Effort to Re-Integrate Jail Sparks New Disturbance

More than 100 Latino inmates at Pitchess Detention Center in Castaic raised havoc again when authorities tried to re-integrate them with black inmates after two weeks of living in racially segregated dorms.

Inmates on Monday night rammed steel bunk beds into walls, hurled milk cartons and rotten fruit at jail guards and barricaded themselves behind overturned beds when guards came to take them to an integrated dorm, said Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Lt. Gary Sinclair.

It took a squad of 10 deputies armed with tear gas and plastic grenades to quell the disturbance, but afterward the inmates remained in a Latino-only dorm.

“We didn’t anticipate dealing with this,” Sinclair said. “I guess we underestimated their resolve to resist integration.”

Jails at the Pitchess compound, which houses 10,000 inmates, were segregated after three days of race riots two weeks ago during which 80 inmates were injured. Hundreds of Latino inmates, acting on orders from the Mexican Mafia prison gang, started the fighting as a way to establish their control, authorities said.

Latinos outnumber blacks in the jail system, and most of the men injured in the riots were black, including a 21-year-old who remains in a coma. Authorities said the only way to restore calm was to take the unusual step of dividing inmates by race, although they said the move would be temporary. Both Latino and black inmates indicated they preferred segregation.

On Monday, authorities started to re-integrate the cell blocks. There were no problems initially. Guards removed inmates from segregated dorms in groups of five, adding five African Americans, then five Latinos, then five more blacks and so on until the dorms were full. Most dorms hold between 60 and 120 inmates.

But at 9:30 p.m. Monday, Latino inmates in a dorm on Pitchess’ east side refused to leave. When deputies tried to extract them, they started rioting, Sinclair said. No one was hurt, but some property was damaged. The troublemaking inmates were punished but kept in a Latino-only dorm.

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Authorities are now exploring ways to coax inmates into segregated dorms without using force, Sinclair said.

“It’s a game of strategy around here,” Sinclair said. “We’re always trying to stay one step ahead of inmates and they’re always trying to stay one step ahead of us.”