[9] Dustin Bettis, a former inmate who did time in Lanesboro, told the Observer he saw Wall give a pocket knife to one inmate and a cellphone to another. ANSON COUNTY, NC (WBTV) - Three inmates from the Lanesboro Correctional Institute in Polkton have been indicted by an Anson County Grand Jury for the September 28, 2012 murder of a fellow inmate, and an assault on a second inmate. Contact an Observer reporter: Ames Alexander | 704-358-5060 | aalexander@charlotteobserver.com, Gavin Off | 704-358-6038 | goff@charlotteobserver.com. But after investigating for more than a year, the SBI closed the case. The prison is named for the nearby community of Lanesboro. John Sapper is appointed as the new administrator at Bertie Correctional Institution in Windsor. The massacre also received attention from the BBC with several articles in the last several years dealing with the vigils and the trials. Some family members believe that the murder may have been connected to an incident that occurred at a convenience store earlier in the week. POLKTON, N.C. - A lieutenant and a sergeant were stabbed by inmates at Lanesboro Correctional Institution around 2 p.m. Thursday and are being treated for their injuries at local hospitals, a But if another staff member had been standing beside the officer that morning, "there's a possibility (Mosley) would have kept walking," McCoy said. Angela Smith, who worked as an officer at Tabor Correctional Institution from 2010 to 2014, said she was often asked to work overtime because the prison was so understaffed. April 2011 - Richard Neely, a former top administrator at Lanesboro, was charged with felony obstruction of justice following allegations that he destroyed video footage that might have shown officers using excessive force in a fight with inmates. He said hes haunted by Turners murder and has branded the letters of his best friends nickname into his right side. But Daniel Roberts, one of the attorneys, told a judge at a court hearing that the videos and other evidence suggest prison officials either sanctioned the attack or looked the other way. Officers said excessive overtime work can leave them burned out and exhausted. Hes a manager at Lanesboro Correctional Institution. Experts say such corruption jeopardizes prison workers, wastes taxpayer dollars and endangers the public. His dismissal letter states that he helped create conditions that increased the chance of death or serious bodily injury to employees, inmates or the public. An investigation by The Charlotte Observer, NC woman who beat 1 in 3.35 million odds shows up to claim her lottery jackpot, Mail carrier cant believe his eyes after seeing NC lottery win. Meggan Callahan was killed there allegedly by an inmate who beat her to death with a fire extinguisher. Drive down U.S. 74 toward the beach and you may not realize its there. Vazquez repeatedly stabs Turner with a shank. Real-time updates and all local stories you want right in the palm of your hand. Turner, 35, a convicted murderer nicknamed Thug Life, has served most of his 21-year prison sentence. Richard Dwyer, a prisoner at Lanesboro Correctional Institution, died Aug. 17 of an apparent suicide, a state Department of Public Safety news release said. This story was originally published July 17, 2018, 8:17 PM. Prison leaders say that when staff vacancies at a prison rise, they make adjustments, such as moving prisoners, reducing inmate programs and sending fewer staff members to special training. Wall, who joined the prison system in 1995, was fired in August 2013 for willful violation of written rules and creating conditions that increased the chance of death or serious bodily injury, his dismissal letter states. Authorities say prison Sgt. He sued and won a $10,000 settlement from the state. In 2014, Vazquez pleaded guilty to second-degree murder for killing Turner. The incident was reported around1:30 p.m. at theLanesboro Correctional Institution in Polkton. November 2014 - Five former Lanesboro inmates filed a federal lawsuit alleging that officers at the Anson County prison repeatedly helped gang-affiliated inmates get weapons and wage attacks. The vigil and pleas for justice led to several trials for the officers involved in the massacre that same year. The winner, from Charlotte, took her prize as a $600,000 lump sum, officials said. Inmates within the LCI were prohibited from possessing controlled substances and are permitted to use controlled substances only when prescribed by a medical professional and under the direct supervision of LCI staff. But while North Carolina typically hires about 1,800 to 2,000 prison officers per year, it usually loses about that many as well. