Rumble In The Yard! Prison Guards Locked Up For Staging Inmate Fights

Forget the Oscar De La Hoya v. Manny Pacquaio fight, or even MMA. A few enterprising New Mexico prison guards in have found a way to bring us all the violence of our favorite ring sports without the hassle of high pay-per-view rates or ticket prices.
Up until their indictment last week, five jailers at the Grant County Detention Center near Albuquerque had been forcing inmates to engage in hand-to-hand combat with each other and videotaped the action, for their own amusement and the amusement of their family and friends.
Is prison boxing better than a prison rodeo, or any other prison sport for that matter? Let’s find out.

County Manager Jon Saari said the sheriff’s office did an internal investigation into the case. Four of the accused officers are no longer employed by the county, Saari said, and a fifth is on administrative leave.

The inmates were told to fight with boxing gloves in the detention center’s sally port but they were not given headgear or mouth guards, according to an affidavit filed by an investigator.

The inmate who suffered a broken hand said he was denied medical attention because officers didn’t want anyone to find out how he was injured.

Another inmate told District Attorney’s investigator he was forced to fight at least six times on a Saturday night and three more times the next day.

The guards laughed and joked during the matches, then told the inmates not to tell anyone about what had occurred, according to an affidavit.

One inmate reported seeing officers exchange cash before a fight, and another officer told an inmate, “You made me a lot of money.”

After the fights, inmates were rewarded with a cigarette.

Just a cigarette? We’d think that a good prison fight performance should probably win you a whole pack of smokes, and maybe a condom filled with some raisin wine. As for the video, one of the five guards had been filming the fights using a cell phone, and the 17 videos collected have been taken as evidence. Not for nothing, but that’s just bad form using a cell phone camera. It’s not that we’re enjoying the plight of the inmates here, but the world deserved high-res DVDs of these fights.
At least a few YouTube clips would have been nice. Is that too much to ask? We coulda found the next Kimbo Slice, for all you know.
Jailers Accused of Forcing Recorded Inmate Boxing Matches [FOX News]
Image [The Atlantic]