donna Konitzer

 Hi Peggy

 

this email is for you, but I need some people in upper management to know about it, as well as that reporter. What they did here to me today is a pretty blatant violation of my 2010 settlement agreement. Their actions today have also resulted in them creating additional causes of action against various DOC staff here at RCI and in upper management, including for violating the terms of the aforementioned agreement, as well as retaliation, sexual harassment, endangering my safety by sexualizing me for my peers by

placing me in a cell that essentially puts me on display for my peers. I'll explain fully in the following paragraphs.

 

The DOC upper management staff who took part in the mediation, negotiation and ultimate agreement to the final draft of the settlement were the DOC Deputy Secretary (the number 2 person in command of the DOC), the DOC Security Chief (this is the person in command of all DOC Security Directors. There is one at every prison), and the DOC Mental Health Director Kevin Kallas MD ( this is the individual who is largely responsible for all the transgender related lawsuits in wisconsin by WI DOC inmates, due to Kallas' oppressive policy initiatives regarding transgender medical care in the WI DOC.

 

I need all of the above described upper management staff to be made aware of what I'm telling you here. This is too serious for quoting me peggy, so please do not quote me. Please use my exact words as written here.

 

.....

 

At approximately 10:00 am on Monday, March 4th, 2024, I was awoken and ordered to the officer's station on Kenosha Unit.  I was informed by Officer Loberg that I was to pack my belongings, as I was being moved to Green Unit.

 

To say that I was stunned is an understatement. Nevertheless, I began packing my belongings. My 59 year old out of shape ass was apparently not moving fast enough, so I was visited at my cell by a prison guard and a female Corrections Supervisor, who I am given to understand after asking several other staff Monday evening, that This Supervisor was a Lieutenant McBride.

 

Lt. McBride ordered me to be done packing and out of my cell by 12:00 noon and on Green Unit before the 12:30 pm count.

 

Although this Supervisor McBride never overtly threatened me, everthing in her demeanor and body language suggested to me that she was going to send me to segregation if I in anyway deviated from this short amount of

time to get off of Kenosha Unit.

 

I barely made it out of my cell on kenosha unit in time, was faint, and sweating profusely. I am not in great shape peggy, I had a recent injury to my neck and have had a lot of pain in the middle of my back lately, in the same spot on both sides.

 

The neck injury was from an attempt to hang myself last year after learning about the mutilation the DOC was calling gender affirming surgery, wanting to provide inmates with a vulva only and discard all the other healthy tissue that normally would have been used to create a vagina. Telling inmates that they could have an additional (and far riskier) surgery when they got released to have a vagina created.

 

I had just reached a point where I just couldnt cope any more with

this stuff. Kallas claims he wasnt behind this, but I can't believe that. Its entirely consistent with what I  have come to expect of him. I'm certain Kallas cooked this up with one of the surgeons at UW Health in Madison. That surgeons name is Katherine Gast MD.  She's the head of UW Health's Gender Services Program.

 

Because I didnt want to end up in segregation in Clinical Observation status and have to go through that psychological brutality again, I attributed my neck injury to text neck, though it was pretty serious, with several displaced

disks in my cervical spine which required weeks of muscle relaxants and physical therapy and traction for my C-spine. I still have pain in my neck.

 

When I left Kenosha Unit for Green Unit, I was required to use a cart that had a flat tire on it and this was known before that cart was brought to Kenosha Unit. It was extremely difficult and painful to push this cart and try to keep my stuff from falling off of it. It took me 15 minutes just to push that cart about 250 yards. I ended up having to abandon it at the side of the road because I was exhausted and wouldnt have made it to Green Unit in time for

the 12:30 pm count. My belongings sat outside on the side of the road until count cleared when I was allowed to go retrieve them. When I arrived at Green Unit right before count, I must have stopped at the side of the building

exhausted, because one of the inmate workers asked me if I needed a wheelchair. He wasnt joking or being smart. He thought I really needed one.

 

When I arrived on Green Unit and saw the cell they were intending to move me into, I wept.

 

I was moved into a cell which places me under direct line of sight by staff 24 hours a day, and any inmates on the unit who care to look into my cell. The cell I was ordered to move into is situated directly adjacent to a staircase that allows inmates going to the upper tier cells to see directly into my cell, I'm plainly visible to them while using the toilet, as well as to anyone walking by my cell. My cell door is essentially made of glass with a 2 foot metal

divider between two large windows, the top window is  approximately 18" wide by 24" high.The bottom window is approximately 18" wide by 13" high. The lowest extreme of the upper window is  50" from the floor, or 4.2 feet.

 

I can't change clothes without being under observation. When I shower, I can't get dressed for upwards of 15 minutes because I get yeast

infections of my skin and if I'm damp when I get dressed that has very negative consequences. My skin has to be dry before I apply medication under my breasts and other areas, only then can I get dressed. If I depart from this I risk worsening of an existing infection, or aquiring new ones. This was well known by staff prior to my transfer to Green Unit.

 

Inmates are not permitted to cover their window when dressing or using the toilet, which is strictly enforced on Green Unit. Under threat of disciplinary action.

 

It should be noted that the windows on my cell are among the largest on the unit, with the vast majority of the cells having far smaller windows.

 

The cell I was placed in was clearly chosen for its ability to both embarass, and humiliate me, in addition to its intimidation factor. It screams...'fuck you and your settlement! We don't agree with that shit!'

 

I've actually had prison staff speak this to me in these exact words, though not recently, and not by anyone I'm willing to identify. Many staff use their demeanor, body language and facial expressions to express this very statement nonverbally.

 

Green unit was built to be a segregation and disciplinary unit. The cells are built like cells on a disciplinary unit; stainless steel sink and toilet unit, an exterior window that can't be opened as windows on regular, normal housing units can. The windows on Green unit are also fogged over so inmates housed on Green cannot see outdoors.

 

My bed on Green Unit is of a type known as a 'restraint bed' or 'strapdown bed'. These beds are used on segregation units. Inmates have their clothing stripped off by numerous male staff, and are then strapped to the bed naked.

 

Its known to staff at RCI that I had this done to me twice at Dodge Correctional Instutution in the early 2000's, after I attempted to do surgery on myself that the DOC had steadfastly refused to provide, even if it killed me. One of these strap down incidents caused me severe psychological trauma, after approximately a dozen male prison guards were present, pressing me hard against the bed while some watched, while another male guard used what I later learned was a "cut-down knife", to cut all

of my clothing off. I was then placed in full body restraints completely naked. I had an out of body experience when this happened, completely dissociating.

 

Some months later, when I could look at what happened in a way that didnt involve flashbacks of the incident, circular intrusive thoughts about it, or related nightmares, I did a painting of what I saw when I had my related out of body experience of the incident. At the time of the incident all I saw was a knife. I didnt know what a cut-down knife was.

 

I feel really sick, and after spending all day packing, moving and unpacking, my body is in shock. I'm tired and exhausted but can't go to sleep probably because I'm pretty sure I'm going to start having those nightmares again.

 

End Of Part One