LOCAL

Allegations of physical threats and sexual

abuse dog York County Prison contractor
Matt Enright York Dispatch
Published 6:30 a.m. ET Aug. 18, 2021 Updated 1:56 p.m. ET Aug. 18, 2021

Inmates led through the prison in shackles with genitals exposed. Forced to stand for hours
handcuffed with weapons pointed at their backs. Threats to fire upon them.

That's the experience York County Prison inmates reported in a March 31 incident involving
a private contractor hired by the county.

Now, prison officials are seeking to expand their relationship with that contractor, the South
Carolina-based Corrections Special Applications Unit, or CSAU.

"We have serious concerns about York County Prison contracting with CSAU," said Su Ming
Yeh, executive director of the Pennsylvania Institutional Law Project.

In November 2020, York County approved a $122,000 contract with CSAU to train up to 18

corrections officers in less-than-lethal weaponry and conflict resolution. A price tag for the
new contract, still being debated, hasn't been disclosed publicly.

The county says that training resulted in fewer uses of force and safer conditions for
prisoners. The prisoners say otherwise.

Noah Barth, of the Pennsylvania Prison Society, said inmates were forced to stand for several
hours facing a wall with their hands cuffed behind their back with weaponry pointed at them.

Later, a man they believe was a contractor with CSAU gave commands that led inmates to
believe they were about to be fired upon. 

"They heard commands from behind them saying 'Take aim' and 'Ready,' and the men
involved in this incident were not fully aware that these were nonlethal weapons," Barth said.
"They were under the impression that they were having live firearms pointed at them."
In a memo sent to York County Prison warden Adam Ogle and obtained by The York
Dispatch, Barth detailed what inmates say happened on March 31.

Representatives from CSAU did not respond to numerous requests for comment.

'If you give me a reason, I'm going to use it'

On a May 20 visit to the prison, the Prison Society interviewed 10 men in housing unit South
D, one of two housing units involved in a March 31 incident.

According to the group's interviews, members of CSAU entered the housing unit with guns
drawn and a dog. They threatened the inmates, told them to take off their clothes and
handcuffed the men before holding them at gunpoint.

"They were threatening us with guns," an inmate told the Prison Society. "Someone would
yell 'Stage 2' and they would cock their guns. They told us they could use the guns. They told
me 'If you give me a reason, I’m going to use it.'”

Two of the inmates reported that an Officer Garcia threatened physical violence. Officer

Garcia could refer to CSAU Senior Team Leader Joseph Garcia, who frequently posts on
Facebook about K9 training.

“If you move, if you look at us, I will take that as a threat and neutralize you," Garcia
reportedly told the inmates, according to the documents shared with prison officials.

While York County Prison officials say no dogs are housed at the prison, inmates report that
members of CSAU officers threatened to set a dog on them.

Two inmates were led to the Behavioral Analysis Unit; one from the gym where the housing
unit was forced to stand, another from the medical unit. The two men said they were led
through the prison at gunpoint with their genitals exposed.

“I was locked in BAU for 10 days because I didn’t ‘follow orders,'" an inmate told the Prison
Society. "They asked if I heard something. I said I didn’t ‘cause I have bad hearing. (Garcia)
yelled: ‘Take that ugly scum to the hole.’”

After the incident, CSAU used footage from the day's events in a promotional video posted to
Garcia's Facebook page, according to an email from  Ogle. 

In an email obtained by The York Dispatch through a Right-to-Know request, Ogle addressed

the video with Garcia, who had posted it to his social media account. The video has since
been removed.

"I understand that you cannot make out the likeness of any inmate, but we do not allow any
video from YCP to be shared with the public without a court order," Ogle, the interim warden
at the time, said in a May 14 email.  "I appreciate you taking the video down." 

More: ICE's decadeslong relationship with York County Prison ends

In an email, Ogle said he had sent a response to the Prison Society and that he had no further
comment at the time.

Garcia, like other CSAU officials, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

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'It has only gotten worse'

CSAU bills itself as a "high-risk corrections special operations mitigation unit." On its
website, the company touts expertise in quelling "inmate insurrection" and emergencies due
to years of experience in special operations.

It's not clear whether Garcia or any CSAU staff members have military backgrounds, but a
2014 National Rifle Association profile touted Garcia's "Jekyll and Hyde persona common to
a military drill instructor or a WWF wrestler."

"That is my mission in life: to train warriors and operators to deal with the most violent
things behind prison walls," Garcia said, in an NRA video clip that includes clips of his
employees detaining prison inmates.

One clip from that NRA video, apparently taken from a body camera, shows an inmate
spitting at the officer wearing the body cam. That officer then punches the inmate, whose
hands are restrained behind his back, in the face. It's not clear where this incident took place.

In South Carolina, a business entity search shows that CSAU is an LLC in good standing as of
May 2019. While the website claims it has an office in Washington D.C., a search with the
Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs could not find a license under the name of
either "CSAU" or "Corrections Special Applications Unit." 

CSAU came under fire from advocacy groups like the Pennsylvania Prison Society and from
local governments. In Allegheny County, the Jail Oversight Board criticized a contract
recently approved by administrators.

Garcia and another affiliated group, Correction-Special Operations Group,  is referenced in

the investigation of the death of inmate Jamal Sutherland at a jail near Charleston, South
Carolina. C-SOG worked with the prison for approximately 11 years, according to the report.
The report says Garcia now heads CSAU.

