RALEIGH, N.C. — With temperatures soaring across the Carolinas this summer, thousands of incarcerated individuals in North Carolina prisons are still enduring sweltering heat without air conditioning, prompting renewed concerns about safety, human rights, and the pace of promised upgrades.
As of July 2025, over 8,500 prison beds across 22 facilities remain without climate control, according to the North Carolina Department of Adult Correction. Despite a multi-year plan to retrofit older prisons with cooling systems by 2026, many inmates — and correctional officers — continue to face extreme heat inside concrete and metal structures.
Living Conditions Called “Torture” by Former Inmates and Advocates
April Barber Scales, who served 18 summers at the North Carolina Correctional Institution for Women in Raleigh, described the heat as unbearable.
“Miserable is an understatement,” she said. “We were constantly sweaty, sticky — people fainted. Staff were agitated, inmates were agitated. There was no escape.”…