Honoring ECI correctional officer who was murdered 21 years ago

MARYLAND– 21 years after the murder of an officer from the Eastern Correctional Institute, leaders came together to honor the victim this weekend in D.C.

Officer Greg Collins was added to the Law Enforcement Officers Memorial. He was murdered on his way home from ECI in 2001 by a former ECI inmate. In 2019, investigators made an arrest in the case, and in 2021 the suspect was sentenced to life. Now, law enforcement officials came together to pay their respects to a man they said lost his life all because of his commitment to his job.

“We gotta make sure that we remember all that do this vitally important work,” Secretary Robert Green, with the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services, said.

“After years of yearning for answers and understanding, we learned again that Officer Collins was killed because of what he did, cause being a correctional officer;  he literally lost his life because of his work,” Secretary Green said.

Secretary Green said he worked with Governor Larry Hogan and lawmakers to change the law so families of correctional employees who are killed because of their job, whether on-duty or off-duty, may receive enhanced death benefits if the death is proven to have been a murder because of the officer’s job. This is even if the suspect isn’t convicted and the case is closed until years later.