Associated Press
WILMINGTON — A counselor who was taken hostage and raped by an inmate is speaking out against Delaware's prison system, saying the Department of Correction is plagued by mismanagement and inadequate, often incompetent, staffing.
Cassandra Arnold, 27, spoke out for the first time Friday since being taken hostage at the Delaware Correctional Center in Smyrna on July 12.Arnold barely survived the harrowing ordeal, which lasted almost seven hours and ended with the shooting death of her attacker, serial rapist Scott Miller, 45.
"There are a lot of people's lives that are in jeopardy," she said. "Inmates aren't safe and the staff aren't safe."
"There are a lot of excellent people there, and that's why I'm doing this. I don't want them to get hurt."
"The way the system works needs to be stopped and changed," said Ms. Arnold, adding that too many Department of Correction employees are "just going through the motions."
"People need to get rid of inadequate and incompetent staff and put in managers who hold people accountable, who train people properly, who are intelligent and who have respect for each other," she said.
Ms. Arnold is particularly appalled about the response by DOC employees to the hostage incident, saying at least three guards were on the scene when Miller grabbed her, but that none attempted to overpower him before he barricaded himself in her office.
During the long standoff, DCC warden Thomas Carroll refused repeated demands by both Miller and Ms. Arnold, who was in constant fear for her life, to talk to Miller, who wanted to be moved to a Virginia prison.
Instead, hours into the standoff, Mr. Carroll sent a one-sentence note informing Miller that he would have the opportunity to talk only after he released Ms. Arnold.Enraged by Mr. Carroll's response, Miller bound and raped Ms. Arnold, saying he had "nothing to lose."
The final insult, Ms. Arnold said, was Gov. Ruth Ann Minner's comment after the incident that "in prisons, you almost expect this to happen."
"I am truly insulted by that statement," Ms. Arnold said through her tears. "If she knows it was going to be like that, then she promoted understaffing and she promoted an unsafe environment. I was embarrassed that she said that."
Arnold said she felt particularly betrayed by Mr. Carroll's refusal to intervene in the standoff, given that he often had singled her out for praise and was her partner in a department-wide effort to improve employee morale and efficiency.
Ms. Arnold, a senior counselor who has worked for the DOC for three years, said her prison experience has left her disillusioned.
"It used to be I thought I was making a difference, and I enjoyed working with the inmates," she said. "I didn't pay attention to the politics and how other people were doing their job."
But when her supervisors took note of how well she did her job, they heaped more responsibilities on her, she said.
While criticizing some DOC employees for their apathy and incompetence, Ms. Arnold said she sympathizes with members of the Correctional Officers Association of Delaware, who have long complained about staffing shortages and low wages and only recently ended a job protest sparked by the hostage incident.
