Six prisoners who started an inmate protest at the Promontory pre-release facility at the Utah State Prison on Monday have been placed in a maximum security unit and could lose their opportunities for parole.
Some 140 inmates refused to return to their dormitories for a 4 p.m. head count Monday. Inmates were protesting a crackdown on the rules prohibiting them from freely moving between dorms, Corrections Jack Ford said.The protest prompted prison officials to call in a SWAT team, which used a flash-bomb to disperse the gathering of inmates who staged a sit-in in a common room outside the 400-bed minimum security prison.
Fred VanDerVeur, director of institutional operations, said the disturbance lasted only about 20 minutes. No one was injured, Ford said.
Promontory prisoners have a lot to lose by staging such a protest, Ford said. Most of the 400 inmates are only a few weeks from parole and many have work release jobs during the day. Any disciplinary issues could affect a prisoner's status with the Board of Pardons and Parole.
The privilege of moving freely between Promontory's 50-bed dormitory's has never actually existed, Ford said. Officially, the rules at the privately run facility reflect those at the state prison.