It was the fall of 1988 when Rose Wilson, then 33, was given a life sentence for murder in South Carolina. Her daughter, Kasi, was only 8 months old.
Like many children of incarcerated parents, Kasi was raised by relatives — in this case her grandparents — but her mother was always in her life.
“We made constant visits. We would go see her once every three or four months or so,” Kasi Wilson said. “I honestly had a perfect childhood.”
Despite those many visits and phone calls, it would not be until she was 12 years old that she learned the extent of why her mom was incarcerated.
Kasi understood the gravity of her mother’s situation, but still wanted her to take an active part in her life.
“It never really changed our relationship when I found out,” she said.
Back in the 1980s, her mother was desperate for cash when she called on a neighbor for help. A newborn at home and hemorrhaging money, Rose Wilson was running out of options.
The neighbor, however, was not receptive. As Rose recalled in a November interview, she pleaded with him. After he asked her to leave, a scuffle ensued in which she stabbed the man. She claimed she never meant to kill him, and it was not until later, after she was arrested, that she found out he had died.
She was tried and sentenced for murder, given life in prison with a possibility for parole.
After nearly 30 years, and multiple attempts, Rose Wilson would never be granted parole. She died suddenly in her cell on March 2 at 66, succumbing to long-term COVID-related health issues.
Like many prisons, the South Carolina Department of Corrections (SCDC) has had an exceptionally tough time battling the coronavirus pandemic. Wilson’s death is a reminder that even after the pandemic is over, correction departments will still need to contend with the survivors, many of whom now have long-term chronic symptoms.
Those who witnessed Wilson’s death, as well as her family, allege SCDC was anything but prepared to tackle the challenge.
As of publication, SCDC has not responded to multiple email and phone requests for comment on Rose Wilson’s death. On March 8, her inmate profile was removed from SCDC’s online database.
Only Wilson’s spiritual advisor, Delcinia Jamison, who works as a program coordinator inside Leath Prison, in the southwestern part of the state, was willing to answer questions about department policies.
‘She was just begging for God not to take her yet’
Just before 4 a.m. on March 2, Rose Wilson had already begun her morning routine of taking a shower and getting ready for the day.
Simply moving around had become something of a production for her. Taking a shower, or even standing in line, had become much harder since catching COVID-19 last year. She frequently complained of breathing and dizzy spells. So when she began complaining of trouble breathing that morning, it did not seem out of the ordinary.
This time her symptoms quickly got out of hand, however.
Eyewitnesses to Wilson’s death spoke only on the condition of anonymity because they were concerned about retaliation from the SCDC.
An inmate who is trained as a nurse recalls being woken by correctional officers to help Wilson on the morning of her death.
“As soon as I got in there I knew it was bad. I had to begin doing chest massages to try and save her,” the inmate said. “She was foaming from the mouth, this white foam mixed with blood.”
For nearly 20 minutes the nurse worked to save Wilson’s life until it became clear her techniques were not working. As Wilson laid dying, the nurse remembered her praying.
“She just kept begging God not to take her yet,” the nurse said.
After Wilson became unresponsive, the nurse said the correctional officer removed her from the room while they waited for an ambulance. Before an ambulance arrived, a different inmate who also witnessed the scene recalls prison officials trying to use a defibrillator.
“They were struggling to even get it open and they didn’t know how to use it, then they tried doing CPR,” the inmate said.
An hour later, at around 5 a.m., the coroner arrived.
At nearly every turn, SCDC staff was unprepared to provide first aid to Wilson. It is unclear what, if any, training correctional officers get on administering aid, or whether they are trained to operate the defibrillator.
Jamison, who did not witness Wilson’s death, disagreed with inmates about whether officers are able to provide immediate aid. She could not specify how they are trained.
“It’s almost ludicrous to me that a guard would not be able to perform CPR,” Jamison said. “I'm program staff and we're required to take extensive CPR classes.” She has been trained on using the defibrillator tool, she said.
Greenwood County EMS would not comment on what time they received a call to respond to Leath Prison or when paramedics arrived after multiple requests.
A spokesperson for the Greenwood County coroner’s office said they were at the facility on the date of Wilson’s death, but would not specify what time or why.
