FBI agents have been called to investigate a melee that left seven prisoners seriously hurt — the latest in a long list of violent incidents, corruption and other problems at the nation’s largest federal prison complex in Coleman, Fl., says the Orlando Sentinel. It’s likely the prisoners involved will face charges, said FBI Jeff Westcott in Jacksonville as worried family members of prisoners flooded Internet blogs and chat rooms seeking information.
Relatives were frustrated by a clampdown on news about the fight. The federal Bureau of Prisons released few new details about Sunday’s recreation-yard brawl in a maximum-security section of the Federal Correctional Complex, including the names of those involved, what started the fracas and whether the inmates would be sent back to Coleman after they are released from hospitals. Opened in 1995, the prison in a rural area northwest of Orlando made up of cow pastures and oak trees, has had its share of troubles. Two former inmates are set to stand trial on charges they stabbed and stomped a fellow prisoner to death inside a recreation “cage” at the prison in 2007.