By Paul Peirce
Tribune-Review
GREENSBURG, Pa. — A state appellate court has reinstated a criminal complaint against a state prison officer at SCI Fayette who was accused of arranging a fight between two inmates to settle a dispute.
The complaint had been dismissed last summer in Fayette County Common Pleas Court.
State Superior Court ordered a charge of reckless endangerment to be reinstated against Sgt. David J. Black, 46.
A criminal investigator from the state Department of Corrections had accused the guard of allowing two inmates to “settle their differences” in an empty cell the evening of Oct. 20, 2013, as he looked on from the control booth at the prison in Luzerne.
Investigator Frank J. Kamalich alleges that Black was aware that inmate Alexander Fulton, 25, had concealed a metal combination lock inside a knit cap that he carried into the cell where he was about to fight inmate Brandon Duncan, 32.
“Mr. Fulton struck Mr. Duncan in the head with a combination lock that was concealed in the brown knit hat,” the appellate judges wrote in their decision.
Duncan, who required six staples to close a gash in his head, testified at a preliminary hearing that he and Fulton scuffled until other corrections officers broke up the fight.
Duncan is serving a 20-40 year term for a 2001 homicide conviction in Fayette, according to the opinion. Fulton is serving five to 12 years on convictions for armed robbery in Philadelphia and drug distribution in Delaware County.
On March 17, Brownsville District Judge Mike DeFino Jr. said sufficient evidence was presented at a preliminary hearing for the case against Black to proceed to trial. The case was dismissed four months later by Judge Gerald R. Solomon, citing a lack of evidence.
But the three-judge appellate panel disagreed with Solomon.
The panel noted that after the fight, Black admitted to another prison employee, Capt. Richard Workman, “that he (Black) had opened the cell door and allowed the inmates to settle their differences, but did not think they would fight.”
The opinion also noted hearing testimony that Black was the only prison official in the room who had control over the cell doors where the fight took place.
Fayette County Assistant District Attorney Anthony S. Iannamorelli Jr., who appealed Solomon’s decision, declined to comment Wednesday because the case is still being litigated.
Black remains employed at the prison, according to the corrections department.