When the Heat Comes for the Old: Georgia's Aging Prisoners Brace for Another Deadly Summer

Only 3 of Georgia's 35 prisons are fully air-conditioned. 13,000+ people over 50 are locked inside. Summer 2026 is forecast hotter than last year. Georgia is not ready. https://gps.press/when-the-heat-comes-for-the-old-georgias-aging-prisoners-brace-for-another-deadl...

Only 3 of Georgia's 35 state prisons have working air conditioning in housing units. More than 13,000 people over the age of 50 are incarcerated in those facilities right now — including roughly 5,700 who are 60 or older. Summer 2026 is projected to be hotter than 2025, which was already hotter than 2024. The infrastructure to protect them — air conditioning, ventilation, adequate medical staffing — has, in most facilities, never existed. When 27-year-old Juan Carlos Ramirez died at Telfair State Prison in July 2023 with an internal body temperature of 107°F after spending hours in an outdoor cage with no shade on a 105°F heat-index day, GDC classified his death as 'natural causes.' Georgia has since stopped releasing causes of death for people who die in its custody altogether. Federal courts in Texas and Florida have already begun ruling that uncooled Southern prisons violate the Eighth Amendment. Georgia has 1,795 in-custody deaths since 2020 and no public heat-illness reporting system. How many more people have to die before Georgia is held to the same standard? https://gps.press/when-the-heat-comes-for-the-old-georgias-aging-prisoners-brace-for-another-deadly-summer/

Only 3 of Georgia's 35 state prisons are fully air-conditioned in housing units. More than 13,000 people over 50 are incarcerated in those facilities — including 5,700 who are 60 or older. Summer 2026 is projected to be hotter than last year. The standard cooling intervention in most Georgia dorms is a box fan blowing 95-degree air. There is no maximum permissible heat index. There is no public heat-illness reporting system. When 27-year-old Juan Carlos Ramirez died with an internal temperature of 107°F at Telfair State Prison, Georgia called it natural causes. Federal courts in Texas and Florida are calling the same conditions unconstitutional. Georgia has 1,795 in-custody deaths since 2020 and no answers. Read the full investigation at the link in our bio. https://gps.press/when-the-heat-comes-for-the-old-georgias-aging-prisoners-brace-for-another-deadly-summer/ #GeorgiaPrisons #PrisonReform #CriminalJustice #GPS #MassIncarceration #Georgia

A new GPS investigation documents the convergence of three compounding crises inside Georgia's prison system: a rapidly aging incarcerated population, chronically failed cooling infrastructure, and a state that has stopped publicly reporting causes of death. Only 3 of Georgia's 35 state prisons are fully air-conditioned in housing units. More than 13,000 people over the age of 50 are currently incarcerated in GDC custody — the fastest-growing age demographic in the system — and peer-reviewed research published in JAMA Network Open and PLOS ONE has established a direct, statistically significant link between uncooled prison housing and elevated mortality, particularly from cardiovascular causes. Federal courts in Texas and Florida have begun issuing rulings that uncooled Southern prison housing violates the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. The U.S. Department of Justice's October 2024 findings letter on Georgia prisons already concluded there is reasonable cause to believe GDC violates the Eighth Amendment. Georgia has recorded 1,795 in-custody deaths since 2020, has no public heat-illness incident reporting system, and no published policy establishing a maximum permissible heat index in housing areas. The legal and public health trajectory is clear. The policy response has not begun. Full investigation: https://gps.press/when-the-heat-comes-for-the-old-georgias-aging-prisoners-brace-for-another-deadly-summer/