Six employees of the Erie County Sheriff's Office were either fired or suspended on Tuesday over allegations of inmate abuse at the jail. The employees are accused of punching an inmate in the ribs at the Erie County Holding Center back in January of this year. "There was a strike to the ribs of a male inmate that occurred," says Undersheriff Brian Doyle.
The incident happened during a midnight shift. "There was a reason why a Sergeant and deputies went up to the block that on the surface was appropriate but once there some of the actions they took were unauthorized and undocumented," explains Doyle.
According to Doyle, a lieutenant reported the incident the next day and had doctors check on the inmate. "There was no actual physical injury like broken ribs or anything like that," says Doyle.
The incident launched an investigation by the Sheriff's Professional Standards Division and investigators determined that three of the employees involved lied to them about what happened. "The employees that were able to keep their jobs did so because of the fact they were truthful during the investigation," says Doyle. One of the fired employees was a Sergeant and the other two are deputies. One employee was suspended for 30 days, while the other two received suspensions of ten days each.
The Holding Center has been in the spotlight lately because of a number of suicides at the jail and court fight with federal investigators over jail access, but the Undersheriff says the intense scrutiny has no impact on how they're handling this incident. "People say things that are third- and fourth-hand information that they heard that this happened or that happened. In part the Department of Justice lawsuit is based on that kind of information. Whenever we find misconduct in the Sheriff's Office we take action," says Doyle.
Sheriff's officials are not confirming the name of the inmate at the center of this incident but he is no longer at the jail.
The Undersheriff is also not releasing the names of the employees involved or if the employee who actually did the punching is among those fired.
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