EDMONTON- An inmate from the Fort Saskatchewan Correctional Centre says the situation inside the facility Friday night was “insane” after inmates were put into lockdown.
“Broken windows, fires I heard on unit five, because they had lighters in there so they lit carpets on fire, small little fires, flooding of cells,” explained Chris, who has asked his last name not be published.
“There were guys in their cells for hours. There’s no toiletries, there’s no running water or anything in the cells. There’s guys that needed medications,” he said. “It was unthinkable.”
He says some inmates were forced to wait up to seven hours to receive their regular medications.
Chris, who is serving a nine month sentence for a number of driving violations, says another issue was the fact inmates were not told why they were being locked down. As a result, he says many people had a hard time coping with the situation.
“It led to windows getting broke and people banging. It was insane really,” he explained over the phone from the correctional centre Sunday morning, adding the mayhem and damage caused concern for him.
“If this is supposed to be safety glass and guys are breaking it with plastic chairs and pieces of wood, I mean, it makes you wonder.”
Things have calmed down over the past couple of days, though, since RCMP officers took over from the guards who were inside the facility Friday night, Chris says.
“When the RCMP officers came in they started letting people out gradually, to use the washroom and distribute medications,” he explained. “Once we were out of our cells, let out for a brief moment from the lockdown it’s been okay. We get treated with respect from the RCMP officers as opposed to the guards that were on duty beforehand.”
While there is more of a calm atmosphere at the facility, Chris says tension is once again building.
“They’re letting people out of their cells a tier at a time, and the other tiers are left locked up, which is building their tension wondering ‘why are these guys out? How come we’re not out?'”
“They can’t let all 70 guys out because there’s only two RCMP on staff. So they let them out in levels and you hear pounding on the walls, banging and people wanting to get out, rattling their doors.”
Chris hopes the strike situation is settled quickly, because he fears tensions will continue to rise if inmates miss their scheduled release dates.
“Right now they’re running skeleton staff. We’ve got two RCMP officers working control panel. We’ve got one DDO, that’s Deputy Director of Operations, working down at the main office at the jail. So, I mean, releases aren’t happening,” he said. “Guys are getting kept here longer than they need to be and, you know, that’s adding fuel to fire.”
Correctional peace officers from the Fort Saskatchewan facility walked off the job Friday, following a similar move at the Edmonton Remand Centre. The Alberta Labour Relations Board deemed the action illegal Saturday, and ordered members back to work. However, many members remained on the picket line Sunday morning.
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