Delaware prison siege ends in officer's death

Just after 5 a.m. Thursday, after more than 18 hours of tense negotiations, a prison Response Team broke down the doors to Vaughn Correctional Center’s C Building, where prisoners still held two staffers and other inmates hostage.

They found a female counselor shielded by inmates, uninjured and protected throughout the hostage situation near Smyrna. Moments later, they found 47-year-old Sgt. Steven Floyd unresponsive; he was later pronounced dead.

“After a torturous ... ordeal that lasted through the night, we learned of Sgt. Floyd’s demise,” said Gov. John Carney at a press conference Thursday. “My prayers all day yesterday was that this event would end with a different result. But it didn’t.”

The counselor was one of several hostages who talked with The News Journal in a phone call on Wednesday afternoon during the siege. The hostage takers had another inmate call his fiancée who called the paper, then he and the counselor relay demands to a reporter.

The counselor sounded frantic, saying that inmates had taken 126 people hostage inside the prison but wasn’t permitted to talk further. Another inmate proceeded to read off demands from those holding them hostage.

“There were inmates that actually shielded this victim and ensured her safety,” said Robert M. Coupe, secretary of the state Department of Safety and Homeland Security, about the counselor on Thursday.

All 120 inmates housed inside Building C are considered suspects in the hostage situation until an investigation proves otherwise, Coupe said.

What led to the overtaking of correctional officers and subsequent standoff remained unsaid Thursday, though inmates and Department of Correction employees say the takeover was a long time in the making. State officials wouldn’t speculate on what prompted the standoff or how it happened but vowed that an extensive investigation would bring about answers and changes to the prison.

No situation should have resulted in the death of 16-year DOC veteran employee Floyd, a man who was not only a wonderful correctional officer, but a father and husband, said Geoff Klopp, president of the Correctional Officers Association of Delaware union.

"He went the extra mile for any human being he could help," he said.

Carney ordered flags at half-mast in Floyd's honor.

STORY: Demonstrators show up at Vaughn to support inmates, officers

Breaching the wall

Aside from dozens of police vehicles streaming Wednesday afternoon into Vaughn Correctional Center, the large prison campus seemed quiet. But what media and onlookers couldn’t see were hours of negotiations and strategic moves by state officials to end the hostile takeover, Coupe said Thursday.

A call for a disturbance involving inmates and staff came just after 10:30 a.m. Wednesday, immediately placing the prison into lockdown. At that time, four DOC employees were taken hostage by inmates within Building C, used to house men transitioning between security levels, Coupe said.

It would take nearly four hours before the first DOC employee was released from the T-shaped building, made up of three narrow hallways and a center gathering area. The officer was treated and released for non-life-threatening injuries, but the standoff was far from over.

As the night wore on, eight inmates and later another 19, would emerge from the building. State officials would not use the term "released" because they did not believe they were held against their will. The second DOC employee was let go at 8 p.m.

STORY: Hostage crisis at Smyrna prison leaves one employee dead

STORY: Vaughn prison teacher describes 'surreal' ordeal

Negotiators went back and forth with inmates on a radio taken from a correctional officer, gaining time to fill metal foot lockers with water and build a makeshift wall over entrances to the building. Officials turned the water back on as part of the inmates’ demands, Coupe said, not realizing the prisoners were using the water to build a barrier.

“They used those blocks to build a wall at those entranceways, which was going to block our attempts for entry,” Coupe said. “So we knew that challenge was there, as well as trying to determine where the hostages were in the building.”

Unable to obtain a “breaching vehicle” or force big enough to take down the water-filled 18-inch-by-24-inch lockers, tactical teams were forced to rethink their next steps, Coupe said. Their best option proved to be a DOC backhoe, driven by a DOC employee, to knock down the makeshift walls, he said.

Less than two minutes after gaining entry into the prison building, the female counselor was rescued, Coupe said. But Floyd did not survive. Officials would not comment on how he died, but they did say some inmates had sharp instruments. Coupe did not elaborate on what those were. He also said no inmates suffered any reportable injuries.

