The prison decided to close down the Maria unit to save on staff. At the same time, they admitted their mistake 3 years ago, and that was to put Closed Custody on Medium yards. Apparently, they forgot the old adage of “One bad apple spoils the whole barrel.”. So they put it back the way it was, with all the bad apples together on Lumley.

Here is how one inmate described the journey from Maria to Cruz. “Nine of us got in the van at 6:30 am to cross a rural road to the main Complex where Cruz is located. COIII Brown got us trussed up in full chains to cross the road. At the main vehicle gate was a new CO, and by golly, this was HER vehicle gate. She compared her manifest of our names to Brown’s list. But it didn’t match! Gasp! Even though our names were on the transfer list for that day, we were ” out of order” and she told Brown to go back to Maria. So back we went after having spent almost an hour haggling at the V gate.

The Deputy Warden of Maria met us, and you could hear her on the phone….”You #%@ and get these prisoners to Cruz or I’ll have your and *$#: badge! Do you hear me!!!”.

So we waited some more and then tried to cross the road again. THIS time the brass, not the little CO, was there to greet us and after much commotion, we were allowed to pass.

So how long does it take for the DOC to cross the road?? 2 and 1/2 hours.”