Chief: Guard ‘well-intended'

LINCOLN — A state corrections officer violated prison policy, but not state sex abuse laws, when he wiped the bottom of a hand-cuffed prison inmate after the inmate had used the toilet, a state official said Thursday.

Bob Houston, director of the Nebraska Department of Corrections, said a prison report on the incident has been forwarded to the Lancaster County Attorney's Office to determine whether criminal charges will be filed.

He said his agency's investigation indicated there was nothing “ill-intended” by the prison guard, nor was it a “sexual issue” for either the guard or inmate.

“This is not standard protocol,” he said. “The officer had been working on a different shift and was not as familiar with the travel procedures as he ought to have been.”

The incident was brought to light Wednesday after former State Sen. Ernie Chambers of Omaha asked the Nebraska Attorney General's Office to investigate. Chambers said he requested the probe after waiting two weeks and hearing that corrections officials had not taken action.

Chambers, who wrote laws against sex abuse by corrections officers, said the incident rose to the level of a criminal charge.

“I can conceive of nothing more disgraceful, degrading, repulsive, humiliating than to be subjected — while handcuffed — to having one's anus/buttocks groped, probed, poked, rubbed by another person against one's will,” Chambers wrote in a letter to Attorney General Jon Bruning.

Citing an April 30 complaint by the inmate, Chambers said the incident occurred at a Lincoln medical facility, when the inmate asked to use the toilet after a medical procedure.

The guard accompanied him into the bathroom and handcuffed the inmate's right arm to a rail on the left side of the toilet.

Later, the officer refused the inmate's request to be uncuffed to “clean” himself, telling him that was against the rules. The guard then used some toilet paper to wipe the inmate three or four times.

The inmate later learned there was a rule barring such touching and contacted Chambers.

Houston said the guard had broken the rules by handcuffing the inmate to a stationary object and by wiping him. While public safety is the top concern, Houston said there was no threat to security in this instance.

The inmate, according to prison records, is serving time for kidnapping, sexual assault and use of a firearm to commit a felony in connection with an incident in which a woman tied to a bed was repeatedly assaulted.

Houston said an inmate's dignity must be considered, as well as whether the incident involved sexual abuse or sexual touching.

“What I've learned is that we have a pretty good officer here. He was well-intended,” he said.

Officials will determine whether any disciplinary action should be taken.

Messages left with Chambers and the Lancaster County attorney were not immediately returned. A spokesman for Bruning said Wednesday that his office was taking the case seriously.

Under state law, a prison guard commits the crime of sexual abuse of an inmate if the act is intentional and for the purpose of sexual arousal or gratification.

Contact the writer:

402-473-9584, paul.hammel@owh.com

« Metro/Region

Share