For Violent Prisoners, It’s Life in a Fish Bowl : Crime: Two prisons in state use high technology, Plexiglass walls, tight isolation rules to control most dangerous inmates.

Gary Bearden is considered one of the most violent, dangerous inmates in the California prison system.

That reputation has earned him one of the most technologically advanced jail cells in the state, a cell made just for him and others like him--at the Secured Housing Unit at Corcoran Prison.

“These inmates were put in here for some kind of violent act,” said Lt. Bob Priolo. “Given the opportunity, these people will continue to be violent. They can’t make it in a general population-type institution.”

Bearden was sentenced to life in prison after he kidnaped a young man, beat him with a tire iron and left him for dead. The same day, he robbed another young man at knifepoint and stole his van.

But it was in 1980, at Folsom Prison, that he committed the crime that landed him in the SHU unit. Bearden was found with a weapon. Later, he received additional time in the unit for assaulting a staff member, fighting and threatening people.

Prisoners placed in the units for attacking guards or other prisoners are as close to permanent solitary as they can get. They can’t eat with other inmates. They can’t attend classes or hold jobs. They can’t shower with other inmates. They can’t go out in the yard with other inmates.

They are simply too dangerous.

“They’re ingenious, as hard-core as they get,” said Correctional Officer Robert Dean.

Charles Manson is one of Bearden’s neighbors.

Corcoran was the first prison in California built specifically for such violent inmates. Through a combination of isolation and high-tech design, the 2-year-old prison has emerged as an example of how to control inmates long considered uncontrollable.

Before Corcoran opened in 1989, SHU inmates were scattered throughout the prison system in conditions that were often difficult to monitor and control. Now the approximately 2,000 SHU inmates in the state are either at Corcoran or Pelican Bay Prison in Northern California.

“Based on the new technology and the design of this prison, we are able to manage these inmates.” Corcoran Lt. J.R. Andrews said. “It shows that this system really works.”

Most maximum-security inmates are allowed to participate in work and classroom programs and are allowed yard time in groups up to 2,000. In the Secured Housing Unit, inmates are in their cell most of the time, fed in their cells, and can’t participate in work, classroom studies or free recreation.

Recreation is limited to 24 inmates at a time, 10 hours a week. Showers are allowed three times a week, and inmates go alone, unless they have a cellmate.

Despite their success, Corcoran and Pelican Bay are probably the first and last of the high-tech prisons in California designed to house violent inmates.

“There’s a fairly stable population of die-hard troublemakers,” said Tip Kendall, spokesman for the Department of Corrections.

Pelican Bay opened in 1990 as the second specialized SHU unit and is similar to Corcoran in design. Pelican Bay has some additional features--like sensors in the ground and constant video and audio surveillance--that make it even more controlled than Corcoran.

At Corcoran, correctional officers monitor the inmates through Plexiglass walls. The control room sits at the small end of a large V-shaped room with cells on the far side. There are only two tiers of 12 cells in each section.

An officer paces the Plexiglass above them, cradling a rifle in his arms. He controls all the doors and cells in the section.

“That’s the concept of this new SHU program,” Andrews said. “You not only have the security, but you also have the (automatic) systems. Control of the showers, control of the cells, control of the doors.”

In the yard, a chess board is painted on the concrete, but barbed wire lies in fat rolls along the top of the walls.

“I deal with them on a daily basis, but I respect their ability to be dangerous,” said Dean. “I mean, I don’t turn my back to the cells.”

The cells were carefully designed to thwart any effort by inmates to injure anyone.

The doors are solid steel with a mesh of small holes instead of bars. It is easy to see through, but impossible to reach through.

Inside the cells, lights come on at a touch of a button, as does hot and cold water at the sink. The gleaming stainless steel toilet and sink are formed from a single piece of metal.

There is nothing here for an inmate to turn into a weapon, nothing to chew on, pick at, take off.

The bed is actually part of the wall, a solid slab of concrete with a thin mattress resting on it. There are no hidden places; everything is in plain sight.

Prison officials are taking no chances. They have had to second-guess every possibility, and some things they learn from experience.

Inmates aren’t allowed toothpaste in a tube--they have toothpaste powder sitting in a paper dish. Their toothbrushes have bristles, but handles have been removed.

“This is what this building is all about. Their minds are always working,” Dean said. “They have nothing to do but observe you, your moves and everything. They have a lot of time to watch you.”