By C.J.Ciaramella @ Reason.com, Dec. 22

The largest women's prison in the country subjects incarcerated women to pervasive and frequent sexual assaults, violating their Eighth Amendment rights, the Justice Department concluded in a scathing and graphic report released today.

The report is the product of a two-year investigation by the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division into rampant sexual abuse and corruption at Lowell Correctional Institution, a state women's prison near Ocala, Florida, that holds about 2,200 inmates. Investigators found that "sexual abuse of women prisoners by Lowell corrections officers and staff is severe and prevalent throughout the prison."

"Incidents of staff sexual abuse of prisoners at Lowell are varied and disturbing," the report says. "Some staff abused prisoners through unwanted and coerced sexual contact, including sexual penetration, and groping. Prisoners were forced or coerced to perform fellatio on or touch the intimate body parts of staff. In other instances, staff demanded that prisoners undress in front of them, sometimes in exchange for basic necessities, such as toilet paper." [....]