HAGERSTOWN, Md. (AP) — A high-profile investigation of brutality claims at two Western Maryland prisons has angered labor leaders but pleased the head of an inmates rights group who said such action is overdue.
Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services Secretary Gary D. Maynard is addressing what he calls the first substantial allegations of excessive force by prison staff since he took over in March 2007.
“I’ve been in this business for a number of years,” he said. “And any case that’s ever been brought to my attention about where someone would physically abuse somebody outside of the requirements of the job — where it’s excessive force — then I’ve always taken action.”
The agency’s procedures manual prohibits the use of force as punishment, harassment, coercion or abuse. It bars the use of more than the minimum amount of force reasonably necessary to control or stop noncompliant behavior.
Union representatives questioned the agency’s announcement of allegations that hadn’t been thoroughly investigated. Nine unidentified officers at medium-security Roxbury Correctional Institution, near Hagerstown, were fired Friday for the purported March 8-9 beating of an inmate, and eight at North Branch Correctional Institution, near Cumberland, are under investigation for a purported assault March 6 on seven inmates.
The agency announced the allegations of excessive force three weeks before the firings. It placed the officers on administrative leave with pay to await the outcome of disciplinary proceedings and criminal investigations. No criminal charges have been filed.
Steve Berger, Western Maryland representative for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, said Mr. Maynard and Division of Correction Commissioner J. Michael Stouffer issued the press releases about the investigations to cover themselves.
“Whether someone was guilty of doing something or not, they wanted to show they’d taken action,” he said.
Ronald E. Smith, labor-relations specialist with the smaller Maryland Classified Employees Association, said brutality claims by inmates are suspect.
“Inmates fabricate stories for attention and for any reason,” he said. “They’re out to cause problems for the officers as much as possible.”
Agency spokesman Rick Binetti said the investigations were announced after word of the allegations leaked.
“When the [agency] takes what some may call major action like that, I think it’s important that we give the public the ability to find out what’s going on,” he said.
Correctional officers are rarely prosecuted for such allegations and even more rarely convicted. An Anne Arundel County jury acquitted five state correctional officers last week of assaulting an inmate at the now-closed Maryland House of Correction in July 2006.
In October 2006, a Baltimore jury convicted a former correctional officer of murdering a prisoner in 2005. Another officer was acquitted of murder and manslaughter charges, and similar charges against a third guard were dismissed for lack of evidence. The men were among eight officers fired after Raymond Smoot was beaten and stomped to death at the Baltimore Central Booking and Intake Center.
Stephen Z. Meehan, principal counsel for the Prison Rights Information System of Maryland, which advocates for inmates who report abuse, said brutality claims are difficult to prove because there are often no witnesses. To succeed in the federal courts, where such claims often go, “you’ve got to have a broken arm or a busted skull,” he said.
Still, he applauded Mr. Maynard for taking swift action. He also said the agency needs a full-time senior staff member dedicated to fighting corruption.
Mr. Maynard, 64, has stirred other controversy during his 40 years in corrections. As director of the Iowa Department of Corrections before coming to Maryland, he was criticized by union leaders for seemingly blaming prison workers for the escape of two Iowa State Penitentiary inmates in 2005.
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