Alabama inmate allegedly stabbed, hospitalized for brain surgery as state's prisons come under fire
A mother is alleging that her son, an inmate at an Alabama prison, was stabbed, beaten and hospitalized without her knowledge — a claim that is becoming commonplace throughout the state.
On Nov. 6, Rebecca Crafton learned through family that her son, Adam Bond, who is serving 20 years at the Donaldson Correctional Facility in Bessemer for conspiracy to commit burglary, had been taken from prison to a hospital.
"My son had been beaten. I couldn't talk to him. I didn't know what had happened, and I … still don't have a diagnosis for my son other than what he just told me a while ago that he's a bad pain," Crafton told Fox News Digital. "His face is leaking, his hands are hurt, his one arm is broken. And they gave him a walker."
The warden at Donaldson, Crafton said, has not been open with her about how her son was injured, apparently citing the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), though she did slip and mention something about brain surgery during one conversation.
The warden also apparently mentioned that Bond, 38, had been stabbed, leaving Crafton to wonder why he was getting brain surgery.
Nearly two weeks after the alleged attack that landed her son in the hospital, Crafton said all she knows is that he is alive and using a walker, based on her limited conversations with a nurse and with her son, who is hard to understand over the phone due to tongue swelling, she said.
"He can barely talk. He talks like a 2-year-old," Crafton said. "So … it's really hard for him to call on the phone — to have to get out of the bed, get on a walker and try to get over to the phone."
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The Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) confirmed to Fox News Digital that Bond was escorted to the health care unit with head trauma on Nov. 6.
"Medical staff evaluated Bond and he was transported to an area hospital for treatment," the ADOC said in a statement. "He remains hospitalized in the Intensive Care Unit. The ADOC Law Enforcement Services Division is investigating a possible inmate-on-inmate assault."
Crafton is in disbelief that nobody called her directly to inform her about the attack that left her son hospitalized. Bond's aunt, Barbara Anne Turner, was the first to learn about Bond's condition after an inmate contacted her. Turner then called Crafton.
"I want to make sure the captain of the ship goes down. This is ridiculous. It's not just happening to my son. I'm standing up for my son as loud as I can," Crafton said.
The most recent attack was not the only abuse her son has allegedly suffered at the Bessemer prison. Crafton has said prison gangs have subjected Bond to abuse and threats over money.
"They kept just asking for money every day. … He was asking me for money on somebody else's phone number. He was asking me for money. I'm like, ‘Oh, my God, I just sent you money.’ I said, 'You don't love me anymore. You used me. Don't ever call me again. If you're going to just ask for money, don't call me again.'"
Crafton thought Bond was lying to her and did not send him any more funds. Then, he called and told her that he had been beaten by other inmates.
"Something needs to change for families," Turner, Bond's aunt, told Fox News Digital. "This is cruel. This is the cruelest thing you could do to a family, to leave them that many days and not know what happened to their loved one but know that they're in a tragic situation. It is cruel. And to not get any information or transparency from them is not right."
News of the alleged attack comes as the ADOC faces criticism over inmate-on-inmate attacks, including sometimes deadly beatings and sexual assaults inside prison walls. Fox News Digital has reported on various allegations of abuse within Alabama prisons.
Most recently, the family of Daniel Williams, a 22-year-old inmate at Staton Correctional Facility in Elmore, Alabama, alleged that they had to take him off life support after he was severely beaten and sexually assaulted on Oct. 19, just two weeks before he was set to be released.
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Similar to Crafton's claims, Williams' father and stepmother alleged that prison staff did not immediately inform them that their son had been brutally beaten. In fact, his stepmother, Taylor Bostic, previously told Fox News Digital that a warden told her that Williams had overdosed.
When they went to visit him in the hospital, they were shocked to see he had severe physical injuries.
"He was black and blue from head to toe," Bostic said. "He had restraint marks on his wrists. He had indents, almost, in his head from being beaten. So, my husband, Terry, called the warden and said, 'Why the hell … did you tell me my son died of an overdose when it was obviously an assault?' And the warden said it's under investigation, and that's all we've heard from them since."
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When asked about Williams, the ADOC told Fox News Digital in a statement at the time that "a possible inmate-on-inmate assault was reported at Staton Correctional Facility" in October.
In yet another recent example, inmate Christopher Latham was beaten with a weight at Staton — the same facility where Williams was allegedly beaten to death — in August. He was taken to Ventress Correctional Facility in Clayton, where two inmates assaulted him, and he suffered a traumatic brain injury that eventually killed him, per the Alabama Political Reporter.
Like Williams, Latham was placed on life support before his family eventually decided to take him off.
The Justice Department sued Alabama over the condition of its prisons in 2020 after a federal investigation revealed that "Alabama violated and is continuing to violate the Constitution because its prisons are riddled with prisoner-on-prisoner and guard-on-prisoner violence."
Alabama's most recent inmate population, which was disclosed in public filings in 2017, was 19,500, according to the Montgomery Advertiser. Of those 19,500 people, an estimated 3,400 had a mental illness, the outlet reported, citing a six-year-old court ruling that includes the most up-to-date numbers for the state's prison population.