Lockdown lifted at Central Jail
The Orange County Sheriff’s Department lifted lockdown restrictions at Men’s Central Jail on Friday, a week after 12 inmates were injured in racially motivated brawls in two dormitories.
Since then, the roughly 1,300 inmates at the Santa Ana jail had been denied visits, trips to the exercise yard and education programs out of concern of renewed violence. Sheriff’s officials lifted the restrictions after those concerns eased, Sheriff’s Capt. Roland Chacon said.
The fighting between black and Latino inmates erupted April 18 in two holding rooms lined with bunk beds. Each room housed 68 inmates, Chacon said. Deputies broke up the fighting quickly.
On Friday, about eight deputies in protective gear kept watch while inmates were fed in a dining hall, but no new violence erupted. For the last week, inmates had been fed in their cells.
-- Stuart Pfeifer
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