The following action alert was first posted on IDOC Watch on August 31, 2024.
On September 01, 2024, Shaka A. Shakur delivered the following statement on behalf of Angel Manuel Anderson, a 74-year-old inmate who has been denied doctor-prescribed eye treatment for almost three years. The full transcript is below the video.
To demand medical care for Angel Manuel Anderson, DOC # 1159062:
- Call the VADOC Health and Medical Department at (804) 887-8118 and
email them at healthservicesinquiries@vadoc.virginia.gov. - Email VA DOC Director Chadwick Dotson at chadwick.dotson@vadoc.virginia.gov.
Listen to Mr. Anderson’s Plea For Help
Read Mr. Anderson’s Plea for Help
My name is Angel Manuel Anderson. I’m a 74-year-old veteran of the United States Air Force from April 1969 until 1973. I’m currently incarcerated at Buckingham Correctional Center in Virginia State. My reason to write this letter to you all is with the intention to get medical assistance. I have a serious medical condition. I am blind from the right eye due to a lack of medical assistance.
The extensive neglect and inattention over 30 months has made this a permanent condition, therefore a handicap. All this started at River North State Prison, or River North Correctional Center, where I was taken on August 12, 2021, to an eye doctor at Southwest Virginia, 1128 North Main Street, Suite B, Marion, Virginia 24354; telephone number 276-783-6131 and 1-800-804-7388; fax number 278-783-1953. The doctor’s name that I went to see was named Austin B. Taylor. I was diagnosed by him with H40.1134, primary open-angle glaucoma, bilateral indeterminant stage ADT. Austin B. Taylor’s doctor’s orders state, “Patient presents from his institution due to changes in his vision. He has an ATD OD and elevated IOP. Severe standing noted on slit lamp examination. OCT performed and interpreted today. Gonioscopy performed today. Likely glaucoma. Will set goal IOP at next visit. Latanoprost QHS OU. Follow up on one month with Dr Austin Taylor. Please see attached.”
Appointment was made for September 23, 2021, instructions HVC HVF 24-2 IOP check. Since then, I was never took back to see the eye doctor. I inquired again about my follow-up because my eyes are getting worse. I was told by Medical Department at River North State Prison: “You are scheduled to go back.” After my continuous inquisition, I was put on the bus as an institutional transfer to Buckingham Correctional Center. Since then, I was transferred from River North State Prison to Buckingham Correctional Center. Upon arrival at Buckingham, my stress with my situation with my right eye and my follow-up to the eye doctor, I was told by the nurse practitioner after viewing my medical file that “You would be scheduled to see the eye doctor as soon as possible.” I wrote several informal complaints and grievances regarding my eyesight where I stated, “It is getting worse, right eye.” Rejected as unfounded. Again, I filed a complaint and grievances regarding my eyesight where I stated it is getting worse and the response to my complaint was it was rejected as unfounded. After several pleas, I was scheduled to see a new eye doctor in Buckingham on September 23, 2022, where he recommended referral to MCV ophthalmologist, unable to treat me at the facility. MCV is the outside Medical Hospital in Richmond, Virginia.
For over a year the medical department has rescheduled nine different times-rescheduled nine different times!-to eye doctor appointments, to cancel every time without explanation. Why all this cancellation? No reply, only finding out after inquiry with the nurse doing blood work schedule. The appointments were actually cancelled. Since my last eye doctor appointment at Buckingham on 9/23/2022, the Medical Department kept feeding me the same repetitive reply: “We will schedule you to see a specialist,” from 9/23/22 until May 23, 2024, a lapse of 19 months-all this time without any medical treatment.
I’ve addressed this issue to Warden Zook here three times; three times to the Assistant Warden, Whittington; and four times to the Major, Major Dillard. They all have walked me to Medical, those many times each, hoping to get medical assistance. The Head of Medical… just keeps saying the same thing: “We’re going to schedule you for an eye appointment at MCV.” No schedule has been done at any moment.
Right eye: sight lost, constant pain and watering; left eye: sight getting affected due to the strain, else becoming more vulnerable to this prison environment. Now blind from right eye, risk of losing my other due to no treatment. My higher risk of losing my left eyesight is very real, while the Medical Department of Buckingham is still lying with fake eye specialist appointments, even threatening me with a transfer to another institution instead of dealing with this eye chronic condition. For over 30 months I’ve asked for help from nurses, nurse practitioners, several institutional doctors, an eye doctor and head of Medical Department of Buckingham to take me to see a specialist or ophthalmologist.
None of them have did enough to prevent the loss of my right eye. I’m currently 74 years of age, locked up for over 23 years. For over 30 months I’ve been seeking medical assistance. This has become detrimental to my health and very stressful to myself and my family. River North State Prison and Buckingham Correctional Center have neglected my pleas for a chance to keep my eyesight. I’ve been treated with indifference. The lack of action has caused me to lose my right eyesight and now putting me on a higher risk to lose my left eyesight. Cruel and unusual punishment. I am in desperate need of a medical specialist’s assistance. I’ve done all that I can under my circumstances. Any help from your office will be greatly appreciated.
Again, my name is Angel Manuel Anderson, my DOC number is 1159062. I’m housed at Buckingham Correctional Center, PO Box 430, Dillwyn, Virginia 23936. I’m asking for this information to be passed on. I have the paper trail: I do have the grievances on this issue, and asking for calls to be made to the Director of the Department of Corrections, and the Medical Department asking for some type of inquiry as to an explanation as to why I’m not being treated.
Here’s a complaint that I filed on 8/6/24:
“I have been putting requests in for my eyes because I’m blind in my right eye because medical at Buckingham had took so long to send me out to see the eye specialist. I’ve been asking and requesting to see how to go about buying a bigger TV and a pad for people who are legally blind and all the other things that I’m supposed to have to get help just to fill out a bubbles commissary sheet and somebody to write for me too. Medical is not trying to help me at all and I’m put in the request with my eyes and they keep giving me the run around about my records. If I can’t get some help I will call my lawyer.”
The response to that complaint by Miss Bryant, Institutional Operations Manager:
“We’re meeting with you on or about 8/8/24. We discussed your options of reasonable accommodations for your visual impairment. I received your request for a 15-inch TV and magnifying sheet which I have approved.”
That was her response.
He just filed another complaint because they issued a memorandum out to who’s visually impaired. It’s this thing was, how are you issuing memorandums out to people that can’t see or are visually impaired. How is they supposed to even interpret or read the damn memo, you know? All right, that’s the end. Again, I just read it on his behalf because he can’t do it himself.
