THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, April 25, 1996 TAG: 9604250003
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A16 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Short : 48 lines
Things will undoubtedly be heating up at the Mecklenburg Correctional Center in the coming months. Last week, prison officials there said, a death-row inmate tried to bore through his cell with a makeshift drill fashioned from parts of his small electric fan. The warden has ordered all inmate fans confiscated.
This is the latest in a series of prison crackdowns during the Allen administration, and it makes little sense. In fact, turning Virginia's prisons into infernos, and leaving the entire population without circulating air, is asking for trouble.
Those of us on the outside can hardly imagine the ovens Virginia prisons can become during the hottest part of summer.
Until now there was some relief for overheated inmates: They were allowed to purchase small electrical fans from the prison canteens. It was only a matter of time, of course, until a prisoner decided to use the appliance for something other than its intended purpose. Michael Williams - who awaits death for murdering an elderly Cumberland County couple and has four life sentences for killing four other men - was the culprit.
Inmates told staff writer Laura LaFay that it is unfair to punish all 346 Mecklenburg inmates for the transgression of a single man. They reported that disturbances in the prison were being staged as a protest against the decision.
A spokesman for the Department of Corrections pointed out that inmates are ``always trying to beat the system, be it fashioning weapons or gaining an advantage over correctional officers.''
That is ubndoubtedly true, and prison officials must make the prisons safe - for themselves and for the inmates. Any object that can be fashioned into a weapon or used for escape must go.
But in the interest of humanity - and also the safety of prison guards who must work with the surly, overheated inmates - we urge the Department of Corrections to find less potentially dangerous fans for inmates.
Guards must be vigilant about their use. But it isn't right to indiscriminately punish those who want only to keep cool along with those who have a burning desire to escape. by CNB