Frankly, I think everyone currently in the custody of the AL DOC is in dire need of care, supervision and safety. All of them. In my opinion, when the state takes custody of someone, whether that is a child through CPS, an inmate through the courts, or a patient in a mental hospital the state is then required to provide proper care for that person. And it's evident through the court documents that I've previously linked that AL DOC is failing on every single measure of humane and responsible treatment for the people they've taken custody of.
It's now been five years since the court issued all kinds of injunctions and demands on the AL DOC, none of which they've complied with. In fact, the rates of everything - homicide, suicide, rape, assault - have done nothing but go UP in the last 5 years. I don't understand why it's taken the US Department of Justice this long to step in an attempt to wrest control from the AL DOC. It's about time, but that's 5 years too late, in my opinion.
If I were stuck in that barbaric system with no help or end in sight I might just escape too, or die trying. Or confess to a murder I didn't even commit.
It's a fair assumption that Vicky White knew how bad things were at Donaldson and the other state prisons, not just from Casey's accounts but also from the stories from all the other inmates who have been cycling through that system for years. She probably heard about it daily. And it's not like she could go out and advocate for prison reform in AL. They'd have fired her on the spot.
I don't agree with what Vicky White did and I am not advocating committing crimes to change the system. But I have come to an uncomfortable understanding (not defense) of what happened here. And I understand Vicky's symbolic gesture of dropping her retirement paperwork on her way out. It was her way of officially saying, "I'm done with you people and your system."
All my own humble opinion.