Rule on force used by Ark. prison guards for 'lawful orders' to change

LITTLE ROCK Guards at Arkansas state prisons would be able to use force on inmates who failed to obey "lawful orders" under a new rule being considered by correction officials, the first change to the department's corporal punishment policy in nearly three decades.

Under a policy approved in 1979, guards could only use force to protect themselves and others from injury and prevent damage and escapes by inmates. That rule came after a tumultuous decade when a federal judge ruled the state's prison system was an unconstitutional "dark and evil world" where armed inmate trusties once policed others incarcerated.

In the time since, the Correction Department gained accreditation from the American Correctional Association and created other rules governing conduct by its guards. However, the corporal punishment law remained the same, describing it as "contrary to humane standards of care and professional correctional practices."

Bobby G. Smith, a policy coordinator for the state Department of Correction, told legislators at a hearing Thursday the new change would not be controversial. He said guards needed the freedom to be able to force inmates out of cells when they needed to be cleaned and under other circumstances.

"What we find is sometimes inmates simply refuse to cooperate when given orders to leave their cells," Smith said. "This language will clarify that and give our officers the authority to use whatever force necessary to do those things."

The legislative council's Committee on Administrative Rules and Regulations asked no questions about the policy and immediately declared its review complete. After the hearing, Smith said he was not authorized to talk to reporters and referred all questions to prison spokeswoman Dina Tyler.

Tyler said another regulation already allows guards to use "non-deadly physical force" and chemical agents like pepper spray to subdue inmates to restore order. She said the state prison system abolished the use of corporal punishment as early as 1966.

Tyler said guards could use everything from their presence to a tactical-weapons team to subdue inmates.

"It may be verbal force, it may be pepper spray, whatever the situation calls for. It's a graduated scale and you don't use anything more," she said. "As soon as they comply, you certainly don't squirt them with pepper spray."

In 1970, U.S. District Judge J. Smith Henley declared the state's whole prison system unconstitutional as state police reports documented how inmates lived under brutal conditions. "Brubaker," a 1980 prison film starring Robert Redford, was based on Arkansas.

Though improved, problems persist in the state prison system. Last year, officials fired seven guards at the East Arkansas Regional Unit at Brickeys for using excessive force against inmates.

The prison system currently has 14,711 inmates spread among 20 facilities.