A remote California prison has a culture of racism and abuse that is exacerbated by a code of silence among its guards and staff, the state’s inspector general said Wednesday.
Guards at High Desert State Prison, in the town of Susanville north of Lake Tahoe, regularly let inmates know if new arrivals are sex offenders, making them vulnerable to assault and extortion by other inmates, Inspector General Robert Barton said in a report released Wednesday. Barton also cited what he called a "culture of racism and lack of acceptance of ethnic differences" by staff.
"From the casual use of derogatory racial terms to de facto discrimination, it became apparent to the OIG that there is a serious issue" at the prison, Barton said, referring to the Office of Inspector General. "The institution's leadership appears oblivious to these problems."
Just 18 percent of the prison's inmates are white, the report said, compared with 74 percent of guards and 89 percent of supervisors.
"Blacks were treated very differently," one former inmate said in an interview with Barton's office. "They are on lockdowns a lot longer; they go to the hole for the smallest of reasons; and officers messed with their food."
Barton also criticized the guards' union, which he said resisted efforts to interview staff and attempted to shut down the investigation by disparaging his department to lawmakers and Governor Jerry Brown.
Employees formed tight-knit groups that socialized together and maintained a code of silence about misconduct, he said.
A spokeswoman for the California Correctional Peace Officers Association was not immediately available for comment.
Barton's investigation, which was conducted at the behest of the state Senate, follows years of complaints and media reports alleging problems at the facility.
“The findings in this report are deeply troubling and speak to larger woes in our broken criminal justice system,” said Senate Democratic leader Kevin de León of Los Angeles.
Jeffrey Beard, secretary of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said the state has taken numerous steps to improve conditions at the prison, including appointing a new warden earlier this month.
"We do not tolerate staff misconduct of any kind and will take appropriate action to hold all employees accountable," Beard said in a statement.
The department is investigating allegations of misconduct and has developed a corrective action plan, he said.
(Reporting by Sharon Bernstein; Editing by Leslie Adler)
