DES MOINES – AFSCME Council 61 President Danny Homan issued the following statement in response to yet another correctional officer and nurse being attacked by an inmate at the Iowa Medical and Classification Center (IMCC):
“Last night, an inmate in a Mental Health Unit at the Iowa Medical and Classification Center (IMCC) in Coralville attacked both a correctional officer and a nurse. The inmate became irate and was instructed by the officer to return to his cell. He then slammed the correctional officer into a wall. The officer fell to the ground while the inmate repeatedly punched the officer in the head. Due to unsafe staffing levels, there were no officers nearby to stop the attack. Two inmates intervened by pulling their fellow inmate off of the officer. When a nurse approached the inmate and told him she was there to help him, he kicked her in the chest.
“We are now at a point where staffing levels are so low that we are counting on inmates to intervene in attacks against correctional officers and other staff. The two staff members involved in this incident were lucky to escape with only minor injuries, though the officer is currently being treated at a local hospital for a possible concussion.
“Governor Reynolds and legislative Republicans who have mismanaged our state’s budget and continually underfunded and even cut funding mid-year to the Department of Corrections have to answer for this. The state of our corrections system is irresponsible and downright unacceptable.”
7 thoughts on “Iowa union boss blames prison beating of officer and nurse on low staff numbers”
There you have it. The answer to the problem of a officer not doing his job correctly is to spend more money on more unqualified officers.
And there you have it, a typical uninformed & ignorant NIT reader, not facing the facts.
Due to Branstad & his fluff piece Reynolds slashing of Department of Correction funding, they are severly understaffed.
“The total Iowa DOC staff level in 2009 was 3,064 vs. 2,390 in 2017. That’s a 22% reduction in staffing levels. The offender levels basically stayed the same while staff levels plummeted.”
Ya, reduce the number of people guarding criminals so you can give the savings to your big corporation buddies.
Some jobs are dangerous – should only be filled with the right people – Unlike the Florida she sheriffs snowflake UNION employees that are inept -stupid and have no HONOR . Double that for the crud that calls himself sheriiff.
Of course he complains that he needs more money that’s the knee jerk reaction for anything that goes wrong. As his liberal buddies are continuing to enflame the country against law enforcement leading to injuries and deaths of police officers all over the country. The correctional officers should just learn how to take a knee and he would have been fine.
Ok here it is. There is all kinds of risk assessments and threat levels for these inmates. Apparently they underestimated this guys threat level. Why is this any different than a Police Officer getting injured or killed which is a result of the liberals and media towards law enforcement jumping to conclusions in certain cases in which they were wrong but cops got killed and still are with the stupid take a knee rhetoric. Also, we already spend too much in regards to Corrections. Bloated management and unions protecting worthless workers. Take a look at the histor. There’s a direct correlation with money spent and more people going to prison.
It will be interesting to hear the republican’s response to this incident.
So, do you have your response to the Republican response written up and ready?