Pr. George's Jail Didn't Act on Threat, Union Says

Officials Doubt 2007 Memo on Locks

Two years before a band of inmates at the Prince George's County jail disabled the locks on their cell doors and stormed out to assault their guards, a high-ranking jail official was told that inmates could disable the locks without the knowledge of jail officers, according to a copy of a memo provided by the officers union.

Despite the warning, jail officials changed no policies, required no additional training and took no steps to make the locks more secure, said Lt. Curtis Knowles, president of the Prince George's Correctional Officers Association.

"You have an officer sitting in a housing unit, he thinks it's on lockdown, but an inmate can come out of his cell at any time to harm the officer or another inmate," Knowles said.

A county spokesman said officials have "questions about the authenticity" of the memo but stopped short of accusing anyone of fabricating it. The jail official whose name appears on the document said he recalls writing it and delivering it to the lieutenant colonel who was then the third in command at the jail.

On Feb.1, at least eight inmates simultaneously burst from at least four cells on a second-floor tier, their faces covered with bedsheets, and threw trash cans and chairs at jail officers. Inmates were angry that the jail was locked down and that they were not able to watch the Super Bowl, jail officers said. The uprising was quelled without any serious injuries.

Days after the Feb. 1 incident, Vernon Herron, the county's director of public safety, disputed an assertion by Knowles that jail officials had been warned that the cell locks in the Upper Marlboro jail can be defeated with plastic utensils and other items.

Herron said at the time that he had not heard that there was a widespread problem with locks being disabled.

Knowles this week gave The Washington Post a copy of an internal memo from Lt. Scott Devine to then-Lt. Col. Gregory Harris. In the memo, dated Jan. 16, 2007, Devine reported that an inmate had demonstrated how others disabled the locks by jamming plastic spoons into them. An electronic panel that is monitored by officers gives the false impression that the door is closed and secure, even though the lock has been disabled, according to the memo.

"Inmates would do this and the officer will have no way of knowing the cell door is breached," Devine wrote.

Herron and Harris did not respond to phone calls. John Erzen, a county spokesman, said Herron was not available for comment. Erzen said Harris, who is now the jail's deputy director, has no recollection of receiving such a memo.

Erzen said Herron stands by his earlier comments. Erzen said jail officials cannot find a copy of the memo, which he said would typically have been filed.

Erzen and Acting Director Mary Lou McDonough questioned the authenticity of the memo. Erzen pointed out that it includes a reference to an interview with an inmate that occurred two days after the date on the document. He said that if cell door locks had been disabled, as the memo states, there should be an incident report and a record of the locks being fixed; no such records were found, he said.

"We have questions about the authenticity of the memo, for all the reasons we've cited," Erzen said. "We're not calling anybody a liar. We're not about to do that."

In an interview, Devine said he remembers delivering the memo to Harris. Devine said that the reference to a date two days after the memo was submitted was a typographical error.

Devine said that when he delivered the memo, Harris told him, "Good job, Scott." Devine said Harris also spoke of providing overtime pay for Devine to train officers about the problem, an idea that did not come to fruition.

In the wake of the breakouts on Super Bowl Sunday, officials have taken steps to prevent such incidents, Erzen said. A locksmith fixed the disabled locks and checked the integrity of each cell lock in the jail, which has a capacity of 1,320 inmates, Erzen said. In addition, jail officers check each door in each unit at least three times per eight-hour shift, Erzen said.

McDonough said she banned playing cards, which she said inmates could use to disable locks.

An expert has said there are only a handful of reports each year of inmates disabling cell locks in the nation's 4,600 municipal and county jails. In 2006, after a guard was killed at a state prison in Jessup, investigators found a device commonly used to prevent cell doors from locking. That prison has since closed.