LAS VEGAS- Those Nevada prison guards sure are something special…. They created a “gladiator-like scenario” where two handcuffed inmates were allowed to fight each other, before a corrections officer trainee fired four times with a shotgun, executing one prisoner and wounding the other, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday.
Attorney for the family of the slain inmate, Cal Potter, characterized the Nov. 12 shooting at High Desert State Prison as an execution. Potter states that guards and supervisors had violated prison policy. “Officers know they will see a fight if they release ad seg inmates that are supposed to be in walk-alone status,” Potter told The Associated Press.
“Defendants … refused to intervene,” said the lawsuit. “On the contrary (they) created a gladiator-like scenario and allowed the inmates to fight.”
“The Nevada Department of Corrections does not comment on pending or ongoing litigation,” according to a statement from the prisons public information office, which also said that an investigation of the incident was in the hands of the state attorney general’s office.
The lawsuit names two corrections officers and a shooter, whom Potter said was a trainee, by their last names only. It also names as plaintiffs the state of Nevada, prisons chief Greg Cox and the warden, assistant warden and a lieutenant at High Desert State Prison. It alleges wrongful death; excessive force; deliberate indifference to Perez’s medical needs; negligent training and supervision; and intentional infliction of emotional distress. It seeks unspecified damages greater than $30,000.
Perez, 28, was a two-time felon serving 18 months to four years for hitting a man in the head with a two-by-four piece of lumber in downtown Las Vegas two days before Thanksgiving 2012.
Perez’s death was ruled a homicide; he died of gunshot wounds to the head, neck, chest and arms.
The other inmate, Andrew Jay Arevalo, 24, survived with gunshot wounds to the face. Clearly he was supposed to die too, so that the wardens could present the sole narrative, probably claim that the two had scuffled with them for their weapons. According to his attorney, Alexis Plunkett, her client had told her that he and Perez were handcuffed when they were shot. Perez leaves behind two children, ages 3 and 2.
The lawyer said Perez’s family weren’t told that Perez had been shot. They were also given conflicting statements during initial meetings with prison administrators after his death.
“They were devastated three days later when they went to the mortuary and learned that Carlos had … multiple gunshot wounds to his face and upper body,” Potter said Tuesday.
Deputy prisons chief Brian Connett said in a March 27 interview the shooting came in response to two inmates fighting at the prison housing about 3,500 inmates.
He has since defended the state Department of Corrections as a responsible steward of the safety and security of guards and inmates. He said the three corrections officers who were involved would remain on paid leave pending action by the attorney general.
Disgusting, this man boldly defends the wardens who allowed a fight to take place… and then shot both CUFFED men FOUR times. That’s an execution, there’s no other way to look at that, yet they still get PAID LEAVE? He still thinks that their behavior, likely just ONE of many incidences throughout the entire prison complex, was that of “responsible stewards”? Being imprisoned for just a few years seems to have become a death sentence.
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http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/news/2015/04/08/lawsuit-alleges-gladiator-like-scenario-led-to-slaying-nevada-inmate/?intcmp=obinsite