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Turner lies bleeding to death on the concrete floor. A fellow prisoner, Joel Corto Ortiz, pleaded guilty to felony assault with a deadly weapon for stabbing Christopher Cook, another inmate who was seriously injured in the fight. The police released their dogs in the barber shop, where the wounded prisoners were taken. The Anson County Sheriff's Office says one inmate is dead and another was stabbed. In court documents, Parsons has denied that. Nikki Haley will be at Horry-Georgetown Technical College on March 13, a month after she launched her White House bid. Bias Easley was a corrections officer at the Lanesboro Correctional Institute, near Wadesboro. The N.C. Department of Public Safety has declined the Observers requests for copies of the video, citing ongoing investigative reviews.. Roberts and Jeremy Smith, the state-appointed lawyers who represented Vazquez, said they watched prison surveillance video taken on the day Turner was killed and learned the following: Around lunchtime on Sept. 28, 2012, Ortiz and Zelaya-Sorto, along with one or two inmates who were members of a gang called the United Blood Nation, were in an administrative office with Wall and an assistant unit manager. The officer opens the door for an inmate, and the three gang members follow him into a cell block where they dont belong. Early on the morning of Nov. 15, 2013, Lanesboro had just four officers in the chow hall to oversee the 100 inmates who were there for breakfast, McCoy said. Another prisoner also slips through the door. Guice, the prison leader, acknowledged that the state faces significant staffing challenges. A federal lawsuit, filed last month by five former Lanesboro inmates, alleges that corrections officers helped gang members wage attacks against other inmates. By Ames Alexander, Gavin Off and Elizabeth Leland. Meggan Callahan was killed by an inmate at Bertie Correctional Institution Wednesday evening. Many of those videos were labeled with the words use of force a term that describes the force used by law enforcement officers to control unruly people. The state Department of Public Safety says an inmate at Bertie. Recently, North Carolina inmates were able to smuggle a cell phone into the detention facility in which they were detained, and use it to orchestrate the kidnapping of the father of a prosecutor in the state. He said the injuries he suffered in the 2011 attack have made it impossible for him to lift much weight above his head or work some prison jobs. He died helping me, Cook wrote in a letter to the Observer. Staff researcher Maria David and David Raynor of The (Raleigh) News & Observer contributed. The incident was reported around 1:30 p.m. at the Lanesboro Correctional Institution in Polkton. According to the indictment, between August and September 2018, while employed at LCI as a correctional officer, Blyther accepted a bribe to smuggle a controlled substance into the LCI on behalf of an inmate housed at the facility. News anchor Fred Shropshire is leaving Charlotte station WCNC. His attorney, Joseph Ledford, wouldnt discuss his case and said he advised his client not to talk. "They might have had enough officers to subdue that inmate before he got that fire extinguisher from the sergeant," said Robert Webster, a former captain at two North Carolina maximum-security prisons. But local law enforcement officials are optimistic about changes at Lanesboro. They have a very difficult job Most of them do it the right way. "When your shift starts at 5:30 a.m. and you work 12 hours and you get told you're held over till 9 (p.m.) you're not alert. "If inmates wanted to jump another inmate or take somebody out that day, that would be the time to do it when you're understaffed. Both are members of the Folk Nation. At Lanesboro, 45 miles southeast of Charlotte, it was common for 42 officers to watch about 1,200 prisoners on the night shift, according to Gregory McCoy, who worked there as a correctional officer from 2009 to 2016. Inside his cell block, inmate Christopher Cook expects trouble. Attorneys for the state quizzed Wynn why he didnt take steps that might have allowed him to avoid the attack. 