Del. Corrections Officers speak out against ACLU agreement

Correctional officers and their union point to an ACLU agreement with the DOC as the source of security problems at the prisons. 

Delaware's correctional facilities are still under a magnifying glass in the aftermath of the fatal inmate takeover at James T. Vaughn Correctional Center in early February.  T

The agreement made last year stems from a 2015 ACLU lawsuit concerning the treatment of prisoners suffering from mental illness in prisons.

However CO's say the agreement, among other things, restricts the amount of disciplinary actions that can be taken against inmates.  Such as  "no inmate may serve more than 15 days in disciplinary detention during a 30 day period".  

Correctional officers say because of the agreement inmates no longer respect authority.

"Pretty much he said what're you going to do to me, you give me a 24 I still get rec, I still get a visit, there's nothing you can do and he laughed and call me a bunch of names and the truth is he was right," said Robert Chandler, a CO at the Vaughn Correctional Center.

The agreement also called for the DOC to construct a new building at Vaughn Correctional Center to better facilitate the mental health treatment of maximum security inmates. In the interim correction officials had to find current space that could be used to provide that treatment.

Correctional officers testified at legislative hall that the implementation of that portion of the agreement resulted in dangerous inmates being moved into less secure housing.  

According to Sgt. Aaron Forkum, who also works at the Vaughn Correctional Center,  the DOC took a building called MU 21, which used to house max security inmates and they changed it so that it could house and treat inmates suffering from mental illness.

"In losing those 75 beds, like I said, that enabled 75 max offenders to be moved to lower security units out of necessity because the available number of secure units were lowered to house those specific offenders," Forkum said.

The Delaware ACLU has since responded to claims that agreement has weakened correctional officers ability to discipline prisoners calling the claims unequivocally false and utterly untrue.  

The DOC has also declined to comment on any allegations that came from the Senate hearing.