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Our mission is to reverse the trend of mass incarceration in Colorado. We are a coalition of nearly 7,000 individual members and over 100 faith and community organizations who have united to stop perpetual prison expansion in Colorado through policy and sentence reform.

Our chief areas of interest include drug policy reform, women in prison, racial injustice, the impact of incarceration on children and families, the problems associated with re-entry and stopping the practice of using private prisons in our state.

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Friday, December 04, 2009

Details Emerge In Prison Murder

Westword
Last week, we reported on the bludgeoning death of inmate Ronald Ferguson, a convicted child molester, at the Colorado Territorial Correctional Facility outside of Canon City.
A fifty-year-old habitual offender serving time for kidnapping and sexual assault on a child, Ferguson was struck repeatedly in the head with a metal bar; his alleged assailant, Kevin Lust, is serving a life sentence for the murders of his wife and ex-fiancee.
Now, inmate sources have come forward with more details that raise questions about general security issues at Territorial and whether Ferguson was being set up for attack. If their reports are correct, Ferguson begged corrections officers to protect him from Lust, given a history of altercations between the two, but was ignored.
"Apparently, these guys got into a fight some 7-8 months ago in the kitchen," one inmate writes. "They were separated and sent to different units."

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm not surprised that the guards didn't do any more to protect the inmate. Many of the guards turn their heads when they see one inmate assault another inmate.

From the mother of an 19 year-old inmate, I heard of the guards unlocking his cell at night so that he could be raped by older, bigger inmates. The older, bigger inmates were bribing the guards and got away with rape with the assistance of the guards.

The inmate is terrified and too afraid to complain because of murders like the one in Territorial. If not murdered, he would probably be beaten by the other inmates while the guards looked the other way.

The DOC director needs to investigate the guards.

Anonymous said...

You got it partly right but how about investigating the DOC director. Better yet throw him in a cell with Lust for about 12 hours. He might then understand the terror that inmates are put threw and correct the security inside the prisons. djw