1992 military police killing of prisoners in Brazil, Act in memoriam of 111 prisoners dead in the incident. Hes a rookie at Lanesboro who is new to that job, still learning who to let in and who to keep out. The weapons were found nearly a year and a half after the deadly fight, and forensic tests did not tie any of them to the attacks on Turner and Cook. Parsons testified that it was easy for inmates to make weapons, from broom handles, batteries and even toothbrushes. Said Gary Harkins, former research and information director for ACOIN: "People can get killed when you don't have enough staff. Officers said excessive overtime work can leave them burned out and exhausted. "If you had more staff, then you might have been looking at hurt staff instead of dead staff" (on the day Callahan died), Harkins said. Corrections officers recovered another improvised weapon at the scene a sharpened metal plate, which may have come from a prison door. February 2017 - Former officer Evangeline Hunt was charged with smuggling in drugs and other contraband for inmates. By Ames Alexander - aalexander@charlotteobserver.com. That was one of three times inmates attacked Mitchell. Bridges, 46, a North Carolina State graduate and former Concord police officer, was familiar with Lanesboro. [3] Around 2:15 P.M., the prison director, Dr Jos Ismael Pedrosa, informed the local military police Polcia Militar do Estado de So Paulo about the uprising. Prosecutors later dismissed the charge because of problems with the credibility of witnesses. Blyther was arrested by the FBI on Tuesday, October 29, 2019, and had his initial appearance this morning before U.S. Magistrate Judge David S. Cayer. Inmate Craig Wissink, who has been serving a life sentence for murder since 2004, has been charged with first-degree murder in connection with Callahan's death. Five years after the murder, Lanesboros problems continue. In 2012, an inmate filed a federal lawsuit alleging that Lanesboro corrections officers cracked his skull with a baton and then destroyed a surveillance video that showed the assault. Those officers must cover two shifts and a number of them are off, sick or on vacation at any given time so only a fraction of the total staff was likely available to work the day shift on April 26. Prison video shows Wall making a keep your mouth shut gesture stretching his arms wide and then folding them so his hands covered his mouth to the office where Vazquez had been taken, Roberts and Smith said. 2016 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. For months, Bridges tried to make sense of what she saw at the murder scene and on surveillance video. "All it would take is for five or ten guys to decide we're going to take over the prison. Had there been more, he said, one female officer might never have been assaulted. Ortiz later told investigators his weapon was a plastic toilet bowl cleaner with a sharpened end. [17], After years of national and international pressure, the prison was demolished on 8 December 2002, the former complex having been turned into a park. Parsons, now retired, testified Tuesday that during his time at Lanesboro, he took a number of steps to reduce violence and keep weapons out of the hands of inmates. Accessed March 29, 2018. More than 45 N.C. prison officers have been fired . Hodges was sentenced to two years in federal prison. The four staff members at the Lanesboro. Soon afterward, the suspects were escorted into offices where they received medical treatment. A video taken inside Lanesboro Correctional Institution shows prison officials gesturing to suspects in an inmate's 2012 murder to keep their mouths shut after the killing, lawyers who. Lanesboro has a standard operating capacity of 864 close-custody male inmates, with 128 segregation cells and 8 health care beds. In October, the prisons top administrator, David Mitchell, was injured after he was stabbed in the neck by an inmate wielding a plastic shank. State Bureau of Investigation agents say they are examining possible wrongdoing by former Lanesboro officers and cannot discuss the assertions by Vazquezs lawyers. The fatal fight broke out roughly five minutes after the inmates left the office. The state has changed the prisons leadership several times in recent years. Two pending federal lawsuits allege that Wall and his officers sold weapons to gang members. Inmates involved in the fight told investigators that one of the shanks was a real long knife, another resembled a razor, and the third was a plastic toilet bowl brush sharpened at one end. In a court filing, he said he never facilitated attacks. Starting in November 2013, more than 800 inmates at the prison were put on lockdown for several months after an attack injured a corrections officer. Lanesboro Correctional Institution is a state men's prison in Polkton, North Carolina, first opened in January, 2004 and operated by the North Carolina Department of Public Safety Adult Corrections.As one of the state's four largest prisons, the official capacity is 1,800 prisoners.