Jail employee alleges retaliation for report of rodents

SANTA FE, NM (AP) – A mental health worker at a state prison in western New Mexico said she was harassed and threatened by superiors after reporting details of an apparent rodent infestation in a lawsuit filed in the district court Tuesday.

The state’s Whistleblower Protection Act lawsuit was filed on behalf of Nicole Ramirez, a licensed social worker and psychiatrist at the correctional facility in western New Mexico. The correction department did not immediately respond to requests for comments over the phone and email.

Proponents of improving prison conditions say the 390-bed facility’s regulators have not fixed rat and mouse infestations in the kitchen of the women’s prison in the town of Grant for years. A separate federal lawsuit filed in February on behalf of two former inmates alleges cruelty and negligence related to the infestation, which allegedly resulted in contact between prison food and rodent feces, urine and even rodents found in stews and Oatmeal barrels are submerged.

The new lawsuit states that Ramirez started his job in prison in December 2019 and immediately heard complaints from inmates about rodents and food contact.

When Ramirez filed a complaint with the Professional Standards Office of the Corrections Department, she was confronted by a deputy overseer and said that she should be disciplined according to the lawsuit. Ramirez says she resigned out of concerns about a disciplinary notice and personal safety after a security entry card stopped working.

“Nicole believed that she had a professional responsibility for reporting the infestation as the physical and mental health of women incarcerated in prison continued to be threatened,” said Matthew Coyte, a member of the steering committee of the New Mexico Prison & Prison Project that represents Ramirez.

In a companion lawsuit earlier this week, an advocacy group accused the correction department of refusing to release Ramirez’s internal complaint about the rodent infestation under state open records laws.

The correction department and its food service contractor at the correctional facility in Western New Mexico have not yet responded to allegations of infestation in court.

Lawyers say prison inmates have been plagued by the risk of potentially fatal hantavirus infection from exposure to mouse feces, although no hantavirus infections have been reported. A local wild species of mouse is a known carrier.