In a letter to The Sun from an inmate who claimed to be assaulted by officers, the inmate stated that he and several others were first beaten at Roxbury and then moved to North Branch, where they received worse beatings from officers.
During one of the beatings, the inmate wrote, he was ordered to put his face against a wall. An officer then jumped off a bunk and kicked him in the head, he alleged.
"There was blood all over the walls, and the officers still continued to hit and kick me," the inmate wrote in a letter dated March 18. The inmate's name was on a list of seven inmates whose complaints of abuse are being investigated, according to information provided to The Sun by a source familiar with the case.
Ronald Smith, a labor relations specialist with the Maryland Classified Employees Association, a union that represents correctional officers, said he first learned of the North Branch investigation from a reporter yesterday.
He said his union is representing one of the eight officers connected with the RCI case and that he was trying to determine if any MCEA members were being accused in the North Branch investigation.
"If there are any members of our union, we will certainly represent them to the best of our ability and do whatever we can for them," Smith said.
Also yesterday, testimony continued in Anne Arundel County Circuit Court in the trial of five Jessup Correctional Institution officers accused of second-degree assault in the July 2006 beating of inmate Bradford Matthews. Prosecutors say the officers used excessive force and may have planted a knife on Matthews, but defense attorneys have argued that the officers acted reasonably to restrain an unruly inmate.
Matthews, 25, was set to testify yesterday, but his appearance was delayed as defense attorneys sought a mistrial after discovering that a posterboard documenting each defendant's alleged role in the attack had been placed in plain view of jurors.
Prosecutor Anne Colt Leitess said the posterboard's placement was inadvertent. Circuit Judge Pamela North denied the defense motion to suspend the trial after jurors reported that they had not read or did not recall what the posterboard said.
gus.sentementes@baltsun.com
Sun reporters Greg Garland and Justin Fenton contributed to this report.
