U.S. prosecutors resist calls to free inmates as coronavirus spreads

FILE PHOTO: A guard drives past the entrance of the Federal Correctional Institution, Terminal Island, in San Pedro, California, November 1, 2012. REUTERS/Jonathan Alcorn

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Five inmates at a federal prison in Oakdale, Louisiana, have died since March 28 after contracting the coronavirus. Harold Lee’s family fears he could be next.

Lee, who was sentenced in 2018 for a bank fraud conviction, has asked a federal court for release on home confinement. The 59-year-old has hypertension and requires a breathing machine to sleep.