From Staff Reports
The Baltimore Sun
HAGERSTOWN, Md. -- Five more correctional officers assigned to a Hagerstown prison were placed on administrative leave yesterday and could lose their jobs amid allegations that they used excessive force in an incident March 8, prison authorities said.
Yesterday’s announcement brings to eight the number of correctional officers recommended for termination by the state Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services, which, with the Maryland State Police, is investigating the incident at the Roxbury Correctional Institution.
One of the officers has been suspended without pay, a department spokesman said. A criminal investigation will be conducted by the department’s internal investigative unit and the state police.
Roxbury is a medium-security prison housing about 1,750 inmates.
“The allegations are extremely serious and disturbing,” said Mark Vernarelli, a spokesman for the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services. “We’re aggressively pursuing this case and working with state police and the state’s attorney’s office to determine if anyone will be criminally charged.”
He said the department does not tolerate violence by inmates against staff members or the use of excessive force by staff members against inmates.
Vernarelli would not comment on what led to the incident, but a corrections source familiar with the situation said a beating followed a confrontation between an inmate and a guard the night of March 8.
The inmate was seriously beaten, suffering mostly facial injuries, on three separate occasions that night and early Sunday, the source said. The inmate remained hospitalized last night with injuries that were not considered life-threatening.
Copyright 2008 The Baltimore Sun Company