Inmate slashes throat of correction officer (dragged to safety by the other wounded officer)

[Omaha Steve]

AFSCME has a couple guard deaths every year. Injuries are more than common. Over crowding and not enough guards. If you don't know, I'm an AFSCME member.



http://www.boston.com/news/local/breaking_news/2009/11/inmate_slashes.html

November 5, 2009 05:43 PM

David L. Ryan/Globe Staff

Behind the fences and walls of the Souza-Baranowski Correction Center, a union official says, things are "out of control."

By Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff

A state prison inmate allegedly slashed the throat of one correctional officer and stabbed another in the cheek with a homemade weapon Wednesday night at the Souza-Baranowksi Correction Center in Shirley after being told he would be forced to double-bunk with another inmate, according to a union official.

"The inmate is alleging that he was told he would get a single cell when he was released from the segregation unit. ... When he was told he wasn't on the list...he pulled out a shank and just started stabbing the officers,'' said Steve Kenneway, president of the Massachusetts Correction Officers Federated Union.

The officer whose throat was slashed "was dragged to safety by the other officer who was already stabbed; it was a pretty heroic action,'' said Kenneway, adding that the officers were both released from the hospital early this morning after treatment for their wounds and were lucky to be alive. Two other correctional officers suffered minor injuries when the inmate allegedly assaulted them as they removed him from the housing unit, according to officials.

Diane Wiffin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Correction, confirmed that four correctional officers were injured during a confrontation with an inmate and called their injuries "non-life-threatening.''

Citing privacy laws, she would not comment on whether the inmate became enraged after being told he would be forced to share a cell with another inmate.

Kenneway and a lawyer who heads an agency that provides legal representation to inmates said the incident was just the latest in a string of violent episodes at the Souza-Baranowski facility since the Patrick administration made it the state's only maximum-security prison and then, in January, started double-bunking some inmates.

FULL story at link.

[imdjh]

1. The guards don't have guns?

[Orrex]

2. Nope, because those guns can be taken away