Terry Kill and his wife, Twyla, are praying constantly that coronavirus won’t blaze through the Monroe Correctional Complex, in part because they’ve been awaiting Terry’s release from prison so he can be baptized.

Until coronavirus hit Washington, it seemed that day was quickly approaching for the 52-year-old immunocompromised inmate.

He’d been moving toward a work release in Seattle this summer, but that has changed.

At the recommendation of the Office of Corrections Ombuds and at the risk of losing his opportunity for work release, he left his kitchen job over concerns about viral transmission. Tables had been spread out, but lines for food were still cramped.

Now five Monroe staff and six prisoners have tested positive for coronavirus.

Following the release of that news on Wednesday, nearly 200 prisoners revolted. Some were pepper-sprayed and struck by sting ball grenades for noncompliance, according to a Washington Department of Corrections news release. Police said inmates had threatened to set fires and take officers hostage. Terry, meanwhile, was in his bunk, in a different unit, Twyla said.

The department said order was restored on Thursday, after two units were evacuated and the facility was placed on restricted movement. Going forward, at-risk inmates will continue to be moved into isolation to guard against the virus.

As prisoners have shared concerns with their families about virus spread, the DOC announced last week that inmates at Coyote Ridge Corrections Center had started producing protective gowns, upon request from the State Emergency Operations Center.

Manufacturing is expanding to other unspecified Washington prisons, according to a DOC news release.

As Terry told Twyla over the phone, he’d like to help in this time of crisis. But if mask manufacturing reaches Monroe, working in close quarters and sharing equipment could threaten his life.

“If they’re choosing not to reduce overcrowding so they can have people there making this stuff, you cannot put prisoners’ lives in danger to provide more things,” Twyla said.

At Coyote Ridge, an hour and a half drive from Spokane, one staff member has tested positive for the virus. But the prison houses a textile facility now producing 500 medical gowns per day and the DOC hopes to increase production to 2,100 a day. These prisoners are meeting a dire need for personal protective equipment in Washington.

Soon inmates could be producing masks and hand sanitizer too, Secretary Stephen Sinclair said in a video released by the DOC. Sinclair also said the DOC is following Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines, including social distancing.

“I couldn’t watch the Sinclair video,” Twyla said. “If you can imagine, I actually almost threw up, watching this man talking about washing his hands, wiping down surfaces – watching this man, when I know my husband can’t do that. I had to pray that out of my system.”

DOC Communications Director Janelle Guthrie said all of their facilities have started an intensive cleaning protocol, which focuses on sanitizing high touch surfaces, increased personal hygiene and posting of COVID-19 hygiene information in public areas.

Prisons have placed hand sanitizer, which is normally contraband, in areas where soap and water are not readily available and have authorized facility employees and contract staff to use it. Inmates have access to hand sanitizer in supervised locations.

They’ve also started screening employees and all people entering facilities, Guthrie said. Anyone with a fever of 100.4 or greater and anyone who reports having a cough within the last 14 days will not be allowed into a DOC location.

The DOC is asking employees who test positive for COVID-19 to self-quarantine for two weeks, Guthrie said. Fourteen staff and seven prisoners in Washington have confirmed cases, according to the DOC website.

Guthrie did not answer which facilities have started personal protective equipment production, how much inmates are paid per hour, how many hours inmates are working, or whether officers have access to personal protective equipment. She’d need approval from higher up the chain of command to answer many questions, she said, and has not received that approval 10 days later.

“We appreciate concerns about those who are incarcerated with the Department of Corrections,” Guthrie said. “The agency would like to assure (the public) that DOC is doing everything in its power to protect the population in the Washington correctional facilities.”

According to Ona Minjarez, whose brother Freddie Deleon is an inmate at Larch Correctional Center near Vancouver, proper social distance and sanitation just aren’t possible in the context of prisons, especially crowded ones.

Deleon wrote a letter in March – which starts, “this is a cry for acknowledgement” – and asked Minjarez to send it to newspapers.

High-touch surfaces at Larch Corrections Center haven’t been sanitized between uses, he wrote, and inmates don’t have access to personal protective equipment or basic cleaning supplies like bleach.

While Deleon told his sister he’d be happy to help out by making masks, he’s overwhelmed by the conditions at his facility.

He’s incarcerated at a minimum security work camp. He writes that inmates are being separated from people who have been exposed to the virus but that they’re still using the same phones, computers and facilities exposed people have just finished using, without sanitation between uses.

“Not one man here has more than four years left on their sentence,” Deleon wrote. “This virus has the potential to turn a term of minor consequence into a possible death sentence.”

But Minjarez, Deleon’s sister, said even if inmates wanted to follow precautions, many times they can’t. They sleep multiple men to a cell or room, hand sanitizer is contraband and soap is limited.

Twyla said manufacturing in prisons is, in her opinion, slave labor. Many prisoners are paid about 50 cents an hour and Terry had worked his way up to a dollar an hour at his kitchen job before he quit.

Minjarez said she isn’t worried about forced labor if mask or gown production comes to her brother’s facility. She’s worried about forced proximity.

“These guys aren’t in there for doing something good,” Minjarez said. “They’re being housed and fed on taxpayer dollars, so they don’t have a lot to pay for and the least they could do is help. My concern is the conditions. They are too closely confined for one, and they need to have the means to stay clean and sanitize.”

Twyla said officials need to remember that prisoners are people, and many are working hard to better themselves.

She and Terry have been married for 12 years, and until year nine Terry was sober. A medication for Hepatitis C sent him into a spiral that ended in his drug possession and burglary charges. In prison he’s taken advantage of every program available to him – Bible study, church, classes.

“The tumble he took was not him, it was him on self-destruct mode,” Twyla said. “Right now, who he is and what he’s doing, I’m extremely proud of. I would shout that from the rooftops. And I know where he’s going when he gets out and it’s not those dark places ever again.”

She said she never considered leaving him – that it would’ve been like leaving a spouse for being diagnosed with cancer. She said their marriage has that one thing everybody looks for, and “God showed up with handcuffs” to force Terry to stabilize long enough to beat his addiction. Now she said she’s praying conditions won’t kill him.

“Our future is really, really bright. We’re more excited about our future than we have ever been,” Twyla said, tearing up. “I just hope that neither one of us get sick and die before we see each other again. … I guess that kind of thing is up to God.”