Officials Knew of Plans for Jail Melees

In the wake of three days of fighting by thousands of prisoners at the Pitchess jail that has left 166 people injured, a high-ranking sheriff’s official said Friday that deputies knew well in advance that inmates planned a mass outbreak of violence and the guards were ready for it.

Despite the many injuries, the preemptive mobilization prevented a far worse outcome, said Mark Squiers, chief of the Sheriff’s Department’s Custody Division.

Squiers also said he believes the fighting between African American and Latino inmates may be the result of a power struggle within the ranks of the Mexican Mafia, a powerful gang based in the state prison system.

When the fighting at the Pitchess Detention Center--which has been plagued by frequent racial brawls for a decade--erupted at the facility at 2 p.m. Wednesday, the department had extra deputies on hand and an emergency command post already set up, Squiers said.

“Sources came to us about an impending problem . . . the word had spread to the point that we knew down to the time it was to happen,” Squiers said. “We were in fact mobilized when it occurred.

“The damage and the injuries were limited to far less than what it could have been,” Squiers said. “We have to be extremely proud of the reaction of the deputies for containing the violence.”

About 500 deputies were on duty at the jail this week, combating the violence. But the Sheriff’s Department has declined to say how many guards are usually stationed there and how many were reinforcements, saying it does not want prisoners to know the number of guards, a spokesman said.

But the Sheriff’s Department has been at a loss to stop the fighting, which continued Friday, with six more injuries reported. So far sheriff’s officials estimate that more than 2,300 inmates have been involved in 16 separate melees since Wednesday.

Squiers said that contrary to previous statements by sheriff’s deputies, he believes the fighting is not fueled solely by racial tension between African American and Latino inmates, the cause of scores of brawls in recent years.

“What this is about is state prison gangs and the assertion of power,” he said, voicing suspicions that the violence is the result of a power struggle between members of the Mexican Mafia trying to fill a void created by the indictment of 23 of its key leaders last spring in federal court.

“This whole conflict, in my estimation, is orchestrated and is in all likelihood attributable to a Hispanic prison gang and a series of orders instructing inmates to act in the way they have,” he said.

Squiers did not explain why attacks on black prisoners would affect a power struggle within the Latino gang.

African American prisoners, outnumbered 45% to 35% by Latinos, have suffered about three-quarters of the injuries in the fighting, deputies said.

“We know there is a gang influence,” Squiers said. “But we don’t know who these people are, only that there are many of them.”

An estimated 40% to 50% of county jail inmates are believed to belong to street gangs, he said.

Also, contrary to a statement by the department Wednesday, Squiers said that some inmates have been temporarily segregated by race.

“Some dormitories are all black or all Latino,” he said. “We don’t have enough room to do it completely.”

A department spokesman had said Wednesday that racial segregation of the prisoners was philosophically undesirable, too difficult to maintain and ineffective. Groups segregated in the past simply fought among themselves, that spokesman said.

With no long-term solutions in sight, sheriff’s deputies have been forced to react to the violence, rather than control it, Squiers said.

“I’m not saying there’s no solution,” Squiers said. “But I’m not confident when you have a prison gang calling the shots that there is a great deal you can do other than to react.”