Witness Describes Plot to Kill Folsom Guards

A former state clerk conspired with the Aryan Brotherhood to get the home addresses of Folsom Prison correctional officers targeted for assassination, according to a former member of the white supremacist prison gang.

Robert Ryan Rowland testified Tuesday on the opening day of trial for Judith Danelle Box, 39, a former program technician for the state Franchise Tax Board who is charged with two felony counts of unauthorized computer access and conspiracy to commit assault.

Jim Reber, a spokesman for the tax board, said Box was dismissed last November because of alleged misuse of computer files. The firing occurred before the latest felony charges were filed, he added.

Rowland, an inmate who said he left the Aryan Brotherhood last year, testified that the gang decided to retaliate against correctional officers after gang member Arthur Ruffo was shot and wounded by Officer David Pitts in the prison exercise yard in June, 1987.

Names of Officers

Rowland said he and other gang members were directed by their leader, Wendell Norris, to collect the names of officers so that Box could run them through the state computers. Box was the girlfriend of Aryan Brotherhood member Phillip Fortman, Rowland said.

As soon as gang members were released from prison, Rowland said, they were going to kill the officers.

A few weeks after Ruffo was shot, somebody tried to shoot Pitts while he was riding in his pickup truck in West Sacramento. But prosecuting and defense attorneys said Box had nothing to do with that assault.

Prosecutor Albert Locher told the jury that Box obtained the home address of one correctional officer on Sept. 14, 1987, and attempted on Nov. 6. to gain access to the records of another officer.