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HomeNewsArchivesBOC Director Says Prisoners Assaulted Officer, Lied About Being Beaten

BOC Director Says Prisoners Assaulted Officer, Lied About Being Beaten

Bureau of Corrections officials on Wednesday denied guards beat prisoners in an incident Monday, saying instead prisoners attacked a guard and rioted.

The prison officials gave details Wednesday on how the riot broke out.

The Source reported Tuesday that several prisoners at Golden Grove Adult Correctional Facility claimed they had been taken out of their cells Monday morning, cuffed, placed in a holding cell, and beaten in the pre-dawn hours.

At 10:45 p.m. Tuesday, the Bureau of Corrections sent out a press release by email regarding an incident at the prison that differed markedly from the prisoners’ account.

In Tuesday’s release, Bureau of Corrections Executive Director Julius Wilson said an assault and riot took place at the Golden Grove Adult Correctional Facility & Detention Center on or around 9 a.m. Monday, and said the incident resulted in an assault on an officer by two detainees.

The bureau issued a second statement on the incident Wednesday, providing more details.

Citing reports submitted to him by his staff, Wilson said "the officer assigned to the lockdown unit was supervising the recreation of detainee Shaquan Prentice," when inmate Juan Ilarraza asked for help, then attacked the officer "via the food slot."

"While losing his balance, the cell keys dropped from his possession and were retrieved by detainee Prentice who then opened the cell doors of the other detainee cells," Wilson said in the statement.

“An officer from the adjacent unit heard the disturbance and immediately assisted the assaulted officer by helping him out of the unit to safety, locked the unit and a called for additional back up,” Wilson said. “The detainees who were let out of their cells lit mattresses on fire and flooded the unit, which at this time was filled with smoke."

The assaulted officer and detainees, Pedro Davis, Ali Benjamin and N’Kosi Parris, were taken to the emergency room at the Juan F. Luis Hospital for further assessment and have all been released, Wilson said in the statement.

The unit where the incident took place is a segregation unit that houses detainees who consistently fail to follow the rules of the institution, according to BOC. There were a total of 16 detainees housed at the time of the incident, and only six of the 16 were found to be involved in the disturbance. Detainee Prentice was arrested for assault, and detainees Benjamin and Parris have been transferred to the Criminal Justice Complex on St. Thomas pending the outcome of this investigation, according to Wilson’s statement.

According to BOC, the unnamed injured officer is in satisfactory condition, but is on leave seeking further medical attention.

Late Wednesday afternoon, Wilson contacted the Source, insisting there was no beating, and repeating the details given in Wednesday’s press release.

"Listen, I had an officer almost killed. I had fires. I had inmates fighting staff. We responded. We are not into beatings. We respond with the force you have to respond with," Wilson said.

The officer was getting X-rays Wednesday, he said.

Addressing the delay between the initial reports of the incident and the issuing of Tuesday’s news release, Wilson said, "You have got to understand when something like this happens you don’t get all the information immediately. But you rely on the institutional staff to protect the public and inmates and maintain control. And control was indeed lost for I would say two minutes," Wilson said.

The unit in question is for extremely unruly and violent inmates and it is very difficult to handle, Wilson said.

"That unit can be a zoo. Most are young. Most are awaiting trial for murder. They are gang members and bangers. There are only 16 of them and only six participated," he said.

Asked how he knew for certain the prisoners were not pulled from their cells at 5 a.m. as they allege, Wilson said moving that many prisoners would require more manpower than is available on that on the late-night shift. He said he was at the prison when the 9 a.m. incident occurred and although he did not witness it unfold from the beginning, he was informed about it and saw its immediate aftermath.

When asked what the prisoners might hope to gain by falsely claiming there was a beating, Wilson said "you are asking me to guess at motives I don’t know, other than maybe to avoid the felony charges we are laying on them for assaulting an officer."

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