Two dozen Baltimore jail officers indicted for allegedly using excessive force – NBC News

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BALTIMORE– More than two dozen correctional officers in Baltimore were charged Tuesday with using excessive force on prisoners at state-operated prisons in a city plagued by decades of institutional corruption, inside and outside jailhouse walls.

The 25 prosecuted officers are accused of assaulting and threatening detainees at reformatories, damaging proof and falsifying documents, said Baltimore City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby, whose office secured the indictments.

Maryland corrections secretary Robert Green stated all the prosecuted officers have been on administrative leave since 2018, when the state Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services started investigating the claims.

Gov. Larry Hogan stated in a declaration that his administration has no tolerance for corruption in the state’s correctional system.

“Our correctional officers have among the most hard jobs in all of public safety, and we will not let the criminal behavior of the couple of tarnish the fantastic work of the almost 5,000 dedicated officers who serve with distinction every single day,” he said.

Hogan, a Republican, stated the department’s anti-corruption actions have resulted in the arrests and convictions of more than 200 officers, prisoners and “citizen accomplices.”

In 2015, Maryland closed the guys’s section of a state-run Baltimore jail that was infamous for its decrepit conditions, criminal activity and corruption. In 2013, a federal indictment exposed a sophisticated smuggling ring running inside the Baltimore City Detention Center, involving dozens of gang members and correctional officers. The examination also exposed that a jailhouse gang leader had impregnated four female guards.

Corruption has infected numerous corners of Baltimore’s city federal government.

Most recently,

disgraced previous mayor Catherine Pugh pleaded guilty to federal charges originating from sales of her self-published kids’s books. Another former mayor, Sheila Dixon, left workplace in 2010 as part of a plea deal for abusing about $500 in gift cards meant for needy families.

The city’s corruption-riddled cops department stays under a federal consent following the April 2015 death of a young black guy, Freddie Gray, while in police custody. The department also has been rocked by a string of indictments and guilty pleas by job force officers accused of extortion, break-in, falsifying evidence, reselling taken drugs.

Let our news fulfill your inbox. In 2015, Maryland closed the males’s area of a state-run Baltimore prison that was well-known for its run-down conditions, criminal activity and corruption. In 2013, a federal indictment exposed a sophisticated smuggling ring running inside the Baltimore City Detention Center, including lots of gang members and correctional officers. Mosby stated 21 of the 25 indicted officers were taken into custody Tuesday.

The indictment includes supposed offenses versus 25 detainees and occurrences that took place as far back as 2016, authorities said.

“This case represents our strong effort to root out people who don’t belong in the field where public safety and rehab is the mission,” Green, the corrections secretary, told press reporters. “This is a disturbing case, but it does not represent nor should it cast a shadow on the dedication and stability of the remarkable correctional specialists in this department.”

Associated Press press reporters Regina Garcia Cano in Baltimore and Brian Witte in Annapolis, Maryland, contributed to this report.

The arraigned officers deal with a combined total 236 counts, including charges of assault and participating in a criminal gang, Mosby said.

Mosby said 21 of the 25 prosecuted officers were nabbed Tuesday. All were members of a tactical system with a paramilitary command structure running inside 4 detention facilities in Baltimore.

Mosby said the officers used violence and intimidation to “preserve its dominance and its operational territory” inside the jails.

“All 25 of these correctional officers have apparently abused their power and abused our trust,” she included.

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