On the third day of 100-degree temperatures final week, locked with out air-conditioning in a Texas jail north of Houston, Joseph Martire stated he started to really feel overwhelmed. His respiratory grew heavy.

An inmate for practically 16 years, Mr. Martire was anticipating to be launched in a couple of weeks. But it was so sizzling that day, he recalled, that he questioned if he would make it that lengthy. He was lined in sweat and felt so lightheaded that he needed to brace himself towards a wall. At some level, he handed out.

“It’s kind of weird getting woken up with fingers in your eyes and not knowing how you got there,” Mr. Martire, 35, stated of the efforts to revive him by urgent on strain factors round his eyes. He was ultimately moved to an air-conditioned emergency medical space. “They kept me there for two hours, drinking ice water, salt water, taking my temperature, making sure I was still alive,” he stated.

The weekslong June warmth wave scorching Texas has been significantly brutal and harmful contained in the state’s sprawling jail system, the place a majority of these incarcerated, and the guards who watch over them, have been struggling with out air-conditioning.

In greater than a dozen interviews this week, present and former inmates, in addition to their kinfolk and pals, described an elemental effort at survival happening contained in the prisons, with inmates counting on heat water, moist towels and followers that push sizzling air. Some flooded their cells with water from their mixture sink-toilets, mendacity on the moist concrete for reduction. Others, determined for the guards’ consideration, lit fires or took to screaming in unison for water or for assist with an inmate who had handed out.

“If any individual goes down, we begin beating on the lockers and doorways yelling, ‘Man down!” said Luke King, 41, an inmate who, along with Mr. Martire, is in a prison in Huntsville, Texas. With the heat, he said, that has been happening “at least daily.”

The superheated conditions inside many prisons — where temperatures can reach 110 degrees or above — have been a well-known problem for years, and not just in Texas. Across the South, prisons in habitually hot states like Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi also do not provide centralized air-conditioning in most cases, according to a 2019 report. And the heat dome that has settled in recent weeks over Texas has been increasingly shifting to the east, bringing extreme temperatures into those Southern states.

In Texas, the Republican-controlled House this year proposed spending $545 million to install air-conditioning in the majority of state prisons that do not have it. The House also overwhelmingly approved a bill to require that the temperature in prisons be no higher than 85 degrees and no lower than 65. State law in Texas already requires county jails to keep the temperature within that range.

The bill to require cooling died in the State Senate. And despite a record surplus, the final state budget did not include money specifically for prison air-conditioning, though state prison officials have been slowly expanding cooling facilities within their existing budgets.

State Representative Terry Canales, a Democrat from South Texas, blamed the lack of action on Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, a conservative Republican who leads the Senate. Mr. Patrick’s workplace didn’t reply to a request for remark.

“The narrative comes from the 1980s that we need to be tough on crime, and installing A.C. in prisons seems soft on inmates,” stated Mr. Canales, who sponsored the temperature laws and has introduced payments to handle jail warmth in every of the final two legislative classes.

“The truth is the state is paying millions of dollars a year in heat-related lawsuits and we’re facing chronic corrections-officer shortages,” he added. “It’s not conservative. Being in prison in and of itself is a punishment. But nobody is signed up to be tortured.”

The Texas Department of Criminal Justice, which runs the prisons, has not attributed any of the 32 inmate deaths recorded this month to extreme warmth, and has not reported a heat-related loss of life since 2012. Inmate advocates have questioned these statistics. A 2022 research of Texas prisoner deaths discovered that on common, greater than 10 a yr could be attributed to the heat in prisons with out air-conditioning.

“We take numerous precautions to lessen the effects of hot temperatures for those incarcerated within our facilities,” Amanda Hernandez, a division spokeswoman, stated in a press release. “These efforts work.” So far in June, she stated, there have been 5 inmates with heat-related accidents who required medical care “beyond first aid.” Last June, there have been three such circumstances.

She added: “Much like those Texans who do not have access to air-conditioning in their homes,” inmates are capable of preserve themselves cool by different means: ice water, followers and “access to air-conditioned respite areas when needed.” She stated that the division had taken steps to establish inmates who had been probably extra susceptible to the warmth and given them precedence placement in areas with air-conditioning.

The division operates 98 amenities, of which 31 are totally air-conditioned and 14 don’t have any cooling in any respect. The relaxation have air-conditioning solely in sure areas. The division has been including air-conditioning every year and now has greater than 43,000 “cool beds” — a few third of these within the system — based on Ms. Hernandez. The division has mentioned plans to ultimately air-condition all prisons at a projected price of greater than $1 billion, however nonetheless wants the funding.

In the meantime, a number of present inmates and their households stated prisoners had been struggling by the warmth and had typically been unable entry the promised respite areas, both due to staffing shortages or as a result of they had been denied permission. Others stated there have been few followers out there, or that the water of their jail showers — meant as a way of cooling — supplied little reduction.

“He says, ‘I feel terrible, I have to go take a shower,’” said Cynthia Anguiano, 41, describing a conversation with her fiancé, who has been serving a long sentence for a fatal shooting. “And then the water comes out like almost hot.”

She said two of her brothers, also in Texas prisons, had been sharing their struggles with her via text messages. “Hey sis, what’s up? It’s been sizzling as hell over right here,” learn one among their messages, shared with The New York Times. “I get shortness of breath because there’s no air circulation.”

Hope Thommen, 40, stated her boyfriend was serving a sentence for armed theft in a jail in Central Texas, which he described to her as feeling “like a chicken coop in the heat with no shade.” He informed her that different inmates had set hearth to sheets and mattresses, “trying to get the guards attention because they’re hot,” she stated.

“From the minute he wakes up he says, ‘I feel like I’m dying,’” Ms. Thommen stated.

One of essentially the most vocal teams advocating for inmates in Texas grew out of concern over the warmth in previous years. “The way to solve this problem would be to simply put the air-conditioners in,” stated Amite Dominick, one of many authors of the 2022 warmth loss of life research and the founding father of the group, Texas Prisons Community Advocates. “People are desperate. They’re tired of it.”

Excessive temperatures inside prisons have additionally been an issue for workers and guards, stated Jeff Ormsby, the chief director of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Texas Corrections, a union representing jail staff.

“It’s been really bad. We’ve had several people call and say they’re quitting because of the heat,” Mr. Ormsby stated. “It’s a messed-up situation. The working conditions are horrific. The assaults go up in the summer because of the heat. It’s just a stress factor.”

An worker at one jail stated the warmth was so intense that his work garments had been typically soaked by with sweat and that he sometimes felt overwhelmed sufficient to want to take a seat down. The worker, who requested anonymity as a result of he feared reprisal for complaining about his work circumstances, stated he had seen a colleague taken away in an ambulance this month.

Inmates described comparable experiences of watching these round them succumb to the acute temperatures. “I’ve seen a lot of old people go down from this heat. There’s just no relief here, there ain’t none,” stated Mr. King in Huntsville, who was imprisoned for crimes together with theft and housebreaking. “I’d hate to lose my life behind this. I’d hate to die because I’m in a hot cell.”

He added: “I understand that we’re inmates and we make mistakes. Paying for your mistakes is one thing. But living like this is wrong.”

Mr. Martire, who has been serving a sentence for housebreaking, stated that when he handed out from the warmth this month there have been two others within the emergency space, additionally recovering from being overheated.

“It’s like sitting inside of a convection oven,” he stated in a phone interview. “It heats up and it keeps on heating up when the sun goes down.” He has tried to remain centered on his impending launch and stated his plans for dealing with the summer season warmth on the surface had been comparatively easy.

“Swimming as much as possible,” he stated.