By GEOFF MULVIHILL
Associated Press Writer
LEESBURG, N.J.
By every account, the New Year’s Day 2005 fight between inmates and guards at Bayside State Prison was terrifying, with broomsticks and clothing irons used as weapons and blood splattering the floor and walls. However, inmates and guards tell vastly different stories about the scope of the fight and what happened after it ended.
In legal filings, letters to Department of Corrections officials and interviews and correspondence with The Associated Press, 24 inmates allege that guards dragged prisoners from their bunks, punched them, stomped on their backs, spit at them and used racial slurs after the initial skirmish was over.
“All of us got beat up. You hear me? Everybody down there got beat up. A lot of people didn’t have nothing to do with it got beat up,” inmate Ernie Ford said in a telephone interview from New Jersey State Prison in Trenton, where he was moved after the Bayside fight. Ford, serving five years for dealing in drugs and fake drivers’ licenses was found guilty of the prison charge of disruptive conduct.
The guards’ unions say no prisoners were abused during or after the fight. The guards say they were attacked by members of the Bloods street gang. They also maintain that administrators downplayed the scope of the fight, refusing to classify it as a riot to avoid embarrassment and additional scrutiny from lawmakers and the public. Corrections officials and inmates said only four prisoners were involved in the fight; guards said about 30 inmates fought.
Twenty-nine guards were treated for injuries ranging from chipped vertebrae and pinched nerves to shortness of breath, according to records provided by a guards’ union. Two of them may never return to work, the union said.
Bayside, a medium-security prison for men about 35 miles west of Atlantic City, has a history of violence. In 1997, an inmate fatally stabbed a guard, the state’s last murder of an on-duty correction officer.
Four inmates were indicted in November for their alleged roles in the fight and could face criminal trials. Those four also were found guilty of violating prison rules by assaulting guards, a charge six other inmates were cleared on. In all, 20 inmates were found guilty of breaking prison rules, most of them for leaving their bunks during the fight.
A grand jury did not act on abuse allegations made by a few inmates, said Cumberland County Prosecutor Ronald Casella.
At least five inmates have filed legal notices that they plan to sue the state for injuries caused by correction officers, and one plans to file criminal abuse complaints.
“I’ve never been through anything like this,” one of those inmates, Terrance L. Williams, said in a telephone interview from a Trenton halfway house. “I was more scared of what was going on in prison than I was on the street in a coke alley with gang-bangers.”
Williams was serving four years for drug and child-neglect charges.
Of more than 20 inmates who responded to letters from the AP asking what happened during and after the fight, only one said the guards were not abusive. Edward Fasanella, who is serving 10 years for burglary, theft and parole violation convictions, wrote that after the fighting, guards walked through a prison wing “talking crap to us, but no threats were made.”
Corrections Commissioner Devon Brown turned down repeated requests for an interview. Department spokeswoman Deirdre Fedkenheuer said the inmates’ claims are being investigated.
Mario Iavicoli, a lawyer for the union that represents corrections lieutenants, said the inmates are alleging abuse to avoid punishment. “It’s not untypical that inmates make these allegations to try to protect themselves from the sanctions that are imposed from these disturbances,” he said.
Joseph A. Carmen, a lawyer for the New Jersey State Corrections Association, which represents prison guards, said the guards didn’t abuse prisoners, noting that no inmates were treated for serious injuries and that an internal investigation has found no wrongdoing.
Some inmates alleged that prison nurses ignored their injuries.
Guards and prisoners agree that the fight began when 25-year-old convicted drug dealer Omar McCray, who was indicted for his alleged role in the fight, was stopped at the entrance to a unit where inmates live in open pods rather than locked cells. Guards took away contraband chicken he was carrying and, within minutes, guards and inmates were fighting.
Guards said McCray called for help from members of the Bloods gang, yelling “Bloods out, rat-a-tat, Bloods out.” Guards radioed a distress signal and 54 officers poured in from other parts of the prison.
One inmate, disbarred lawyer Mark Bendet, serving time for an insurance scam, said that three or four hours after the fight guards forced him to lie face down, then punched and threatened him.
“That’s bone-chilling to hear something like that: ‘We will kill you,’” said Bendet, who was not charged in the fight.