Did Kamloops prison inmate order hit on guard?
Investigators are looking into what is believed to have been a "gang-related hit" ordered by a Kamloops Regional Correctional Centre inmate against one of the jail's correctional officers.
That's how the incident is being described by Dean Purdy, spokesman for the corrections branch of the B.C. Government Employees' Union.
He said the plot was uncovered on the night of Thursday, Sept. 6, while KRCC was under lockdown following an unrelated stabbing.
"Within an hour of that incident, the jail received intelligence that an inmate had arranged a hit on one of our officers," Purdy told KTW.
He said officers have since learned the incident was gang-related.
It is now being investigated both internally by jail staff and by the RCMP.
As for the stabbing, Purdy said, an inmate was rushed to hospital with non-life threatening injuries after he was stabbed in the upper body with a home-made shank.
"At that point, the jail was locked down and the other prisoner was taken to segregation," Purdy said.
The stabbing is also being investigated by jail staff and police.
It is believed the victim has since been released from hospital and is back at KRCC.
Purdy said both incidents speak to the overcrowding at the maximum-security provincial jail, located in west Kamloops on Hillside Drive.
"The current situation inside the jail is a pressure cooker right now," he said. "The number of gang-affiliated inmates is also becoming more and more onerous."
Opened in 1989, KRCC was built to house fewer than 200 inmates. Purdy said it is routinely home to more than 320.
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