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Holmesburg Prison

Philadelphia, Italy

Holmesburg Prison

Holmesburg Prison, given the nickname "The Terrordome," was a prison operated by the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and the Pennsylvania Department of Prisons (PDP) from 1896 to 1995. The facility is located at 8215 Torresdale Avenue in the Holmesburg section of Philadelphia. It was decommission

ed in 1995 when it closed. As of today, the structure still stands and is occasionally used for prisoner overflow and work programs. It was the site of controversial decades-long dermatological, pharmaceutical, and biochemical weapons research projects involving testing on inmates. The experiments and research conducted on prisoners soon influenced ethical standards that are used today in modern research. The creation of the Nuremberg Code with the rule of informed consent was drafted based on this case as well as several others, like the Tuskegee experiments in Alabama. The prison is also notable for several major riots in the early 1970s as well as a report released in 1968, the results of an extensive two-year investigation by the Offices of the Philadelphia Police Commissioner and the District Attorney of Philadelphia documenting hundreds of cases of the rape of inmates. The 1998 book...

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