State Officials Take ‘Aggressive Measures’ On Prison Security

State officials are taking “aggressive measures” to increase safety in the Pennsylvania prison system.

Among the efforts the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections is taking are efforts to tackle illicit, harmful substances and the violence connected to their appearance in correctional facilities.

This month, the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections released a plan that they say will add new training and use of personal protective equipment for staff ranging from cooks to corrections officers, engage in-house fire response teams in hazardous material training, add to the inventory of protective gear, expand the use of body scanners at state prisons and community corrections centers, review procedures for inmate mail processing and detection of contraband, purchase K-9 accidental drug overdose reversal kits, and add three K-9 teams dedicated to securing community corrections facilities.

Officials have said that body scanners have shown promising results in stopping contraband at the facilities where they have been tested.

In addition, state prisons have noted attempts to smuggle in drugs through the mail have increased significantly in recent years. Officials said that illegal substances are often hidden under stamps, in pictures, or saturated into papers.

The newer methods used to smuggle drugs in have made detection harder and more time-consuming for corrections officers.

Recently, a total of 18 Pennsylvania Department of Corrections staffers in the western portion of the state have been sickened by exposure to an unknown substance. Pennsylvania State Police continue to investigate the incident and conduct testing.

While correction officer assaults in state prisons are down over the past 25 years, authorities have also focused on preventing them.

After Sgt. Mark Baserman died following an assault earlier this year at State Correctional Institution Somerset, corrections officers began stepping up their training on violence prevention and response. They also started new weekly intelligence briefings focused more on risk assessment and placed a dedicated intelligence official at each facility.

“The safety and security of staff and inmates is paramount to the Department of Corrections,” said Pennsylvania Department of Corrections Secretary John Wetzel. “Whether the threat is drugs or staff assaults, the agency is working vigorously to combat these threats on many fronts.”