The jury in a $2.8 billion lawsuit over the 1971 uprising at Attica held a deputy warden liable for violence in retaking the prison but deadlocked over three other defendants.
Another trial will be held to determine how much the state must pay in damages. U.S. District Judge John Elfvin also ordered another trial in the 18-year-old case to resolve the liability of the three others. No dates have been set for those trials."I'm disappointed," former inmate Herbert X. Blyden, one of 1,281 prisoners represented in the 1974 lawsuit, said after Tuesday's verdict. "We can't let them off the hook."
Police shot and killed 29 inmates and 10 hostages in the assault on Sept. 13, 1971, that ended a four-day revolt. Inmates killed one prison guard and three prisoners during the clash, the deadliest prison revolt in U.S. history.
The suit said former Deputy Warden Karl Pfeil, former state Corrections Commissioner Russell Oswald, former Warden Vincent Mancusi and former state Police Maj. John Monahan were liable for the beating and torture of inmates during and after the assault.
The trial took 31/2 months, and the jury deliberated nearly four weeks. The judge came under fire last month for going on a Caribbean vacation during deliberations; he cut short the trip on orders from his judicial superior.
Elfvin was also accused of pressuring the jury by making them deliberate late into the night.
"We've got a partial victory in that we got Karl Pfeil," said former inmate Akil al-Jundi, who was shot in the face and hand during the assault.
Defense attorney Richard Moot said another trial for the others shouldn't be held because too much time has passed to obtain a fair outcome.
Oswald and Monahan have also died, and their estates were named in the lawsuit.
Pfeil had testified that if there were reprisals, he did not see them.
Pfeil's lawyer, Irving Maghran, said he may appeal. He said the jury should not have been allowed to hear stormy arguments by the inmates' lawyers over whether to let jurors see photos of injured prisoners.