Want the best of VICE News straight to your inbox? Sign up here.FLINT, Michigan — It's been five years since the Flint water crisis, which killed at least 12 people and poisoned tens of thousands. And Claudia Perkins is still using bottled water for just about everything — cooking food, washing dishes, bathing her great-grandchildren. She goes through about 100 bottles a day.The state says the tap water is safe to drink again, but residents are wary of all the corroded pipes, and they're no longer willing to give government officials the benefit of the doubt. Perkins says she doesn't know anyone who drinks the tap water."Flint is pretty much the same as it was when this ordeal first started," Perkins said. "I think people are let down. I think they're just — some don't believe anything is going to happen."The people of Flint are frustrated, despondent even, and not just because of the city's still broken water system. For years, they've banked on seeing some kind of justice for what happened, but even that's now up in the air. Special Prosecutor Todd Flood, who spent three years investigating public officials, is out. A new team is in. And no one knows whom to trust."We have people that died; you can't get their lives back," Perkins said. "Somebody needs to pay for this crime."VICE News traveled to Flint where the criminal investigation has taken a confusing turn, and no one has been put in jail yet.This segment originally aired August 29, 2019, on VICE News Tonight on HBO.
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