The Path of Suffering
An obituary to Stateville, the prison designed to break us.
By Anthony Ehlers
As a kid in the streets, I remember hearing about Stateville.
In the county jail, the stories—there were thousands of them, none of them good—were notorious. For many years, Stateville was one of the most violent, dangerous prisons in the country.
I got off Death Row at Menard in 2001. They didn’t want me there, so they sent me to Stateville. Carved into the wall of my cell were the words, “Here Lies Via Crucis.” Via Crucis, also known as the the way of sorrow, is the path Jesus walked to his crucifixion. But when I saw it, I didn’t think about religion. I thought about what it felt like to be in that place. To me, it was the path of suffering. And that’s exactly what Stateville was.
In 1996, after the Richard Speck tapes became public—videos showing the serial killer, already serving a life sentence, doing drugs and having sex in prison—IDOC launched a statewide crackdown. Stateville had been running on its own terms for years.
Even by the time I arrived in 2001, it still wasn’t under control. One of my first experiences there was watching a guy get stabbed in the chow hall. Nobody flinched. Coming from Menard, I expected a long lockdown. But they only locked the gallery for two days. Then we were back out. At Stateville, that kind of violence was just part of the week.
Eventually, the joint tightened up. But that brought a different kind of pressure. Guys couldn’t handle being stuck in their cells. A lot of them turned to psych drugs. I had a friend named E who couldn’t take it anymore. They gave him meds to knock him out, wake him up, and carry him in between. One day he stopped taking them. A week later, he hung himself.
Then there was my cellmate Angel. He was bipolar, like my mother. Some weeks, you couldn’t stop him. Others, you couldn’t get him out of bed. One day, he started giving away his things. A few days later, he jumped off 10 Gallery.
He found a door out, and he took it. I only hope he found his freedom.
Suicide wasn’t uncommon, and you’d be shocked by who broke. Sometimes they didn’t even see it coming themselves. The thing is, when you’re suffering, you don’t always know it. You just wake up and keep moving. The only way is forward. That’s how most of us made it through—one step, one breath at a time. I can’t tell you how many times I wanted to give up, but I refuse to give in. They want me to die, they sentenced me to die—I’ll be damned if I give them that.
Typically, in prison, you don’t share bad news or tell other people what’s going on. Just as you can’t help those out there, no one in here can help you either. I couldn’t help Angel before he killed himself. I would have done all I could to help him if he shared with me what he was going through. I didn’t see it because I was too busy trying to keep my own head above water, trying to make sure I didn’t drown. All any of us in here are trying to do is to keep swimming.
Everyone has a breaking point. E reached his. Angel did too. A lot of guys did. The more time went on, the more it felt like Stateville was designed to push you there. It didn’t just let you suffer—it made sure you did. And when it broke you, there was no help coming.
Mental health was something you had to manage on your own. You could go to psych to get drugs but not to get real help. Even now, there aren’t enough people working to help the men who need it. Guys still suffer silently.
The same was true for physical health. If you got sick at Stateville, you either got better on your own or you died. It was that simple. They never “found” cancer until it was terminal. Even if they found it, you weren’t assured of getting treatment in time. I know of several guys who were waiting to get treatment for cancer and died as a result of waiting. Everything there came too late, and it cost a lot of men their lives.
In 2010, Don Lippert, while incarcerated at Stateville Correctional Center, filed a lawsuit alleging inadequate medical care, specifically the denial of his prescribed insulin. This case expanded into a class-action lawsuit addressing systemic healthcare deficiencies within the Illinois Department of Corrections.
A consent decree was approved in January 2019 to reform prison healthcare, including appointing a court-approved monitor to oversee the implementation of these reforms. But a 2023 report by the monitor indicated that, four years after the decree's implementation, major deficiencies remained unaddressed, including a 50% vacancy rate for doctors and a 46% vacancy rate for overall healthcare positions.
When COVID hit in 2020, IDOC wasn’t prepared, and to be fair, they shouldn’t have been for such a calamity. But they made things worse. They turned F-house—a condemned, crumbling building—into a quarantine zone. Those who were COVID-positive worked in food service and around the facility. Some of them were still sent to work, infecting even more.
We stayed on lockdown for the better part of a year. No yard or gym, no visits with our loved ones, no class sessions for school or movement. Stuck in our cages while men around us died—including my best friend and cellmate, James Scott. I lost many friends to COVID.
Over 30 men died during this time; however, IDOC only admits to 13 actual deaths due to COVID.*
That was the toll in our immediate surroundings. Many guys had friends and family members die of COVID at home. Lynn Green lost numerous family members to COVID. There is no worse feeling than knowing your family is sick and needs you, and you can’t do anything to help them. You don’t get to say goodbye or comfort your family as they hurt. You can’t go to the funeral or be there to bury those you love.
Some people say they’re surprised we kept up with school through COVID. But school was the only normal thing I had. It kept me going. The quarter James died, I still got all As. The only way is forward, and the only way to get there is one step at a time.
When lockdowns ended, it didn’t make the rest of the issues at Stateville better. The state, and the federal courts, knew about the conditions we lived in: the crumbling structures, the bird shit, the mold, the lack of ventilation—all of it. And they did nothing.
The water at Stateville was found to be contaminated with high levels of lead and copper, exceeding federal safety standards. Additionally, in 2022, Legionella bacteria were detected in the prison's water system, leading to water shutoffs and the distribution of bottled water. The neglect was palpable.
“Imagine you had an animal shelter,” I wrote for the Chicago Reader. “It was full of dogs and cats. They were packed into a building that was crumbling down around them. It was dirty and moldy. It was hot with no ventilation. The animals only got dirty, poisoned water to drink, and they never got out of their cages for walks or to see the sun. You would have riots in the streets. There would be angry protestors with signs. There would be media and news helicopters. It wouldn’t be tolerated. Yet, we do this very same thing to men, and no one bats an eyelash. Every day we knew that our lives were worth less than a dog’s.”
“The state, and the federal courts, knew about the conditions we lived in: the crumbling structures, the bird shit, the mold, the lack of ventilation—all of it. And they did nothing.”
Every grievance, every death, every day without help might’ve gone unnoticed—until our brother Michael Broadway died. The conditions of Stateville killed him.
He told our brother Bob and me that if he had to be up at 9 Gallery, he would be glad he was by us because he knew we wouldn’t let anything happen to him. That still haunts me. I stood watching in a mirror as he took his last breaths. No one was there to help him. I was just a few feet from him, and I couldn’t get to him.
Mike died of neglect and incompetence. He died in a way I’d seen countless other men die in Stateville—of neglect. The difference was that Mike had a lot of people who loved him and cared about him, people who would shine a light on what happened.
The light was so bright it finally shut Stateville down.
I got Via Crucis, the path of suffering, tattooed on my chest because that is what Stateville represents. Men suffered there—Mike, James, friends of mine. Many in silence, and many who didn’t make it out alive.
It’s closed now, but its damage lives on.
*I know that 30 men died during this period at Stateville because I and others kept track and recorded all their names. We lived through this experience. The Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority’s “Death in Custody Reports” also document dozens of deaths listed as “natural causes” at Stateville during this time—a vague misnomer, since many of those deaths were, in reality, caused by COVID-19. The Illinois Department of Corrections, in “COVID-19 Deaths Reported within IDOC from March 2020-2021” from the John Howard Association, reported only 13 COVID-19 deaths at Stateville, and it took legislative pressure to force the agency to release even that data. IDOC has never been forthcoming about the true scale of those deaths.
