Assaults at Logan CC surge amid overcrowding, cutbacks
Prison overcrowding, short-staffing and funding cutbacks can have dangerous consequences, as a recent spike in violence at Logan Correctional Center in Lincoln shows.
Logan logged some 400 violent incidents in the first 18 months after the facility was converted to a women’s prison. That’s according to Illinois Department of Corrections records obtained by AFSCME.
The numbers make clear that violence among Logan inmates and against staff was significantly understated in a recent report by the John Howard Association, an advocacy group that visits state prisons, which stated that “Logan had recorded as of November 2013, two Inmate-on-Inmate Violent Assaults and one Inmate-on-Staff Violent Assault.”
In contrast, the department’s records reveal 170 assault charges from March to November 2013, and 217 more from December 2013 through the beginning of October 2014.
The documents describe inmates fighting, punching, kicking, biting, striking with objects such as food trays or a broom, strangling with a cord, stabbing with a pen, spitting in faces, head-butting, stomping, slapping and throwing urine or boiling water.
Victims ranged from correctional officers and other security employees to nurses and other medical staff as well as fellow inmates.
“The situation at Logan is volatile, violent and dangerous for employees who risk our personal safety every day we serve,” said AFSCME Local 2073 president Shaun Dawson, a correctional officer. “There is simply not enough staff to maintain order and safely house and rehabilitate our inmate population.”
Like all state prisons, Logan suffers from twin, long-simmering crises – severe overcrowding coupled with drastic cuts to staff. Complicating matters, in March 2013 Logan was converted from a medium-security facility for male inmates. It received female inmates of varying security classifications from Dwight Correctional Center, which was closed, and the adjacent Lincoln Correctional Center, which now houses men.
Although Logan CC was built to safely hold 1,106 inmates, it is now severely overcrowded with 1,961 inmates (177 percent of its capacity) as of the last date the department filed its quarterly report to the legislature. Similarly, Illinois houses 49,000 inmates statewide in a system built to hold just 32,000.
Meanwhile, statewide corrections staffing has been slashed 30% in recent years – from nearly 17,000 employees in 2001 to fewer than 13,000 today. At Logan, the local union reports that housing units with 130, 150 or more inmates are commonly staffed by just one lone correctional officer.
“The level of violence at Logan is deeply disturbing – nearly 400 incidents in just 18 months – and the situation is no different at many other Illinois prisons,” AFSCME Council 31 Executive Director Roberta Lynch said. “Frontline employees know what’s really going on, and it is vitally important that their concerns are heard. State government has a responsibility to provide the resources, funding and staff required to assure that employees and inmates alike can count on a safe and secure environment.”