“You’ll need to talk to the prison about that if you want more information, I’m sorry,” the spokesperson said.
SCDC has not responded to repeated requests about what time calls were placed to these offices or by whom.
A preventable death?
At around 6 a.m. is when Kasi Wilson was notified that her mother had died. Inmates say they contacted her to inform her of her mother’s death.
It would be several hours before Wilson would receive a call from Warden Patrica Jones-Yeldell telling her that her mother had died.
For Wilson, who is employed as a certified respiratory therapist, her mother’s death was more than just tragic — she maintains it could have been prevented.
“I was just very angry when I found out — that’s how I would describe it,” Wilson said. “Because if they would have let me take care of her my mother would still be alive.”
Shirene Hansotia, criminal justice policy council at South Carolina’s ACLU, had helped with Rose Wilson’s parole applications. She said they had been optimistic about her release.
“We really thought she had a good shot at getting out, because she had no behavior violations, and her daughter really could have helped her,” Hansotia said. “Especially after everything she went through last year with the virus.”
‘They had me shackled during my physical therapy’
Wilson caught the virus in July 2020.
“I started getting really dizzy, even just standing up in line to go get medicine, sometimes I’ll need to sit or I’ll fall over,” she said in November. “I really can’t even walk that far — even after a short distance I get tired.”
Though Wilson had health issues previously, occasional high blood pressure and diabetes, which she managed with insulin, she never complained of breathing or respiratory issues before COVID.
Before the interview, she had spent months hospitalized for COVID-19, a time she can remember little of.
“I remember they kept me chained to the bed, and there was always a guard in the room, or most of the time there was,” Wilson said.
On at least two occasions while intubated, she experienced cardiac events that left her legally dead and was resuscitated by hospital staff. Only after she began physical therapy to retrain herself to walk did she learn she had been pronounced dead.
Wilson remembered the therapy being particularly agonizing, as she claimed staff kept heavy chains on her.
“They had me shackled during my physical therapy,” she said. “They’d make me relearn to walk with them on, and that was really hard for me.”
For experts who specialize in prison medicine, these claims are familiar.
For more information on juvenile justice issues and reform trends, go to JJIE Resource Hub
Prison medical experts like Dr. Homer Venters, former chief medical officer of the New York City Correctional Health Services, are concerned that prisons will struggle with incidents like Wilson’s because they lack medical infrastructure.
“A lot of facilities just aren’t doing a good job about finding people with long-term chronic conditions after COVID-19 and addressing them,” Venters said. “It’s just devastating the number of these people who do not have access to experts in jails and prisons.”
Many people who are older now, sentenced when they were very young, have developed medical issues that put them at risk for complications from COVID-19.
‘She has no discipline violations’
Since her death on March 2, witnesses say they have been called in to participate in an investigation into Wilson’s death.
“They called me in, and began asking me questions,” the nurse said. “One was about whether it was possible she took too much of her medication that morning. I was really offended by that, that they tried to make it seem like her fault.”
Generally, two agencies are responsible for investigating suspicious deaths within SCDC: the State Law Enforcement Division (SLED), an independent set of state investigators, and agents from SCDC’s internal Division of Investigations.
A spokesperson for SLED, Tommy Crosby, said their agency did not have an investigation ongoing into the death of Rose Wilson.
“We only become involved in investigations at the request of the agency, and we have not received a request from that agency about that matter,” he said.
SCDC spokesperson Chrysti Shain would not answer questions about whether the agency’s Division of Investigations opened an investigation.
Hailed as a model inmate, many who knew her remain confused why Wilson was not granted parole well before the pandemic.
In over 30 years Wilson received no citations for discipline, which Wilson family attorney James B. Moore III said is not normally the case.
“If you look at her record, she has no discipline violations. It’s rare to go that long with no violations at all,” he said. “So that’s something that we are going to be looking into.”
Inmates, as well as Wilson’s spiritual advisor Jamison, described her death as a huge loss for the institution, particularly given how unexpectedly and violently she died.
“Especially for younger people who just came into the prison, she was a role model at the institution,” Jamison said. “She taught them how to live behind bars but not lose your mind.”