Dr. Josef Mengele : “The Angel Of Death” - Police News

POLICE NEWS POLICE NEWS
Welcome To Jail! The Old Jail in St. Augustine, FL
That is the rallying cry that visitors hear as they eagerly
approach the podium to be processed through the St.
Johns County Old Jail. The Old Jail was in use from
1891-1953. When people visit the Old Jail they are
transported back in time more than 100 years, to 1908.
The first thing they notice as they come onto the Old
Jail property is the appearance of the building. It was
financed by the late, great Henry Flagler, the hotelier
that brought tourism to towns all along the east coast
of Florida. He did not want the county jail to be an
eyesore, so in order to get his money the county had
to make it look nice. They accomplished this by using
Queen Ann Victorian style architecture. The St. Johns
County Sheriff would actually live in the Sheriff ’s quarters
attached to the jail, just across the hall from the
inmates, and his part of the building even has a front
and back porch. The only indication that the building
was a jail are the bars on the windows.
the treatment of prisoners, and the enforcement of constitutional
rights. One hundred years ago criminals
were sent to prison for punishment, today prison is the
punishment. It is no longer acceptable to take unruly
prisoners to the stocks or the whipping post, instead
their sentence is extended or privileges, such as use of
the commissary, are revoked.
As the new prisoner walk around to the back of the jail
they notice the gallows where the public executions took
place. There were eight documented hangings at the St.
Johns County Jail, the last in 1912. “Now, wait just a
minute. This is a county jail. County’s don’t administer
executions.” County jails are used in a very different
manner today than they were one hundred years ago.
In 1908, anyone that was convicted of a crime in St.
Johns County could be put in the county jail. Whether
they had gotten into a bar fight downtown or had murdered
a local shopkeeper. A hundred years later that is
no longer the case. More than 80% of the population
at the St. Johns County ‘New Jail’ is inmates that are
waiting for the courts to decide their fate. Inmates that
have been sentenced for less than one year may also be
kept at the new jail, but if they are sentenced for more
than a year they are immediately transferred to a state
or federal institution.
As the processing moves into the Old Jail the ladies
Costumed Deputies or prisoner trustees process visitors
through the jail as if they are prisoners in 1908.
They are led around and through the building, each
area being described using colorful ‘Old South’ colloquialisms.
But visitors who can see past the humor and
the light mood of the tour begin to realize that being
an inmate at the Old Jail was no picnic. The first area
that visitors are introduced to is the “attitude adjustment
center”. This is where the public humiliation took
place, where inmates would stand in the stocks or the
‘birdcage’ for hours while locals taunt and tease them. are shown the cells that will be their home away from
home. They are told about the lack of plumbing in the
While doing research for this article I recently visited building;the bucket that serves as their toilet and the
the current St. Johns County Jail, and the Director of barred window that isthe usual method for disposing
Corrections, Frank Cyr, allowed me to tour the jail and of the waste. As they enter maximum security they
helped me to understand both the differences and simi- see four cells; solitary confinement, death row, maxilarities
between the county jail then and now.
mum security, and the infirmary. The infirmary is a
cell with four bunks. There is no examination table,
One of the biggest changes has been the attitude toward no tools that doctors and nurses may need while treat-
36 Police News | www.police-news.us | August / September 2012 August / September 2012 | www.police-news.us | Police News 37