in a timely fashion, & prisoner capture
October 15, 2003
Bridgewater
Raynham
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Joseph Gillis Jr.
You can do something!
Well, starting with everything that went correctly -- an alert town employee spotted a suspicious person Tuesday morning, alerted the Police, and the escaped prisoner was captured by Bridgewater Police. Bridgewater Correctional could be a case study in everything done wrong. An alarm sounded at 9:50 pm on 10/12, and is not properly responded to. A prisoner in a 5-person half-way house is not in his bed at 11pm, but it is 40 minutes before he is declared missing within the Correctional Facility. Phone logs at Bridgewater Police show a call at 12:09am (half hour later). By neighbor accounts, siren did not sound until 1am, and automated calls were finally made at around that time also. Compounding all of this are statements by Herb Lemon (Chairman of Selectmen, and in charge of Emergency Operations Center) that he was not notified, and therefore many in town were left to learn timely information from channel 4,5,7 and not on our own cable -- as has been promised to us. Herb Lemon and Allan Chiocca were both very disturbed by this situation, and spoke at length about this at the 10/14 Selectmen's Meeting. It is my hope that they aggressively pursue this matter, and to take steps to make sure that these mistakes are not repeated.
As a follow-up, Herb Lemon of the EOC and Board of Selectmen has stated that anyone else that believes they would need/like to know in the event of future prison incidents like this has asked that he be contacted. Your name and telephone number can be added to his listing.
