WORCESTER, Mass. (Aug. 26) - Prosecutors investigating the prison death of defrocked priest John Geoghan want to know if security procedures broke down at the facility, allowing a neo-Nazi who hated homosexuals the opportunity to confront a convicted pedophile.
Joseph L. Druce, who is serving a life term for killing a gay man 15 years ago, is accused of strangling Geoghan to death on Saturday at the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center in Shirley.
``Right now we are going to do a thorough review and re-evaluate all of our policies and procedures,'' state Public Safety Secretary Ed Flynn said Monday. ``We cannot escape the fact that an inmate died while in the care of the Department of Correction.''
Gov. Mitt Romney on Monday appointed a panel to conduct an independent investigation. Surveillance cameras filming the protective custody unit while the attack took place also are being reviewed.
District Attorney John J. Conte said part of the investigation would try to determine how many cells should be opened at any one time on the protective-custody block and whether there is enough staffing at the prison.
Two correctional officers typically patrol the area where the attack took place, but one of the officers was assigned elsewhere during Geoghan's assault, according to The New York Times and the Boston Globe.
Jim Pingeon, director of litigation for the prisoners' rights group Massachusetts Correctional Legal Services, also told the Times another prisoner had tried to warn jailers about the impending attack, but they took no action.
Conte said Druce, who has been cooperating with investigators, told investigators he planned the attack for over a month. Druce is believed to have acted alone.
Kelly Nantel, the state Department of Correction public affairs director, said the department's policy is to keep any two inmates with a documented history of antagonism apart, even if that means allowing only one into the protective custody unit.
Inmates can request placement into protective custody because they don't feel safe in the general population or can accept a recommendation from prison officials to be placed there, Nantel said.
She didn't know how or why Druce was placed there. Flynn said Geoghan had asked to be placed in protective custody and was moved from the state prison in Concord in April. He had complained to his lawyers of taunting and harassment by inmates and guards at Concord.
Druce and Geoghan had just finished lunch in their cells and were let out to return their trays when Druce followed Geoghan into his cell before the doors were locked again. Druce was in Cell 21, while Geoghan was in Cell 2.
In the upper track of the cell door, Druce jammed a book he had precut to fit the slot, then put nail clippers and a toothbrush in the door's lower track to prevent guards from opening the door.
He tied Geoghan's hands behind his back with a T-shirt, then used stretched-out socks, a pillowcase and one of Geoghan's shoes to strangle him, Conte said. Druce did not use a razor he had with him, but may have intended to castrate the former priest, Conte said.
Once he was alerted to the attack by an inmate, the guard on duty tried to get inside, but found the door was jammed. He called for help. By the time a nurse arrived to treat Geoghan, seven or eight minutes had passed, Conte said.
Geoghan, 68, was taken to Leominster Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. An autopsy Monday showed that Geoghan died from strangulation and blunt chest trauma. He also had broken ribs and a punctured lung, Conte said.
Druce is expected to be charged with murder once a grand jury is convened in September, Conte has said.
Druce, 37, a reputed member of the neo-Nazi group Aryan Nation, was convicted in the June 1988 murder of George Rollo, 51, a gay bus driver who had picked Druce up hitchhiking. Druce, who then went by his birth name, Darrin E. Smiledge, attacked Rollo, stuffed him in the trunk of Rollo's car, drove him to a wooded area and strangled him, according to court documents.
Geoghan allegedly molested nearly 150 boys over three decades and became a symbol of the clergy sex abuse scandal that shook the foundations of the Roman Catholic church. He was serving a nine- to 10-year sentence for assault and battery on a 10-year-old boy.
Druce ``has a long-standing phobia, it appears, toward homosexuals of any kind,'' Conte said. ``He looked upon Father Geoghan as a prize. No question he had been planning it for well over a month.''
08/26/03 09:46 EDT
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