Hell before hell : America's most secure jail

Abu Hamza

Hamza is held at the ADX (which stands for Administrative Maximum Facility) at Florence, 100 miles south of Denver, which cost $60 million (£44.5 million) to build and opened in 1994. It is America’s most secure prison, reserved for ‘the worst of the worst’

Many people have asked: What must life be really like inside ADX Florence, better known as ‘Supermax’ and once described as ‘a clean version of Hell’, to make Abu Hamza, the notorious hate preacher, so desperate to leave?  The answer cannot but bring some satisfaction to those who watched helplessly as Hamza made a mockery of British justice during his eight-year battle against extradition.

‘The Supermax is life after death,’ says Robert Hood, its former warden. 

‘In my opinion, it’s far worse than death.  As soon as they come through the door... you see it in their faces.

‘That’s when it really hits you. You’re looking at the beauty of the Rocky Mountains in the backdrop. When you get inside, that is the last time you will ever see it.’

The ADX actually stands for Administrative Maximum Facility.  It is at Florence, 100 miles south of Denver. It is America’s most secure prison.

Usually, its 410 inmates are delivered in buses, armoured cars and even Black Hawk helicopters to the sprawling 37-acre facility — nicknamed the ‘Alcatraz of the Rockies’ — where squat brick buildings are surrounded by a dozen tall gun towers and heavily armed patrols circulate continually.

This is a facility specially designed to cut its occupants off from the outside world, not just from fellow humans but from even a glimpse of the sky.  Visitors have commented on its pervasive and eerie quiet.  Many of the inmates — Hamza included — spend 23 hours a day alone in 7ft x 12ft concrete cells.

Meals are slid through to them via small flaps in the doors. Beds are concrete slabs covered with a thin mattress and blankets.

Furniture is a static concrete desk and stool.  There is a combined lavatory, sink and drinking fountain and — very occasionally — a small black and white TV showing carefully chosen educational and religious programmes.

A slit of a window allows in a small amount of daylight but has little more than a view of a brick wall.

At Belmarsh, in the UK, Hamza was able to communicate to some degree with other jihadis by banging on the water pipes.  That is impossible at ADX because the walls are so thick and cells are sound-proofed.

If an inmate needs a doctor, a consultation is provided remotely through teleconferencing. There is a daily recreation hour when exercise is permitted — in solitude, in an outdoor cage that sits in a concrete pit.  But when prisoners are taken outside their cells they wear leg irons, handcuffs which may be attached to belly chains to further limit movement — and of course are escorted by guards at all times.

Hundreds of CCTV cameras monitor their every move as they pass through metal doors which open and close along their route.