Texas Prison Guards Routinely Use Tear Gas on Incarcerated Women. It Must Stop.

The first time they gassed us, I was reading in my cell. It was 2009, and I had just arrived in prison.

There was no warning, no incident — just the sudden hiss of oleoresin capsicum, better known as pepper spray, deployed because the guards said someone “refused to comply.” This refusal was defined as not returning to their assigned cell fast enough during count time, when security staff documents our presence at designated times.

Within seconds, my eyes, throat, and skin started burning. Women began screaming, coughing, and vomiting. In these dilapidated buildings without adequate ventilation, with most windows nailed shut, the gas lingers for hours. It seeps into our clothes, our bedding, our bodies.

This wasn’t an isolated incident. In women’s prisons across Texas, tear gas — which