Prisoners Attack Protected Unit’s Inmates

Inmates from Corcoran State Prison’s security housing unit invaded a recreation yard for the prison’s most notorious and protected inmates last weekend, beating up mass murderer Juan Corona, smashing Charles Manson’s beloved guitar and leaving staff to cope with the latest in a string of security breaches.

Corona, 65, the killer of 25 farm workers who is sick and suffering from dementia, sustained minor injuries, along with three other inmates, according to official reports. An officer shot one round from a woodblock gas gun to help break up the incident.

Neither Manson nor Sirhan Sirhan, the killer of Robert F. Kennedy who is also housed in the unit, was injured.

Corrections Department spokesman Tip Kindel said that the cause of the breach appears to have been nothing more than a malfunction of the light indicating that the door was secure. A full investigation is underway to look at all possible causes, including whether the door was left purposely unlocked.

Security housing unit “inmates are very observant,” Kindel said. “When they saw the door open, they just burst through it. There will be a full investigation to determine if it’s [anything] more sinister.”

No inmates in the California prison system are more watched over and coddled than the four dozen men locked inside Corcoran’s so-called protective housing unit. Because of their infamy or by having informed on other inmates, they are prime targets for prison assailants.

But on Saturday shortly after noon, in the latest security breach at Corcoran, three inmates rushed through an unlocked emergency door that divides two recreation yards, one belonging to gang members and other violent inmates in the security housing unit and the other belonging to the protective housing unit inmates.

Corona, who usually paces the yard in obsessive fashion mumbling to himself, was one of the first inmates to be attacked. He was struck several times in the back while the others, including Manson, scurried back inside their cellblock.

In the confusion, Manson left his guitar and one of the attackers smashed it into pieces. The acoustic guitar has long been a bone of contention between Manson and prison officials. In the past, the prison has confiscated the guitar because Manson was using it to record music that was then smuggled outside and sold. It was returned to him only a few weeks ago.

Officers responded to the scene and broke up the fighting. Even though only a few inmates sustained minor injuries, a prison official said all protective inmates were taken to the infirmary for examination, a reflection of the unit’s importance.

“This unit is the department’s shining light as far as protecting inmates goes,” said the prison official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “You don’t get sent to [the protective housing unit] unless you’ve killed a lot of people or someone very important or you’ve given up big information.

“To attack one of these inmates is a big badge of honor. So we’re embarrassed. This is a big breach.”

Kindel said the sensor on the emergency exit malfunctioned, with the light showing that the door was locked when it wasn’t. The incident has rattled inmates in protective custody.

“I am scared,” said an inmate who called The Times on Monday. “We’re all scared and everything.”

State audits over the last year have shown a number of security lapses inside the security housing unit. The oversights include a failure by the prison to check histories of some inmates to safeguard against putting known enemies into the same cell.

In December, a control booth operator in the security housing unit went on a food run and was replaced by an inexperienced officer. The replacement allowed a gang member to return to a cell that wasn’t his.

The inmate teamed up with a fellow gang member in the cell to beat up a third inmate. The bloodied and unconscious victim was discovered two hours later when a relative came to visit him.

This was not the first time Corona has been attacked in prison. In 1973, he was jumped by four inmates and stabbed at the California Medical Facility in Vacaville.