With 2012 coming to a close, we’ve gone through our archives for the past 12 months to bring you some of the biggest corrections stories of the year.
A convicted murderer stabbed a female guard to death at an east Ark. prison in January. Sgt. Barbara Ester had been investigating whether he had an unauthorized pair of shoes, and inmate Latavious Johnson stabbed her in the side, abdomen and chest. Ester died in a hospital in Memphis, Tenn., 40 miles away from the institution she worked at
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A private prison for illegal immigrants located in Miss. erupted into a riot that left one corrections officer dead and at least 19 people injured. Officer Catlin Carithers ended up on the roof of the building before being brought out through the facilities’ gates and was pronounced dead due to blunt force trauma. Hostages were even taken at one point, but no gunshots were ever fired, according to Adams County Sheriff Chuck Mayfield. The riot was attributed to a fight that started between inmates, which ballooned out of control.
Social networking is all the rage, and it’s also all the rage that can get you fired. A Ga. corrections officer resigned while another was fired after both sent Facebook friend requests to an inmate while she was locked up in the county jail. The two men also had face to face conversations of a “sexual nature” with the 23-year-old woman, but there was never any physical contact.
A new ordinance in Chicago allowed a suspected illegal immigrant to walk out of jail once he posted only 10 percent of his bond. His crime? Blowing past a red light and elbowing a police officer so hard he sent him to the hospital. Immigration advocates hailed the ordinance as a step toward equality, but officials argued that suspected felons can now avoid federal authorities seeking to deport them.
In a sad twist, a police officer responding to a domestic call in Mass. was fatally shot by a New York corrections officer after he had critically wounded his former girlfriend. The woman had called 911 to say that her ex-boyfriend, the corrections officer, was nearby and that she was afraid for her life. Officer Kevin Ambrose responded to her apartment, where he was shot by Shawn Bryan, who also shot his ex before turning the gun on himself.
After being stabbed in the neck by a homemade weapon, a Fla. corrections officer died while on duty in March. Sgt. Ruben Thomas and another officer, William Brewer, who was assaulted during the incident and survived, were both attacked by inmate Richard P. Franklin. Franklin was sentenced to life in prison after being convicted of first-degree murder and armed robbery.
MSNBC’s prison documentary ‘Lockup’ made a splash at the beginning of this year, the particularly volatile Roy Slagle drawing in viewers as he fought with officers when he refused to be removed from his cell. A follow up called ‘Life after Lockup’ featured the same man along with his twin brother as the camera followed their post-release adventures when they got out of jail.
You had to have been living under a rock to not hear about Jerry Sandusky, a former Penn State football coach convicted of child molestation. It was reported that thugs locked up by Sandusky ridiculed him with the timeless Pink Floyd song “The Wall,” citing lines like ‘Hey teacher! Leave those kids alone!’ An inmate only known as Josh said that the inmates sang the song throughout the night, having no trouble recognizing the 68-year-old coach from television and newspaper reports.
Bath salts were the drug of choice for 2012, causing people to eat each other’s faces off. Thankfully, things didn’t get that drastic when two Ill. correctional officers were arrested for possession of the infamous drug. Family members reported suspicious and threatening behavior to police, saying that they were ingesting bath salts. After observing strange behavior during a traffic stop, both Brian and Denise Duncan were arrested and were held in lieu of $10,000 bond.
After hearing his daughter screaming for help, a Texas man immediately investigated and found Jesus Mora Flores, 47, on top of his 5-year-old with his pants and underwear down. Not hesitating for a moment, he pulled Flores off of the girl and killed him with several blows to the head. A grand jury decided to not indict the father in Flores’ murder, citing that deadly force was justified to stop a sexual assault.