Ely State Prison inmate James Ofeldt ended a week-long hunger strike last week after meeting with prison authorities. Ofeldt had begun his hunger strike by issuing a 47-page, handwritten manifesto to the warden, demanding reforms in the prison including improving conditions in solitary confinement and meeting the needs of psych patients.
Prison officials stated that Ofeldt met with the assistant warden along with his caseworker and had come to an agreement.
This is not the first time conditions at Ely State Prison have been publicly criticized. In 2010, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a suit against the prison citing inadequate medical care of inmates. The suit was settled in 2010, with the Nevada Department of Corrections agreeing to reform medical practices at the prison. Ofedlt cited the ACLU lawsuit within his manifesto, charging that reforms have been grossly insufficient.
From the day he arrived in 2004, Ofeldt has apparently been at war with Ely State Prison waged against both staff and fellow inmates alike. According to his prison disciplinary report, Ofeldt has spent almost half his so far eleven years in prison under one form of discipline or another and close to four years in solitary confinement otherwise know as disciplinary segregation. In June 2014, White Pine District Judge Stephen Dobrescu sentenced Ofeldt to two to ten years for the killing of cellmate Erik “Bingo” Houser.
In juvenile detention, jail or prison since he was nine years old, the inmate is if anything a poster child for all that is wrong with the prison system.
