Chief Drawn to Repairing Troubled Systems

There was a sense of anticipation yesterday morning at the House of Correction in Jessup as reporters and spectators gathered around the lectern to hear from the man who had, in a few short weeks, quietly shut down the state's most violent and problematic prison -- something others predicted would take years.

But there was no speech, no long address. Instead, Gary D. Maynard approached the lectern and in one short sentence introduced Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley before stepping into the background.

"As you can see, General Maynard is a man of very few words," O'Malley (D) joked.

Maynard, 63, who has presided over corrections systems in three other states, is a man who seems to gravitate toward trouble -- an attraction that in January led him to Maryland to become secretary of public safety and correctional services.

In his native Oklahoma, he had taken over a maximum-security prison when it was averaging three or four homicides a year. He became head of that state's National Guard after his predecessor was arrested on embezzlement charges. He took over South Carolina's corrections department following allegations that guards allowed inmates to have sex at the governor's residence and that a female inmate serving two life sentences had sex with prison guards.

The need to fix troubled systems was perhaps one reason he left Iowa this year despite being reappointed director of its relatively stable and smaller system of community prisons, officials there said.

In Maryland, he found a system in dire straits -- especially at the House of Correction, where in the past year, one officer was stabbed to death, three inmates were killed and another guard was stabbed seven times.

"There are periods of great stress and situations where you have to be in control of your own emotions and understand them, where you can't let them see you sweat," Maynard said in an interview yesterday, explaining his attraction to problematic systems. "I don't know why it's that way. If it's too easy, I get bored."

Some who have worked with him think the attraction stems from his experience as warden of Oklahoma's state penitentiary. Just months after he started in 1985, the inmates rioted. Three officers were stabbed, seven hostages were taken and an 18-hour siege began.

The standoff ended only after inmates talked with Maynard in a public meeting, which they insisted be videotaped and attended by a lawyer and reporters.

"I came to learn the true meaning of responsibility and the obligation as a leader to take care of the people under your supervision," Maynard said. "It was forced upon me, but it was one of the best experiences of my life."

Maynard talks in a slow Oklahoma accent, as though measuring his words carefully. He grew up on a farm in the middle of the state and was a high school Future Farmers of America member.