Staffing issues, faulty cameras, motion sensor poles that were turned off because of Canada geese and a sleeping guard all led to the escape of two inmates from a Philadelphia prison earlier this year, District Attorney Larry Krasner revealed.
During a public safety hearing on Wednesday, Krasner spoke on the escape of Ameen Hurst and Nasir Grant from the Philadelphia Industrial Correctional Center back on May 7.
“Before this escape ever occurred, we all knew there were issues that were occurring,” Krasner said.
Get top local stories in Philly delivered to you every morning. >Sign up for NBC Philadelphia's News Headlines newsletter.
Hurst, who was 18 at the time, along with Grant, who was 24, escaped from the prison, located in Northeast Philadelphia, by cutting a hole in a fence surrounding a recreation yard, according to investigators.
Hurst had been imprisoned after being charged in four homicides, including the deadly shooting of Rodney Hargrove outside the same facility he escaped from back in March of 2021.
Local
Breaking news and the stories that matter to your neighborhood.
“We’re not just talking about the escape of someone who was arguably among the very most dangerous people in the prison. He had four open homicides. He had two open gunpoint robberies. We’re talking about someone who was literally charged with murdering somebody on prison grounds," Krasner said.
Grant had been imprisoned on drug and weapons offenses.
Both men were eventually captured while four others were also arrested for allegedly helping them.
During Wednesday’s hearing, Krasner unveiled the video of the escape and also detailed the issues that led to it.
Krasner said it took about 90 seconds for Hurst and Grant to get out. Video shows the men opening doors that were supposed to be locked and then running into a day room while another inmate, later identified as Jose Flores-Huerta, served as the lookout.
“Mr. Huerta was in jail for murder. Murder. For a beating death, a first degree murder,” Krasner said. “Yet he’s walking around the prison, engaging with people within their cells. Apparently carrying bags of water and things like that, to the cells. While the prison is operating.”
Hurst and Grant crawled inside the day room and got into the prison yard through an unlocked door. They then entered the prison yard which was once patrolled by dogs before being replaced by motion sensor poles that had stopped working more than a decade ago, according to Krasner.
“Over a decade ago, probably 15 to 20 years ago, the Canada geese, in the absence of a dog, were landing in the dog run,” Krasner said. “And when they landed in the dog run, they were setting off the sensors. And when they were setting off the sensors, eventually someone decided to turn them off. They have been turned off for more than a decade.”
Both Hurst and Grant used the poles to climb over the fence and used their prison-issued clothing to cover the razor wire, according to Krasner.
Krasner also said that the fence Hurst and Grant escaped through had been cut seven weeks prior and that prison staff had known it was cut days before the escape.
“We have video indicating that prison personnel actually were aware of this for days before the escape, because there’s video showing them looking at it, pointing at it,” Krasner said.
Krasner said the prison staff didn’t find out about the escape until 19 hours later.
“The escape occurred during a four hour gap. The correction officer that should’ve been there, left after four hours. Escape occurred. Then the relief shows up. That relief goes to sleep. The relief went and sat in a chair, and essentially slept,” Krasner said.
When the guard woke up, they repeatedly put in the wrong numbers for the inmate count, according to Krasner.
“The correctional officer who came in after a four hour gap produced at least three incorrect counts,” Krasner said. “We know for a fact that that correctional officer did not go check the doors to see who was anywhere and seems to have interrupted her sleep only long enough to go over and punch in the prior count number and send it along.”
Krasner also cited the facility’s faulty video cameras as a contributing factor for the escape.
“[The inmates] have no fear whatsoever of being on video. There’s cameras all over. They know those cameras are not being watched. Or they wouldn’t have done it this way,” Krasner said. “They know that if the camera contents or the substance of the video are ever going to be obtained it’s going to be long after they’re out of custody and frankly, they were almost not obtained at all due to the extreme problems with the video technology that existed at the prison.”
During the hearing, Philadelphia Prisons Department Commissioner Blanche Carney cited a staffing shortage as a major problem for the city’s prisons.
“We’re dealing with the aftermath and impacts of the pandemic on our staffing levels,” Carney said. “This staff shortage is coupled with a static population that averages 4700 plus daily.”
Krasner acknowledged the staffing shortage but also said the factors contributing to that went beyond the pandemic.
“One of the things that I have heard in general, around law enforcement, and I’m not saying it’s specific to the prisons, is that people apply for jobs and often the list for the applicability is extremely delayed,” Krasner said. “I have heard some information about massive expenditures to advertise and attract applicants, but if those applicants, who are interested in being, let’s say a police officer or a correctional officer, apply, and they’re not put on a list for 18 months or for 12 months, then all the employable ones will have another job.”
Krasner also discussed possible solutions for the staffing shortage.
“On the other hand, if there is a way to extremely quickly turn around these applications and make a thumbs up or a thumbs down, hopefully with cooperation of everybody, including the involved unions and the civil service process, then you may have far more success than simply advertising a job for people who can’t afford to be unemployed for the period of time it takes for the list to show up,” he said.
Krasner said his office had an even more comprehensive report of the issues at the prison and invited any officials to his office to review them more thoroughly. Krasner also emphasized that he wasn’t trying to blame anyone specifically but rather pushing to avoid a future tragedy.
“We cannot have Attica here. And we cannot have another Holmesburg prison riot here,” he said, in reference to two prison riots in the 1970s. “Our investigation around this case arose in the context of a few years of seeing some very negative things occur in the Philadelphia prisons. And I do not say that to point at anyone. I’m pointing at no one except all of us who should work together to fix it.”
Sign up for our Breaking newsletter to get the most urgent news stories in your inbox.
