself, the consequences are stark. In May 2024, Deputy Warden Alonzo L. McMillian was arrested for having a sexual relationship with a prisoner and engaging in improper sexual contact on February 24–25. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that McMillian and another supervisor, Clark, were terminated the day of their arrests. That same year, the AJC documented an incident in which officers failed to notice a prisoner being stabbed until an outside caller reported it; the victim said she had been assaulted hours earlier by up to 10 people. In July 2023, a disturbance involving 11 inmates wielding broomsticks, crowbars, and shanks broke out, and chemical spray was used to quell them — with only nine staff responding.

GPS reporting has also documented gang extortion inside the prison. A GPS article in 2022 described gang members using violence to extort money from incarcerated women and their families, and a 2025 report told the story of Pamela Dixon’s daughter, who was subjected to such extortion.

New Leadership, Retaliation, and Daily Chaos

Warden Wendy Jackson was appointed in April 2025. Within months, GPS began receiving reports of retaliation, intimidation, and unsafe conditions. GPS’s investigative article “Pulaski State Prison Crisis: Untested Warden, Deadly History” detailed how families were sounding the alarm, with accounts of retaliatory housing placements, extended lockdowns, and a non-functional grievance process. Inmate and family accounts collected by GPS describe lockdowns during which water to cells was cut off for days, showers and clean clothing were denied, and personal locks were confiscated — leaving individuals vulnerable to theft of purchased property. Some family members have separately alleged to GPS that facility leadership deliberately allowed conditions of violence and drugs to escalate in order to qualify the prison for a tier program, a claim that, if substantiated, would represent a grave misuse of authority.

The day-to-day reality inside the walls is captured in a firsthand narrative published by GPS’s Tell My Story. An incarcerated woman who spent 2023 through July 2025 at Pulaski wrote that no officers were stationed in dormitories for hours at a time; fights lasting 30 minutes left blood and urine on the floors, and when medical emergencies occurred, inmates had to call their families to contact the facility for help. She described block movement to medical and education appointments being routinely missed, and entire dorms punished with commissary restrictions for the actions of a few. “The fire alarm kept ringing and no one came,” she wrote, evoking a larger sense of abandonment.

Overcrowding, Infrastructure Collapse, and Food Safety

Pulaski State Prison was originally designed for 500 women; it now holds nearly 1,200. That crowding ratio places enormous strain on plumbing, kitchen equipment, and housing units. GPS has documented a systemic pattern of deferred maintenance across GDC facilities — broken cell-door locks, inoperative surveillance, pest infestations — that functions as a force multiplier for the violence and classification breakdowns the DOJ identified.

At Pulaski, the physical toll is visible in the kitchen. Georgia Department of Public Health inspection records show that in January 2026, the facility’s kitchen scored a failing 67, with violations including inadequate handwashing, improper food temperatures, and plumbing backups. A follow-up inspection days later produced a 96, but earlier scores in 2025 had ranged from 73 to 83, indicating persistent problems. GPS’s investigation “Dunked, Stacked, and Served” revealed that such rapid score rebounds often mask ongoing sanitation failures — broken dishwashers, roach infestations, and meals served on visibly contaminated trays — that scheduled walkthroughs do not capture. Across Georgia’s prisons, the state spends roughly $1.69 per person per day on food, or less than 60 cents per meal, far below the FDA Thrifty Food Plan estimate of about $10 per day.

Sources

This analysis draws on reporting from Georgia Prisoners’ Speak, including its investigative series on lethal medical neglect, the DOJ civil rights investigation, and food safety; court and news accounts from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution; Georgia Department of Public Health inspection data; federal findings from the U.S. Department of Justice; and inmate and family accounts collected by GPS. Mortality data is drawn from GPS’s independently maintained database.