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Wilkinson prison riot contained

Published 12:12am Thursday, June 21, 2012

WOODVILLE — Twenty-three inmates were treated for injuries, and the Wilkinson County Correctional Facility is on lockdown after a series of inmate fights broke out Tuesday night.

A news release from the prison states that the prison staff responded to multiple simultaneous incidents of inmates fighting at approximately 8:45 p.m. The release states that the inmates were secured in their housing areas, and the disturbance was contained within an hour.

No prison staff members were injured during the incident.

“At no time was public safety at risk as facility staff responded quickly to contain and resolve the incident,” the release said.

Wilkinson County Sheriff Reginald Jackson said his office responded to the incident, but fighting remained contained within the prison.

“We just went down to give support, but when we got there everything was contained and under control,” Jackson said. “They did an outstanding job.”

American Medical Response spokeswoman Bennie Boone said AMR responded with two ambulances to the scene, and three inmates were transported to area hospitals.

The news release from the prison said two of the three prisoners who received treatment at outside facilities had returned to the prison by Wednesday morning.

Twenty other inmates were treated on-site at the prison for non-life threatening injuries.

The Wilkinson County Correctional Facility is a 1,000-bed prison operated by Corrections Corporation of America. It houses Mississippi Department of Corrections prisoners, and the release said officials with MDOC were notified of the incident and are on site.

Concordia Parish Capt. David Hedrick said the Concordia Parish Sheriff’s Office Special Response Team was notified of the incident but did not have to respond. A spokesperson with the Adams County Sheriff’s Office said the ACSO likewise did not respond.

In late May, a nearly nine-hour prison riot at the CCA-operated Adams County Correctional Center resulted in the death of correctional officer Catlin Carithers and multiple inmate and CCA employee injuries. ACCC houses federal immigration prisoners.

That incident is still under investigation.

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  • Anonymous

    I WONDER WHY INMATES FIGHTING IS CLASSIFY AS A RIOT ? MY UNDERSTANDING OF A RIOT IS: ” PEOPLE ASSEMBLED TOGETHER”, NOT PEOPLE FIGHTING AGAINST EACH OTHER. A RIOT IS ALWAYS ABOUT MAKING A STATEMENT.> MY PERSONAL FEELING<, FOR THOSE THAT THINK JUST BECAUSE SOMEONE IS BEHIND BARS THEY SUPPOSE TO BE TREATED DIFFERENCE IS WRONG. IT DON'T MAKE ANDY DIFFERENCE WHAT RACE OR GENDER THEY ARE; AND IT ALSO DON'T MAKE ANY DIFFERENCE HOW MUCH YOU DISLIKE THEM. ( TREAT THEM BY THE BOOK AND EVERYTHING WILL BE ALLRIGHT.   

  • http://profile.yahoo.com/V3JFQFW2CCVMT4RPDWJUOQKECM Adam

    Who cares…

  • Anonymous

    This is not even worth reporting.  In the first two years ACCC was opened they had facility lockdowns three different times where everything was contained within an hour and there was no news coverage.  These are incidents that Corrections Professionals have to deal with from time to time and it does nothing but get the public feeling uneasy about the offenders being housed in their county/parish.  The only reason this was reported is because of the large incident that happened in Adams County.  As for dave07deuce07 when you take a person and confine them to a cell for 23 hours a day (which, by the book, is legal) they have plenty of time to think about how they can get out of that cell for more than an hour a day. You also tend to get easily aggravated with the other person in the cell with you when you spend that much time together.

  • http://twitter.com/chillin662 P.

    And yet… Bennie Thompson, Christopher Epps, Phil Bryant, Tate Reeves and the other elected officials still allowed CCA to operate with little to no oversight (nothing was done about the inmate assault at WCCC in December either).
    Mr. Carithers’ death seems to be in vain because nothing has been done about that at ACCC.

    Nothing has been done about the riots and deaths that have occurred at Tallahatchie County Correctional Facility (and the dozens of firings that have occurred due to people speaking out against it).

    Nothing was done about the inmate death at Delta Correctional Facility in summer of 2010 either.

    I thought it would take a death of an officer before change would be brought about concerning the private prisons operating in Mississippi but I have been proven wrong. It’s going to take Natchez, Woodville, Tutwiler, holly Springs, etc. being taken hostage before the national spotlight gets brought to Mississippi

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