LOS ANGELES (AP) – Another racial brawl broke out late Monday at a Los Angeles County jail dorm following weekend clashes that killed one inmate and injured more than 100 others, authorities said.
About 90 black and Hispanic inmates were segregated after the “major disturbance” broke out at the minimum security Pitchess Detention Center in Castaic about 9 p.m., sheriff’s Deputy Alba Yates said.
Deputies in protective gear used tear gas to subdue the group, she said. One inmate was treated for moderate injuries.
Some 400 inmates had been segregated and the 21,000-inmate jail system placed on partial lockdown because of the weekend violence.
Sheriff Lee Baca said the inmates would remain segregated to keep blacks and Hispanics from acting on gang rivalries. He said the rioting came after years of animosity exacerbated by overcrowding, too few guards and gang members being taken off the streets.
“This is just the largest demonstration of this kind of hostility,” Baca said.
Inmate Wayne Robert Tiznor, 45, was killed during a major brawl between blacks and Hispanics at the North County Correctional Facility Saturday, and about 200 Hispanic and black inmates also fought at the adjacent North Facility jail late Sunday. The facilities are on a 34-acre site near Castaic about 40 miles northwest of Los Angeles.
About 100 inmates were treated for injuries, but none were life-threatening, authorities said.
The lockdown was a “modified” lockdown in which inmates can go to court and in some cases have visitors, said sheriff’s spokesman Steve Whitmore. But privileges, including, television, have been curtailed, he said.