Fourteen guards at the Edna Mahan Correctional Facility, New Jersey’s only prison for women, including a former top supervisor there, have been indicted for planning, supervising, participating in — or failing to stop — so-called forced cell extractions, which were carried out “with the purpose of punishing, intimidating or terrorizing one or more inmates” during a 2021 raid, reports Tracey Tully for the New York Times.
One woman was punched 28 times by a guard, resulting in a concussion. Other officers fractured the skull of another woman after she complied with orders to let herself be handcuffed, leaving boot imprints on her body. After the raid, the state suspended 34 prison staff members and hired a former state comptroller, Matthew Boxer, to conduct an independent inquiry. As a result of Boxer’s report and a federal investigation into years of sexual abuse at the prison, Gov. Philip D. Murphy announced that he planned to close the prison and relocate women to smaller lockups.