By JAMES MERRIWEATHER
The News Journal
12/04/2004
About 25 corrections officers complained Friday that safety inside the state's prisons had not improved since a July 12 hostage crisis at Delaware Correctional Center near Smyrna.
Even before the officers took turns speaking before a task force appointed to look into the crisis at the Smyrna facility, the attorney for counselor Cassie Arnold - who was kidnapped and raped before her assailant was shot to death - expressed dismay that the task force had not previously heard from the officers.
"There are literally hundreds of correctional officers who want to be heard by the task force, but notice [of task force meetings] has been deficient," Jeffrey K. Martin said.
Neither Allen Deal, president of the Correctional Officers Association of Delaware, nor David Knight, executive vice president, were available for comment after the meeting.
But Tom McGonigle, the task force's vice chairman, agreed that safety shortcomings were a prevailing theme Friday, particularly as they are exacerbated by short staffing.
"One of the things that was raised at today's meeting was that it's hard for people who are coming from Dover to get up here," McGonigle said after the meeting, which was held in a small room in the New Castle County Courthouse in downtown Wilmington.
"At our next meeting, we're going to have a fairly long time for correctional officers to come address us in a more formal way."
That are to begin the meeting early in the afternoon and, to accommodate correctional officers on night shifts, continue through the early evening hours.
At last report, prison officials, who were unavailable for comment Friday night, said roughly 300 of 1,830 correctional officer slots are vacant, including just over 40 reserved for officers away for active military duty.
But, according to Martin, Knight and others estimated that the shortfall might exceed 500.
"The message was a very informed message, a scary message," Martin said. "It's that the prison system is in major trouble and that, unless something is done promptly, it's just a matter of time before disaster strikes."
Lt. Adam Bramble, a correctional officer who was slightly injured in a Nov. 27 attack by an inmate at the Central Violation and Probation Center near Smyrna, was among those who showed up to speak Friday. Martin said, though, that Bramble had to leave to tend to a family matter before he could speak.
"I urged the task force to stop what they were talking about and hear from Lieutenant Bramble," Martin said, "but it was to no avail."
Contact James Merriweather at 678-4273 or jmerriweather@delawareonline.com.
