The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Hostage standoff ends; prison guard found dead
SMYRNA, DEL. — Using a backhoe to smash through a barricade of footlockers, authorities stormed Delaware’s largest prison early Thursday and ended a nearly 24-hour hostage standoff involving inmates armed with sharpened objects. One hostage — a guard — was found dead.
A second hostage, a female counselor, was safely rescued minutes after the tactical teams forced their way into the all-male, 2,500-prisoner James T. Vaughn Correctional Center. Some inmates had shielded her from harm, officials said.
Gov. John Carney called the uprising a “torturous” ordeal. In a statement, he said authorities will hold accountable those responsible and “make whatever changes are necessary to ensure nothing like it ever happens again.”
Authorities did not immediately explain how 47-yearold Sgt. Steven Floyd died, but the head of the guards union said the 16-year veteran of the prison had been forced into a closet and killed by his captors.
During the takeover, Floyd yelled to other guards who were coming to help him that the inmates had set a trap, saving some of his fellow officers’ lives, said Geoffrey Klopp, president of the union representing the guards.
The uprising began Wednesday when inmates with homemade weapons overpowered staff members, seized Building C and took three guards and a counselor hostage.
One inmate told a local newspaper via phone that they were demanding better education and rehabilitation programs and were also upset over President Donald Trump and “all the things that he’s doing now.”
“We know that the institution is going to change for the worse,” he told The News Journal in Wilmington, Del.
During negotiations conducted via an officer’s walkie-talkie, the inmates released two hostages and got authorities to turn back on water service they had shut off. The inmates said they needed it for drinking and washing, but instead, they filled up metal footlockers and built barricades.
Officers smashed through the barrier with the backhoe around 5 a.m. and found Floyd unresponsive, authorities said. He was pronounced dead about a half-hour later.
The other guards taken hostage had been beaten severely and suffered broken bones, cuts and eye injuries, Klopp said.
It wasn’t immediately clear how many inmates took part in the uprising. About 120 were in the building when it began, but dozens were let out as the standoff dragged on.
Officers inside the cellblocks are not armed for fear they could be overpowered and stripped of their weapons.
The negotiations via walkie-talkie were broadcast online for more than an hour before officials blocked the transmission. The conversations were mostly calm, with moments of tension. At one point, an unidentified inmate told a negotiator that the prisoners wanted a “formal apology” from the governor for “decades of oppression.”
While authorities investigate what went wrong, Delaware Homeland Security Secretary Robert Coupe noted that the prison system faces staffing shortages every day.
Klopp said Floyd’s death was preventable and slammed the state for understaffing and low pay.