Date: Fri 02-Aug-1996

Publication: Bee

Author: ANDYG

Quick Words:

Garner-staffing-LaPointe

Full Text:

Prison Attack Sparks Complaint About Garner Staffing

B Y A NDREW G OROSKO

A prisoner at Garner Correctional Institution attacked a prison food service

employee Monday morning, seriously injuring the employee who required

emergency eye surgery at Waterbury Hospital.

Following the incident, the correction officers' union complained that the

incident illustrates the negative effects of the state Department of

Correction's (DOC) continuing cutbacks on correction officer staffing levels

at the high-security prison. The union says the cutbacks endanger correction

officers' health and safety and also compromise the prison's security.

According to DOC spokesman William Flower, food service supervisor Ronnie B.

Moss suffered a serious eye injury in an unprovoked attack by inmate kitchen

worker Donald Fields while both men were in the prison kitchen area at 7:30

am. Fields reportedly disputed instructions given him by Moss before Fields

hit Moss. Moss and Fields are both 37, state police said.

State police said a warrant is being sought for Fields' arrest on an assault

charge. Fields is serving a 17-year sentence in Garner for first-degree

burglary. He started his sentence in November 1991. The DOC will seek to have

Fields serve any prison time given him for the assault after his burglary

sentence runs out, according to Mr Flower.

The incident means a transfer for Moss to Northern Correctional Institution in

Somers, the state's most secure prison, Mr Flower said.

The kitchen assault marks the first serious incident in Garner in months.

Since the fall of 1993, Garner has been using the "close custody" method of

prisoner handling in which violent inmates are strictly controlled in their

movements and held in their cells for 23 hours daily.

Union Complaint

David LaPointe, the corresponding secretary for Local 1565 of the correction

officers union, said the union wants the public to know that staffing cutbacks

at Garner have put the health and safety of correction officers at risk.

When inmates realize that staff cutbacks are being made, they take advantage

of the situation, jeopardizing the safety of correction officers, Mr LaPointe

said.

The staffing cutbacks result from reductions in overtime work for correction

officers.

The union wants the DOC to get correction officer staffing levels up to where

they had been earlier this year, Mr LaPointe said. The toughest and most

dangerous criminals in the state are housed at Garner, he said, adding "It's a

powder keg."

Mr LaPointe questioned why the DOC classified Fields as being a low enough

security risk to work in the prison kitchen.

Correction officers fear that more assaults will take place, Mr LaPointe said.

"Our health and safety is at stake," he said.

To demonstrate their point of view on staffing levels, correction officers

from Garner and other state prisons plan to conduct informational picketing at

the driveway entrance to Garner on August 6, just before a meeting of the

prison's Public Safety Committee, according to Mr LaPointe said. The committee

is composed of members of the community and DOC officials.