Prison Officials May Ease Lockdown

California Rehabilitation Center officials may reinstate male prisoners’ visiting privileges today, the second step in relaxing a lockdown they ordered 12 days ago after a pair of brawls at the Norco prison.

Inmates began to resume their work and educational program assignments Tuesday, said Lt. George Morgan, public information officer for the medium-security state prison.

“There is still no other movement permitted” in the men’s prison, he said.

The facility’s staff, which had been working 12-hour days during the lockdown, also returned to a regular schedule of eight-hour shifts, Morgan said.

Prison officials said a dispute over seating in a dormitory television room to watch the Super Bowl sparked a fracas Jan. 20. The fighting prompted a five-day lockdown of the prison.

Just one day after officials lifted that lockdown, violence again erupted in the crowded prison recreation yard.

The second brawl was a continuation of the Super Bowl dispute, but it took on racial overtones as black and Latino inmates squared off against each other, prison officials said.

The subsequent lockdown restricted prisoners to their dormitories, except for movement in closely guarded groups for meals and laundry exchange.

A total of 166 prisoners have been transferred to high-security facilities in three other state prisons as a result of the fights, Sgt. Janice May said.