Eighty-five Colorado inmates are suing the operators of a private prison, alleging the jail staff ignored warning signs before a 2004 riot and then mistreated prisoners in the days and weeks afterward.
The lawsuit, filed this week in state district court in Ordway, stems from a riot the night of July 20, 2004, at the Crowley County Correctional Facility in southeastern Colorado. Hundreds of inmates destroyed furniture, smashed doors and windows, and lit dozens of fires, including one that destroyed the prison greenhouse.
Two inmates were seriously injured in the incident.
Boulder attorney Bill Trine, who represents the inmates, said the 85 prisoners who filed suit were all "innocent" victims of the riot and its aftermath.
"We're not representing anyone that actively participated in the riot in any way," he said Tuesday.
Two of the inmates who have since been released are planning a news conference today to talk about the riot and the lawsuit.
The inmates alleged in the lawsuit that corrections officers ignored brewing trouble in the days before the riot, shot at them as they tried to seek help once the trouble started, dragged them through raw sewage, broken glass and blood, and forced them to eat nothing but bologna sandwiches for a month.
The lawsuit names the Corrections Corp. of America, which owns and operates the Crowley County prison under contract to Colorado and other states, as well as the former warden and three-dozen other employees. It seeks damages to be determined by a jury.
Steve Owen, a director of Corrections Corp. of America, said the Tennessee-based company "will aggressively defend the complaint" but would do so in court, rather than with public statements.
Alison Morgan, spokeswoman for the Colorado Department of Corrections, said she had not seen the lawsuit and could not comment on it. However, she said the state has insisted on changes at private prisons used by Colorado, including newly drafted contracts designed to hold operators accountable for problems.
"We believe we are on the right course," Morgan said.
A blistering report compiled last fall by the Colorado Department of Corrections found that the prison's spartan staff was too inexperienced and undertrained to control the inmates.
The night of the riot, the prison had a uniformed staff of 33 officers for its 1,122 inmates.
The lawsuit alleges that the prison staff ignored repeated warnings that unrest was escalating among the inmate population, caused in part by the transfer of 198 inmates to the Crowley County Correctional Facility from Washington.
Those prisoners got paid $60 a day for work by Washington, the lawsuit alleged, breeding resentment among Colorado inmates, who got paid $18.60 a day for work. The lawsuit also alleges prison staff rebuffed inmates who tried to warn them of the problems and that once the riot started even prisoners who weren't causing problems were mistreated.
For example, many of the prisoners who filed the lawsuit alleged that guards shot at them as they tried to flee rioting inmates, smoke and fire.
Others alleged they were handcuffed and dragged through feces, blood, water and broken glass to the prison yard, where they were left facedown for hours. There, they were left without water, were forced to urinate and defecate in their pants, and were denied clean clothes and showers.
Trine said the inmates are prevented from filing suit in federal court because they did not exhaust all their options under the prison's grievance procedure - in large part because many of them were in "lockdown" for 30 days after the riot and were therefore prevented from filing a formal complaint.
Inmates' suit

Inmates of Crowley County Correctional Facility have filed a lawsuit alleging:

• Corrections officers ignored brewing trouble before a July 2004 riot.

• Inmates trying to flee the riot scene were shot at.

• Officers retaliated after the riot by handcuffing inmates and dragging them through feces, blood and broken glass.