HOW NOT TO ACT IN FEDERAL PRISON CAMP.
The general consensus is that prisoners at camps are well mannered, simply sitting back waiting to finish the balance of their sentences so they can go home and restart their lives. A majority of the prisoners here fall into that category. However, there are more than a few prisoners who do not match this stereotype. Several prisoners in the later category got themselves and others in to some serious trouble this week.
One of the “dorms” in Pensacola has a reputation for being a bit rowdy. Folks who live there tend to cook in the dorm kitchen on a regular basis. It has been suggested that they use certain foods that may have been “misplaced” by the compound kitchen. To avoid being caught with any “misplaced” kitchen food, I overheard that several prisoners broke the lock on a storage room in the dorm and used the room to secret “misplaced” food. The staff discovered the broken lock, fixed it, and told the prisoners to stay out of the room. Sure enough, 6 days later I heard the lock was again broken. This prompted the staff to impose sanctions against the whole dorm by shutting down the use of the microwave ovens. This made the prisoners very unhappy so someone decided to voice his displeasure by pulling the fire alarm during a rainstorm at count time. The “dorm” was evacuated and all of the prisoners stood out in the rain until it was determined that it was a false fire alarm. The very next day, the alarm was again triggered and the staff became upset. They shut off all televisions in the dorm (in addition to the microwaves) and made all prisoners stay in their rooms. (lock down). They also held standing counts every hour. It is no fun to wake up every hour and stand by your bunk to be counted. One prisoner, I heard, was slow to respond to the 1:00 a.m. standing count and was given an incident report (shot) which subjected him to disciplinary action. He was upset and went to see the warden to complain. Apparently, he got into an argument with the warden which resulted in another incident report, a trip to the SHU, and a transfer to a higher security facility. The moral of the story is to get out of bed when a corrections officer tells you to and do not argue about it!
Another prisoner (Jeff) I heard also earned a trip to the SHU and a transfer in an unrelated incident. Jeff got into a heated argument with a co-worker at his work detail at the Navy base. His supervisor stepped in to stop it and Jeff assaulted him. Jeff is in the SHU awaiting transfer to a higher security facility.
Not everyone is on their best behavior in Pensacola.
Ken Flaska
