N.Y. Official: Expect Another Uprising at Prison

Article Tools Print This Page | Comments(0) | Suggest a Story

By The Auburn Citizen

Published: 06/27/2003

A state union official said recently Auburn Correctional Facility inmates may launch another premeditated attack on corrections officers after the lockdown is lifted.
New York State Correction Officers and Police Benevolent Association official John Telisky, who toured the prison June 23 and remains in close contact with ACF corrections officers, said inmates in two of the prison's five blocks - blocks C and D - are planning another uprising similar to a June 14 attempted 'takeover' that injured eight corrections officers.
Of particular concern to corrections officers are the prisoners in Block C. About half of the block's 355 inmates have ties to the gang which launched the attack, he said.
'They are definitely going to do something when they open up,' Telisky said.
As of Wednesday afternoon, he said, A and B blocks had been searched with limited contraband finds while blocks C, D and E had yet to be searched. The Block C frisk was set to begin Wednesday night or sometime Thursday, he said.
Telisky said officers are braced for assaults by individual inmates while they search Block C and for more coordinated attacks once the lockdown is lifted, perhaps by Sunday.
Telisky, liaison to NYSCOPBA President Richard Harcrow, said the recent premeditated yard attack was a power play by inmates to intimidate staff and other prisoners.
He said ACF officials and the state Department of Correctional Services have not provided much information about the attacks, but he feels the near-continuous investigation into incidents that precipitated December's lockdown has put officers at risk and empowered inmates.
At any rate, Telisky said, officers will be ready for anything when the lockdown is lifted.
'We prepare for the worst and hope for the best,' he said.
Corrections officers have been frisking cells and searching the 1,818-inmate prison 8 a.m. to 10:30 p.m. daily. During a lockdown, a cell frisk is one of the few times inmates leave their cells.
Wednesday, NYSCOPBA President Richard Harcrow said a weapons cache was discovered near where inmates attacked officers in the yard.
Harcrow said corrections officers found 11 razor blades and six ice-pick type weapons in the depot area - where inmates enter and exit the prison.
The discovery indicates the June 14 attack on an officer's post apparently did not go off as planned, he said.
'The inmate who started the incident screwed up and was supposed to act a half an hour later,' Harcrow said. 'Someone was supposed to get a hold of the weapons so they could use them.'
Harcrow believes that 'someone' was a porter, an inmate who performs janitorial duties and is often able to move about the prison. Porters act as trustees and it is possible they could move weapons and other contraband around for other inmates.
'Bad guys are always getting searched,' he said. 'The guys who are a little bit less of a bad guy get to walk around and are not searched as much.'
Harcrow said it is a misconception that inmates are locked up for 23 hours with an hour for recreation each day. In actuality, he explained, the prison operates more like a small city, where inmates come out of their cells at 8 a.m. and do not go back in until 10 p.m. The amount of mobility would be unbelievable to those on the outside, he said.
'It was almost a takeover,' he said, referring to Saturday's attack. 'It was a disturbance that could have been a riot.'
The weapons cache was a big discovery, Telisky said, but weapons are scattered throughout the grounds in any number of hiding spaces.
'Anywhere that would have any type of orifice or hole or type of crack' can conceal weapons, he said. 'The officers find it everywhere.'
Wednesday, in an incident similar to one during December's lockdown, an inmate attacked an officer during a cell search. Telisky said including that prisoner, the number of inmates facing internal disciplinary action is more than 25.
Telisky said reports he has seen indicate there have been widespread disciplinary concerns within ACF recently, including not complying with orders and assaulting corrections officers as they complete their cell-by-cell, block-by-block search.
While the union has been very vocal since Saturday's outbreak of violence within ACF, the state Department of Correctional Services has continued to withhold comment until the search is over.

Comments:

No comments have been posted for this article.

Login to let us know what you think

MARKETPLACE search vendors | advanced search