In a statement detailed in the Ninth District Solicitor's report, Lt. Tyrone Shaw criticized
Garcia's training and work with the prison's Special Operations Group.

"Nothing has changed," Shaw said in his statement about Garcia. "The command staff has
been aware of all of these issues with trainings, his uncontrollable K-9s attacking officers, his
language etc. for some years now." 

Among the issues Shaw cited with Garcia was his training of bite dogs, which the detention
center does not allow, and recordings of this training being placed on social media. While
they had been assured things would change, Shaw said things only got worse over time.

"If we continue in the path we are going, with much confidence I can say there won't be much
of a SOG team in the future," Shaw said in his statement.

In a report cited by the Ninth District Solicitor, former sheriff Gary Raney criticized the
training of Garcia's group. Referred to as "the vendor," the report alleges Garcia's group
emphasized the use of weapons and intimidation, as well as hazing against prison employees.

"The SACDC bought into the vendor’s misguided concepts of tactical training and allowed
him to teach unreasonable force that violated SACDC policy," the report reads.

Garcia touted his team's high-tech assault weapons in a video published by Tactical Life
Magazine last August. As with the earlier NRA video, he doesn't refer to the inmates as
people but as targets. He also noted the low profile of the team's weaponry as essential given
the "political climate."

"It's not intimidating," he said, of one of the group's assault rifles, "but it does intimidating
work."

Garcia also references an incident of friendly fire involving a K-9 and a prison "operator,"
although he doesn't specify where or when the incident took place.

In New York, the New York Department of Investigations probed a contract with C-SOG in
2016, citing concerns by members of the correctional officers union with the training of
officers in hand-to-hand combat.

More: York County Prison, bucking Gov. Wolf, does not mandate COVID vaccine

In Colorado, employees of the Weld County Sheriff's Office were sued by plaintiff Tage Rustgi
for excessive force in a 2020 arrest. While Garcia is not named as a defendant, Tage Rustgi
v. Steve Reams et. al cites Garcia's training as leading to excessive force.

"The glorification of violence, explosions, weaponry, and the use of special forces tactics in
the jail setting, is utilized by Garcia, and by Defendant [Sheriff Steve] Reams, as a recruiting
tool and training device for WCSO employees, including the Defendants in this case," the
lawsuit reads. "The message is clear: join WCSO, and you’ll get the opportunity to utilize
explosives, military-style weaponry, and extreme violence against detainees and people
incarcerated in jails and prisons."

'The place is safer'

Despite the allegations, York County Prison officials want to renew its contract with CSAU.

"The place is safer," Ogle  said. "They've successfully been able to mitigate uses of force and
disturbances in a safe manner, as promised."

Last Wednesday, after the county prison board unanimously agreed to pursue a two-year
contract with CSAU. Ogle defended the company, which he said had helped reduce the
number of use-of-force incidents at the facility.

More: We want your input: Mental health at the York County Prison

With the approval from the prison board, the contract will next be presented to the board of
commissioners for approval.

Barth, from the Pennsylvania Prison Society, said first-hand reports from inmates
contradicted  prison officials' claims of a reduction in use of force. He expressed grave
concerns about renewing the contract.

Ogle disputed the society's characterization.

"They don't know exactly what we do and why we do it, and we can't tell anybody because our
tactics could be used against us; inmates can find a way around it," he said. "They're getting
their information from inmates, which in many cases is not correct." 
The March 31 incident is still being reviewed, Ogle said.

Despite that ongoing review, the warden said: "We have seen no indication of the allegations
that were brought forth by the inmates to the prison society." 

York County Prison had been looking at CSAU for several years before hiring them, Deputy
Warden Shawn Rohrbaugh said.

"At the end of the day, everyone goes home," he said, "and the inmate keeps on doing what
they're doing and gets the treatment that he needs. It's just healthier overall." 

In his research, Rohrbaugh said no agency he'd spoken to had advised against hiring CSAU.
The agencies he'd spoken to had shown a reduction in use of force by at least 40%.

It's not clear how soon county officials could consider approval of  the York County Prison's
new CSAU contract.

President and Vice President commissioners Julie Wheeler and Doug Hoke did not
immediately respond to requests for comment. Commissioner Ron Smith expressed support
for CSAU.

The Prison Society is alarmed that the prison would attempt to fill a contract with an
organization that is still under review and cautioned the county against filling it.

"It seems inopportune to renew the contract while an investigation is underway," Barth said.
"The warden and deputy warden have vocalized a continued and renewed contract in CSAU,
which we find deeply concerning and would advise the county against approving this." 

Other groups have expressed concern that the prison would contract with CSAU again.

Yeh, of the Pennsylvania Institutional Law Project, said the March 31 incident should be
taken into consideration, "when the county decides to engage and pay significant amounts of
money to a company, especially as it relates to keeping people safe in custody in humane
conditions."

The Abolitionist Law Center also spoke out against it, with the group's spokesman William
Lukas saying: "ALC opposes the presence of private paramilitary strike team contractors in
all jails, prisons and ICE detention centers."

This article was updated to correct the amount of the initial CSAU contract.
— Matthew Enright can be reached through email at menright@yorkdispatch.com and via
Twitter at @Matthew_Enright.