Taxstone Speaks Out On The Conditions In Rikers Island Amid The Coronavirus Outbreak

The spread of the novel coronavirus is affecting everyone- everywhere, including the incarcerated, who have found the overwhelming spread of the outbreak-coupled with already declining prison conditions, to be the most dangerous combination.

Taxstone, who is currently serving time on Rikers Island, penned an open letter to reveal what prisoners are dealing with on the inside.

“I’m currently in my grave, with my eyes open, dirt up to my neck, getting dizzy as the world turns,” he wrote in a note on Twitter. “For a month now, we haven’t been allowed visits, legal or social. Understandable, considering what’s going on. But what I don’t understand is how the only people we have contact with on the outside, the correctional officers and civilians, have no protective gear, and they aren’t giving us anything to protect ourselves.”

According to Complex, the rapper and social media personality, shared his note to let the public know that not much is being done for prisoners during this crisis.

Taxstone said that while he knows some people are being released from prison due to the pandemic-others are not. “I see head of corrections stating not to release people charged with murder, rape or robbery…like it’s ok for THEM die,” he wrote.

The former host of the popular podcast Tax Season also detailed how inmates are coping with devastating news from the outside.  He detailed a story of an inmate in a neighboring cell who was told his mother passed away from COVID-19. That particular inmate was jailed for a 3-month parole violation and was even held an extra month because of the pandemic.

“The moral code that they have written and are now breaking goes against all codes of humanity, in the middle of a global pandemic.” Taxstone continued, “We’re being raped of our rights of being innocent until proven guilty, and being left on an island to be murdered by this uncontrolled serial killer called COVID-19. They don’t even care about the correctional officers. We’re all just a check at the end of the day, in one of the industries that are still intact during this global pandemic. The correction officers have families too, you think they want to catch something and bring it home to their families? Of course not!”

Tax has been incarcerated since 2017, after pleading guilty to federal gun charges, following a 2016 shooting in New York where a rival rapper’s bodyguard died.