Indiana authorities have transferred more than 200 inmates who helped instigate a two-hour riot at a state prison, officials said April 25.
The transfers from the New Castle Correctional facility included 69 inmates from Arizona, who have been moved to the Wabash Valley prison near Carlisle, Ind. A total of 151 inmates from Indiana were taken to the Plainfield Correctional Facility, according to a news release from the Indiana Department of Correction.
Indiana officials also have suspended plans to accept hundreds of additional inmates from Arizona following the April 24 riot at the privately managed prison.
The remaining New Castle inmates were working with staff to clean up debris from their living areas, the DOC said. Inmates set mattresses and paper afire in the courtyard and destroyed furniture, broke windows as some armed themselves with clubs before the prison was secured, officials said.
Authorities were investigating whether the fracas that eventually involved about 500 men started because some of the newly arrived prisoners from Arizona were upset about their treatment at the medium-security prison.
The riot, during which two staff members and seven prisoners suffered minor injuries, involved inmates from both states, and none escaped from the New Castle Correctional Facility, officials said.
Prison guard Larry Savage said he, two other guards and three maintenance workers barricaded themselves in a room as dozens of inmates tried to break in before a prison response team arrived about 15 minutes later.
“They were wrapped up in masks, with sticks, knives, shanks,” Savage said of the inmates. “They were just flexing their muscles and they wanted to show that they could take the prison over at any time, and that’s what they did.”
Inmates from Arizona
Indiana Department of Correction Commissioner J. David Donahue said the riot began after a group of inmates from Arizona took off their shirts in the prison’s recreation area to show staff they wouldn’t comply with orders. When they started to remove their shirts, staff members told them to keep them on.
Some troubles continued hours after order was restored, as at one point the staff set off several percussion grenades inside the prison after some inmates became unruly, Donahue said.
The disturbance occurred six weeks after the first of some 600 Arizona inmates began joining 1,050 Indiana prisoners at the facility about 45 miles east of Indianapolis.
Donahue said he has delayed the transfer of 600 more inmates from Arizona until authorities can reassess the condition of the prison.
“This system is different than what they are accustomed to,” Donahue said.
Indiana House Speaker Patrick Bauer, criticized the Daniels administration’s decision to take in inmates from Arizona.
“You are bringing outside elements into a prison situation and also bringing their gangs and their culture,” Bauer said. “These prisoners also have friends and families (back in Arizona). I think it was inevitable. … I think it was a bad idea from a financial standpoint of view and a social point of view.”
Responding to questions raised after the riot at the New Castle Correctional Facility, Gov. Mitch Daniels defended the state’s contract with a private prison operator, saying the deal amounts to free training for Indiana corrections officers.
“This (idea) is not particularly new,’’ Daniels said April 25 on WIBC-AM. “Lots of states do it. Indiana, while leaving this New Castle prison empty, interestingly, was shipping prisoners to Kentucky and Oklahoma, and paying a premium to do it.”
Some of the newly arrived inmates had complained about a lack of recreation and other programs, said Trina Randall, a spokeswoman for GEO Group Inc., the Boca Raton, Fla.-based company that in January 2006 took over the prison’s management.
The injured staff members suffered cuts and scrapes, while the injuries to inmates involved tear gas exposure and minor cuts. All seven inmates were treated at the prison, Randall said.
Arizona Department of Corrections spokeswoman Katie Decker said at least some of the transferred inmates had complained about being moved, which was prompted by the state’s shortage of prison space. She said the inmates sent to New Castle were “carefully picked” before being transferred and could have “no predisposition to violence.”
Daniels praised the response by prison staff and police agencies to the disturbance.
“Corrections is a high-risk business managing high-risk offenders,” Daniels said in a statement. “These events always remind us of the unseen bravery and service of those who protect us by guarding those who have harmed society in the past.”
Indiana’s agreement with Arizona came nearly three months after a plan fell through under which California was to send 1,260 of its inmates to the prison.
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