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COLUMBIA, S,C.(AP) — Federal investigators found in a scathing report this week that a large jail in South Carolina vastly underreports the violence occurring behind its walls and lets dozens of inmates go unsupervised for so long that at least two killings of prisoners were reported to jail staff from outside callers.The U.S.
Department of Justice told the jail in Richland County, which includes South Carolina’s capital of Columbia, that it must improve conditions as soon as possible — repairing holes in walls, fixing locks that don’t lock at all and fixing broken light fixtures that otherwise might be turned into weapons.The jail also must stop the flow of contraband, it said.Cellphones are used to orchestrate gang beatings even as inmates are moved from one wing to another for safety.
Drugs brought into the facility caused eight prisoners to overdose in two months last year, according to the report released Wednesday by federal investigators.The 36-page report is filled with stunning details and damning facts.Named the Alvin S.Glenn Detention Center, for a guard killed by inmates during an escape attempt in 2000, the jail has more openings for guards than the current number of actual officers, the report said.
It added that hours go by without a single employee checking on jail wings and keys have gone unaccounted for.According to the report, the jail has four times as many assaults as the Miami-Dade jail even though the south Florida jail has four times as many inmates.It also said a private company that helps with security has hired people with felony convictions.The report also details stories about people charged but not convicted of crimes and waiting in jail for their trials.One inmate who has been at the jail for three years was beaten and stabbed and the jail took no action until his mother called them two days later, the report said.
It added he was beaten again and a guard only responded when other prisoners reported he was bleeding.He wa...