…cells were left open, canisters with gas found
… fire hydrant disabled, pipes damaged
TOP security officials have concluded that the Camp Street prisoners were up to something much bigger and evidence has pointed to elaborate planning, where underground steel pipes at the facility were damaged to make weapons; one of the main fire hydrants disabled and several canisters of gasoline were placed at strategic locations.
Government is likely to conduct what one official described as the ‘mother of all prison inquiries’ regarding Sunday’s riot which resulted in nine prisoners escaping, a prison officer shot and killed and several other wardens injured. During the melee most of the buildings at Lot 12 Camp Street were gutted as well as the Senior Prison Officers’ Sports Club, which was used as a holding area for the evacuated inmates. “This thing was grand from what we have seen, there seems to have been something bigger that was planned,” the official told the Guyana Chronicle under conditions of strict anonymity.
Six fires
The Guyana Chronicle was told that a total of six fires were lit and Prisons Director, Gladwyn Samuels had confirmed Sunday night that the fire started when inmates lit them simultaneously in the buildings and holding hostage one officer. The prison director noted that around 16:45hrs on Sunday, he received two phone calls, one from the prison and one from a civilian, informing him of the situation at Camp Street. He said that he was told that an officer was being held hostage and following an exchange of gunshots, the prison’s standard operating procedures (SOPs) were activated. Samuels said the wooden sections of the prison at the corner of Durban and John Streets, as well as another wooden area close to the corner of John and Bent Streets, were set ablaze. Those areas, known as the strong-cell division and the condemned division, were immediately attended to as evacuation of the prisoners commenced.
Samuels said that from his observation, all the wooden buildings at Camp Street were damaged or completely gutted and the Prison Sports Club, which was used as holding area, was subsequently set on fire and destroyed. Samuels said that there were no signs of unrest prior to Sunday and according to him, based on reports, the fires served as distractions which resulted in the break for freedom by the escapees. Up to press time Wednesday night eight of the escapees were still on the lam even as the joint services have launched a massive manhunt for them. Among them are: Mark Royden Williams aka Smallie who was sentenced to death for the Bartica massacre and is also facing charges for the Lusignan killings. Uree Varswyck aka Malcolm Gordon who is also facing two murder charges; Stafrei Hopkinson Alexander; Cornelius Thomas (a Trinidadian); Desmond James and Cobena Stephens aka “OJ”.
Planning
Meanwhile, giving an insight into evidence of the prisoners’ planning, the official said it is clear that the intention was to burn down the prison and create further trouble in society. According to the official the disabling of the fire hydrant was to render the efforts of the Guyana Fire Service powerless and also the inmates had blocked off access to the area where the hydrant was. Fire Chief, Marlon Gentle told the media Sunday night that the fire was unprecedented and noted that as the firemen battled the blaze with help from other members of the Joint Services, they were being constantly attacked by prisoners with large bricks. “There are a lot of issues that occurred“, he noted, adding that first responders would have made appropriate moves based on the situation on the ground. Gentle described the scene as “unprecedented”, a major incident where in less than an hour more than six buildings in the centre of Georgetown were razed.
Asked to respond to criticisms of negligence on the part of the authorities which resulted in the riot, the official said: “Those talks about negligence are uninformed this was a plan. We found that some of the cells were opened…so it means that persons inside might have allowed this and might have been part of what happened and so that is why there has to be a broader inquiry not so much on systems, but the criminal aspect of this incident,” the official told the Guyana Chronicle. President David Granger during a tour of the burnt out site on Tuesday said that Sunday’s incident”…was an accident waiting to happen.” He explained too that the New Amsterdam prison was equally a “fragile structure”, noting that government is acting with the resources at hand. He assured that the Ministry of Public Security, at the end of the process, will have more secure prisons across the country, which he noted will not be susceptible to the cycle of breakouts which have been happening. Government had injected over $350 million into expansion works at the Mazaruni Prison located in Region Seven, to accommodate more inmates as part of efforts to address the overcrowding at the Camp Street, Georgetown, prison. Last year, seventeen prisoners in the capital section of the Georgetown prison at Camp Street died as a result of an unrest started by the prisoners that also resulted in damages to several sections of the prison.