When asked how a situation like this occurred in the prison, Coupe stressed the dangers associated with the job of a correctional officer.

“Prisons are very dangerous,” he said. “Our officers train. Our officers work together ... but every day it’s dangerous.”

Though state officials would not comment on the events that sparked the hostage situation, Klopp said at a press conference Thursday afternoon that inmates staged a fight as a trap.

When Floyd called a Code Three – inmate-on-inmate fight – the prisoners stopped fighting and threw Floyd into a closet. Floyd was able to warn approaching lieutenants to get out.

"When the lieutenants came into the building, that's when Sgt. Steven Floyd Sr. then told the lieutenants that it was a trap and to get out of the building," Klopp said.

Carney reiterated that a full investigation will be carried out to determine what prompted this attack – and how the state will ensure this situation will never happen again.

“We will leave no stone unturned,” he said at the press conference Thursday. “We will bring every resource that we have to sort out this issue and this problem to make sure that correctional facilities are secure and that the employees who work there are safe, recognizing that this is very dangerous work.”

Long-time coming

Some say problems at the prison have been brewing for years; many of the demands made by inmates Wednesday were issues that have been reiterated over and over again in lawsuits and court filings.

Stephen Hampton, a Dover attorney that has represented many inmates at the prison, said he was not surprised by the hostage situation nor the inmates' demands.

Over the past few months, letters to his practice have increased with complaints of sentencing issues, overcrowding and problems with correctional officers — all grievances expressed by inmates in their demands Wednesday to The News Journal.

"In this kind of an atmosphere, I think you always have to be on guard for something like this," he said. "Inmates do have legitimate complaints, but just because inmates have legitimate complaints doesn't mean they're going to take over the prison."

Record-keeping, as well as access to health care, has been a consistent problem at Delaware prisons, but more recently, complaints from Vaughn have increased. Overcrowding also adds to frustrations within prison walls, where access to information can be slim and often hard to obtain, Hampton said.

“My suspicion is it was probably an incident that started between correctional officers and inmates,” he said. “I kind of doubt it was a conspiracy. I believe this was kind of something that got out of hand quickly.”

Protesters who gathered Thursday morning outside Vaughn Correctional Center supported prisoners, stressing that their rights need to be heard and respected.

STORY: Hostage takers call in demands to The News Journal

Peoples Power Assembly, a Baltimore-based advocacy organization, held the rally, and demonstrators, led by Sharon Black, said they want an independent investigation of what led up to the siege, for the inmates' demands to be heard and "full amnesty for those behind the bars."

“This will not be our only stop out here in Smyrna,” said Black, adding they would continue pushing an independent investigation, even if that meant they would have to set up their own.

“There are people around this region that are deeply concerned and in support of the prisoners themselves and their families,” she said. “We will continue this.”

Black’s group was joined by several former Vaughn inmates, including Isaiah McCoy, a death row prisoner at Vaughn who was acquitted of murder charges during a retrial last month.

“This is just coming to a head,” McCoy said about the siege. The former Vaughn inmate said corrections officers often oppressed prisoners, including beating them. He blamed the DOC’s hiring practices and lack of services for inmates to improve themselves.

“People are just sick and tired of being oppressed,” he said. “Sick and tired of being without their families.”

McCoy, who said he knew Floyd, told the small crowd that the next issue was how to prevent something like this from occurring again unless conditions inside the prison change.

“For many years I told the correctional staff, ‘It’s very wrong what you’re doing.’ But they didn’t listen,” McCoy said.

Brother Debro Abdul Akbar, a former Vaughn inmate in the late '70s and early '80s, said that while he doesn’t condone what transpired over the two-day ordeal, he understands why it happened.

The 58-year-old, who served 7½ years at Vaughn, still visits the correctional facility and speaks with inmates regularly. Akbar advocates on their behalf in regards to the Actual Innocence Project – a process that reviews petitions from inmates who have evidence that they did not commit a crime – which was launched in October.

