Behind bars: A day in the life of Patrick ‘Tate’ Adamiak

Adamiak must spend 17 more years in a federal prison even though he committed no crime.

by Lee Williams

Patrick “Tate” Adamiak is starting the third year of his 20-year federal prison sentence, even though he broke no law and did nothing wrong.

We’ve written more than 30 stories about Adamiak’s legal dilemma; how he was charged with possessing “illegal” arms that are still sold online without ID every single day; how his first federal judge allowed prosecutors to use evidence that had been severely doctored by the ATF; and how his questionable criminal charges were filed when Joe Biden was president and would likely never happen today.

We’ve documented how Adamiak, who is 31 years old, would be leading a SEAL platoon if he hadn’t been targeted by the ATF, and we’ve reported how this horrible case has affected Adamiak, his family and his friends.

What we’ve never mentioned, until now, is how Adamiak spends his days behind bars at the Federal Correctional Institution in Fort Dix, New Jersey, which is home to about 4,000 other federal inmates.

“FCI Fort Dix is a decrepit facility. The complex was discarded by the military decades ago as uninhabitable and later converted into a prison. The mold-infested, asbestos-ridden, lead-paint-filled buildings are literally falling apart. The showers look like a set from the movie “Saw,” and you get dripped on by the facilities above while bathing,” Adamiak said. “Ceilings collapse, windows leak, and there is no working ventilation in the winter. There is no air conditioning, so the summer months are unbearably hot and infested with fruit flies. With nearly $48,500 allocated per inmate per year—about $3 billion annually—many of us question where the money is going. Almost 4,000 inmates are here, and we were stunned watching Fox News tour the GITMO facilities—they look nicer than this place. Since the Federal Bureau of Prisons (FBOP) makes no effort to house us near home, they might as well send us there.”

Daily prison life

“I first wake up at 5 a.m. when they bang the door and shine a flashlight on my face, which happens three times a night,” Adamiak said. “I get up around 6 a.m. I used to be in a cell with 11 other guys. I got a two-person cell about two months ago. I wake up to the sound of a loud staticky PA system calling inmates to their assignments. I get my uniform on and make my breakfast. It’s the same thing every day: oatmeal and peanut butter. Then I go to work or school depending on the day.

Adamiak has been trained by the prison as a steamfitter.

“I work with the gas pipes and hot water heating systems,” he said. “Basically, I keep the buildings warm. I am a grade one, in charge of the inmate population at the shop. We do repairs throughout the day, installing new systems and fixing old ones.”

Work ends at around 10:30 a.m. every day.

“We gotta return all the tools,” he said. “I walk around with boxcutters and hammers, which is interesting. We go to lunch and check the tools back out after lunch. Around 2 p.m. we’ll return to the cell. Lately, we’ve been coming back early.

Lunch is basically the same every day.

“We’re on a four- or five-week food schedule. We have chicken sandwiches every Tuesday, with tons of rice and beans every meal. It’s fine, I guess, but most people when they first come in and they’re fresh here won’t even eat it. Microwaves are banned. To heat their own food, inmates make ‘stingers’—two wires attached to metal plates that are dropped into mop buckets filled with water to boil it. Food is wrapped in trash bags and submerged. It’s disgusting and unsafe but the only option. Our drinking water comes from 1940s plumbing. Inline filters rarely get changed due to funding. Staff refuse to drink Fort Dix water because it is known to be contaminated.”

Boredom is a significant problem.

“When we return to the cell, I normally decompress by studying, reviewing my case or researching things I’m interested in. I’ll daydream about things I want to do when I get out, make phone calls and send emails to family and friends,” he said. “I shower every day in the afternoon, but we have a 4 p.m. count, so I have to be back in my cell to get counted. After that they’ll do mail call and then we’ll go to dinner.”

Dinner actually changes more than lunch.

“Dinner is the same thing on a rotating schedule, but it’s very similar to lunch. There’s a lot of rice and beans, crappy tacos, just water to drink. You get one tray and that’s it,” he said. “After dinner, I’ll go back to the unit (cell). Depending upon the day, I’ll watch news, do a lot of writing, read about my case or read a book. I have a couple of friends here who have accomplished a lot in their lives, contractors and businesspeople. I will talk to them and try to learn about their lives.”

Adamiak usually goes to bed at 9:30 p.m., or thereabouts.

“It’s a lot of dead time,” he said. “If you’re not reading, writing or working on a case, there’s not a lot to do.”

He is well known by the other inmates as the only innocent man behind bars.

“Yeah, everybody knows,” he said. “Most people, when they’re discussing my story, say of all the people they’ve met, I’m the one person who should not be here. I have heard multiple people say that here. Of all the people here, everybody says they’re innocent, but I am the only one who truly knows he is.”

His federal prison is not high security, but it is always dangerous.

“Somebody died here last weekend. There are fights every day, stabbings frequently. I haven’t had to physically fight anyone, but people have tried to rob me. I deescalated using no force. Most of the times I try to deescalate verbally. It’s a hostile environment. We’ve got people in here and that’s all they know. At one point it’s just such a cluster.”

Mass punishment is a problem for the 370 inmates in Adamiak’s building.

“If one person is found with contraband, they consider buying food a privilege, so they stop it as punishment,” he said. “The food in the canteen is only chips, cookies and salty meat. That’s problematic. Medical here is a joke. They’re not helpful at all. I would rather suffer in silence. It’s mentally disturbing to go to medial. They make you wait for four hours. I don’t even bother.”

Communication with his family is a money-maker for the prison.

“Communication with family is limited and expensive, even though inmates are scored on how much they communicate with loved ones. The more communication, the lower your custody level. Studies show that strong family connections reduce recidivism and improve mental health, but the FBOP treats communication as a profit opportunity,” he said. “We are limited to 300 phone minutes per month—about 10 minutes per day. That may sound like a lot, but it is nothing when you’re hundreds of miles away from family. Even inmates who qualify for fee waivers under President Trump’s First Step Act are still charged.”

The federal prison is poorly managed.

“There’s no consistency,” he said. “Everything is supposed to have a time like a high school when you gotta catch a bell. It’s supposed to have a rhythm. If you’re trying to leave at 7:20 for work, you stand there waiting. It’s the same thing outside. It could be pouring rain or snowing like today. It’s 30 degrees outside yet we were out there for half an hour. There’s no consistency for staff.”

Despite his innocence, Adamiak has learned things behind bars.

“I won’t take little things for granted anymore,” he said. “When you come to prison, you develop an appreciation for a lot of things people outside take for granted. I’ve learned to appreciate things more. I learned how to survive with nothing. Being in here, I pretty much live off of soup. The first thing I’m going to do when I get out is get something to eat with my family.”

Said Adamiak: “I already lost my mom since this all started. I was scared when I came in, to be frank. Am I ever going to spend another day with my dad? The worst thing about prison are all the missed opportunities and memories of friends and family. I am missing out on everything. The best years of my life are being burned away for no reason, since I did nothing wrong.”

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