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| Court upholds punishment for inmate who cheered Sept. 11 attack |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 06/28/2004 |
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A N.Y. prison inmate who laughed as he watched televised coverage of the terrorist strikes on Sept. 11, 2001, and was overheard saying the attacks were inmates' "chance to take this place," was properly disciplined, a state appeals court decided. Though Patricio Linares contended he does not speak English, the Appellate Division of state Supreme Court found "substantial evidence" to show that a corrections officer correctly heard Linares make the inflammatory remark to a fellow inmate. The court's 5-0 ruling also said the prison hearing officer who presided over Linares' case properly took evidence in the matter. Linares asked that a videotape of him and a large group of inmates at Coxsackie Correctional Facility in Greene County watching television on Sept. 11 be admitted into evidence but the court said no such videotape existed. Inmates did not riot that day. The hearing officer found Linares, 37, not guilty of the other charge against him, violent conduct. Linares, who is now at the maximum-security Clinton Correctional Facility near Plattsburgh, is serving a 12-year-to-life sentence for a Manhattan drug sale conviction. He will be first eligible for parole in October 2006. Linares got 10 months in disciplinary housing and lost access to telephones, the commissary and the right to receive packages. He also lost 10 months of good time, meaning he may have to spend 10 months longer in prison before he is paroled. "Statements like the one he made are actionable by us anytime," said state prison spokesman James Flateau last Friday. "And it was certainly heightened by his doing that on 9-11." Flateau said about 60 inmates statewide were disciplined for misconduct on Sept. 11 or soon afterward. Like Linares, most were accused of trying to stir up trouble amid the emergency, he said. |
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