The Department of Corrections has announced that normal operations will resume today at all of the state’s correctional facilities.
All of the state prisons, including SCI Pine Grove in Indiana, had been on a lockdown over the past 12 days after 50 staff members and 33 inmates were sickened and taken to outside hospitals between May 31st and September 1st. During the lockdown, inmates were confined to their cells, and in-prison visits were forbidden. Authorities believe that items laced with synthetic marijuana were to blame for the prison employees getting sick, and drug overdoses linked to synthetic marijuana for the incidents involving inmates.
During the lockdown, officials with the Department of Corrections issued several changes to some processes. They included eliminating mail processing at the prison facilities and using an off-site third party vendor to process all non-legal mail, increasing staffing in visiting rooms, stricter visiting suspensions for those caught bringing contraband into visiting rooms, expanded use of body scanners and more.
Corrections secretary John Wetzel has said that he would not hesitate to institute the lockdown again if conditions merit it.