A petition to nominate Akbar as a board member for the Actual Innocence Project was launched because inmates believed his time spent inside Vaughn Correctional would aid their cause.

“They [inmates] want somebody that can be a go-between with the powers that be and them,” Akbar said. “They feel like they have no voice in the present and nobody is being acknowledged as their mouthpiece so to speak.”

The hope for the petition is that it with enough signatures, the document will garner the attention of Gov. Carney, Attorney General Matt Denn and other officials in power.

The petition has gathered more than 300 signatures.

Through many conversations over the past five months, Akbar said he’s learned of Vaughn prisoners’ frustrations with their living conditions.

Akbar said inmates have complained about being locked down for too long, having restricted library hours, having too little time for exercise and having educational and rehabilitation programs taken away as well as not having special needs programs for inmates whose health is deteriorating. The way the guards verbally and physically interact with inmates is also a concern, he said.

He recalled a time when he was incarcerated and inmates forged a protest against correctional officers until they were given toilet paper. He said officers responded with about 40 prison guards and four dogs.

“These are the types of things prisoners say are continuing to happen down there,” he said.

“The greater the injustice, the greater the outcry for justice,” said Minister Robert Muhammad, of the Muhammad Mosque #35, who has attempted to work with inmates inside Vaughn Correctional for close to a decade. He said his attempts continue to be denied.

“This dynamic is not new,” said the Rev. Derrick Johnson, pastor of Wilmington's Joshua Harvest Church.

Johnson said the death of a correctional officer was “needless” and “senseless.”

He said the prison riots of 1982 and 2004 and the two-day hostage crisis that just occurred had the same denominator: lackluster prison conditions that have not improved.

“The conditions that existed in each of these crises exist to a greater degree today,” Johnson said. “One cannot ignore that.”

“There will be many people that say, ‘What do they want? More basketball? More television?’ They will say, ‘They should not have luxury and ease.’ But what they (inmates) have a right to is basic human decency, quality of life and access to mind stimulation and justice.

“It’s called the justice system.”

Understaffing an issue

Correctional officers and some state leaders say that understaffing was a big part of the prison takeover.

When asked about staffing levels Wednesday night, Department of Correction Commissioner Perry Phelps acknowledged the department is always recruiting to fill vacant positions. The DOC has active job postings online for correctional officers with a starting salary of just over $31,000.

Klopp said the staff is outnumbered inside the prisons 50 inmates to 1 correctional officer, making for unsafe situations like Wednesday's.

“We the COAD family believe that Sgt. Floyd’s death is due directly to staffing issues that have been going on with the Department of Correction through the [Gov.] Jack Markell administration for the last eight years,” Klopp said.

Klopp claimed that prisoners had had “dry-runs” trying to figure out weak points at that facility.

“It’s a test just to see what’s going to happen and how we respond so then they can make adjustments for what they think they may want to do in the future,” he said.

Issues at DOC such as staffing, retention, shortages and overtime had been talked for some time.

Klopp said they’d spoken to Carney and hope to turn the conversations into results in order to fix “the systemic issues in the Department of Correction that have existed for at least the last eight to 10 years.”

One of the union’s concerns is that a task force ends up making recommendations that are not followed, as happened after the 2004 incident in which serial rapist Scott A. Miller was shot dead following a nearly seven-hour hostage situation in which he raped a prison counselor.

“We’ve been asking for help from the previous governor, and we got none,” Klopp said.

A lot of what happened at Vaughn is a result of inexperienced officers and a lack of staff at the facility, Klopp said. He said the amount of overtime needed to staff Vaughn “is unsustainable.”

Because these concerns, as well as the $20 million DOC overtime budget, were not taken seriously, Klopp said, Delaware lost its first correction officer while on duty, an outcome he stressed never had to happen.

“I can’t say it was inevitable," Klopp said, "but I can say it was preventable.”

Contact Brittany Horn at (302) 324-2771, bhorn@delawareonline.com or on Twitter at @brittanyhorn. Contact Esteban Parra at (302) 324-2299, eparra@delawareonline.com or on Twitter @eparra3.