Florida Prison Lockdown Has ‘Nothing To Do With Charlottesville’

TALLAHASSEE, FL — Inmates in the care of the Florida Department of Corrections will spend the weekend observing a partial lockdown status. State officials say the decision to cancel weekend visitation and limit other activities was based on “credible intelligence.”

While the lockdown that affects an estimated 98,000 inmates at prisons, work camps and annex facilities throughout the state comes as racial tensions are high across the country, the action “has nothing to do with Charlottesville,” Ashley Cook, the department's press secretary, told Patch.

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“The department received credible intelligence that a small group of inmates at several institutions were attempting to disrupt operations and impact the safety and security,” Cook said. That intelligence prompted the state to cancel weekend visitation at all correctional facilities set for Aug. 19-20. The partial lockdown was also announced.

Cook said she could not elaborate on the nature of the intelligence that prompted the action due to security concerns.

Under the partial lockdown, prisoners’ recreational and educational programming has been suspended, Cook said. Inmates, however, have access to day rooms, showers and calls to family, among other activities, she added.

The decision was made “in an abundance of caution and in the best interest of staff, inmate and public safety,” the department said in a statement announcing the cancellation of visitation. The “The Florida Department of Corrections foremost responsibility is to ensure the safety of Florida communities, staff and inmates,” the agency said in a secondary statement issued on the lockdown.

It is unclear how long the lockdown will remain in effect. The decision affects prisoners in both men’s and women’s facilities.

The lockdown comes on the heels of last Saturday’s “Unite the Right” rally in Virginia that took a deadly turn when rally goers and counter-protesters clashed. A counter-protester was killed when a car plowed into a crowd of people. The rally was planned by white supremacist groups, including the Ku Klux Klan, to protest the removal of a Confederate monument.

Since Saturday’s violence, riots and rallies have broken out across the country. Confederate memorials have also been toppled or defaced in some parts of the country. In Tampa, community members raised more than $140,000 in a day to move Hillsborough County's Confederate memorial from the front of the county courthouse to a family cemetery in Brandon.

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