NEWS
Minnesota Prison Locked Down After 100 Inmates Refused To Return To Cells Amid Record Heat
Courtesy of FOX 9 Minneapolis
A Minnesota prison was under emergency lockdown on Sunday after about 100 inmates refused to return to their cells amid a heat wave breaking temperature records across the state.
The Minnesota Correction Facility – Stillwater is in Bayport, about 25 miles east of Minneapolis, where the temperature on Sunday was a record-tying 97 degrees, according to the National Weather Service.
The Minnesota Department of Corrections said the incident was peacefully resolved by 4 p.m. According to the agency, the increased cell time was caused by “understaffing” over the holiday weekend.
DOC Commissioner Paul Schnell in a press conference Sunday said about 100 men from one housing unit refused to return from a common area with phones and showers to their cells. He said that two staff overseeing the area were contained in a “security bubble” and unharmed.
“Never was there the need for any type of entry by any of our tactical teams,” Schnell said. He said the men spent the majority of the time sitting at tables playing cards, and that there was no violence at all.
Two men who continued to refuse at the resolution of the incident were moved to a segregation unit for disciplinary reasons, Schnell said.
He acknowledged that there are problems with the windows in the old facility, and that it does get very hot, and said the agency has been conducting studies to install climate control systems.
Schnell also refuted claims that the prisoners did not have access to clean water.
But critics say the understaffing issues that kept prisoners largely in their cells on Sunday are an ongoing problem.
“Today’s incident at MCF-Stillwater is endemic and highlights the truth behind the operations of the MN Department of Corrections with chronic understaffing leading to upset offenders due to the need to restrict programming and/or recreation time when there are not enough security staff to protect the facility,” AFSCME Council 5 Interim Executive Director Bart Andersen said in a statement.
The local council of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees or, AFSCME, represents around 43,000 workers in Minnesota.
“Our union believes to our core that our correctional facilities cannot have transformational offender programming without sufficient facility security, we can and must have both,” Andersen said.
TMX contributed to this article.
