An inmate at the Eastern Oregon Correctional Institute attacked a corrections officer at 8:15 a.m. Thursday in what prison officials said was an unprovoked attack.
Alan Arthur Watkins, 23, formerly of Corvallis, stabbed officer James Hinkle with a handmade knife in a housing unit in the 1,600-bed, medium-security prison in Pendleton. The prison was put on lockdown, and visits were canceled for the day.
Hinkle was treated at St. Anthony's Hospital in Pendleton for more than one stab wound and was released, prison spokesman Doug Harder said.
Watkins was put in disciplinary segregation, Harder said. He has been at the prison since December.
Watkins was convicted in 1997 in Benton County of shooting to death Denise Barigar, his former foster mother, at her Corvallis home when he was 14. He is serving a life sentence with the possibility of parole after 30 years.
Hinkle has worked at the prison since November 1994. Oregon State Police are investigating.