New Stony inmate shocked to arrive during virus outbreak

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 23/11/2020 (1936 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Andrew Collie spent two years at Atlantic Institution prison in New Brunswick before a “problem” with a correctional officer led to a transfer to Stony Mountain Institution, just after the penitentiary just north of Winnipeg reported its first positive case of COVID-19.

“As soon as I walked into the building, the guards were all dressed in (personal protective equipment) and going crazy,” said Collie, who arrived at the institute on Nov. 10 and has been in one prison or another since a 1998 conviction for manslaughter.

“The guard said to me everything is crazy right now because there is a COVID case,” said Collie, 48. “I said, ‘Why did you transfer me here when there is a COVID case?’”

As of Monday, the number of Stony Mountain inmates who had tested positive for COVID-19 ballooned to 72. Prison staff accounted for an additional eight active cases. All inmate cases are confined to the prison’s medium-security facility, which has an inmate population of 521.

At the time Collie was transferred, Atlantic Institution had no positive COVID-19 cases, nor did Millhaven Institution, where Collie spent a brief time during transit to Stony Mountain. That was still the case as of Thursday, according to the most recent figures posted on the Correctional Service Canada (CSC) website.

“They could have kept me (in Millhaven) no problem, but the transfer was already done for me to come here,” Collie said.

Collie said he was placed in a quarantine range upon his arrival at Stony Mountain and didn’t receive a change of clothes or even a bar of soap for two days.

He has filed a grievance with CSC, questioning why he was transferred out of a COVID-19-free institution, increasing the risk he would contract the virus. Collie said he’s been told he won’t receive an answer before Feb. 11.

“As soon as they realized there was a COVID case in the building they should have stopped the transfers immediately, especially bringing me in on a plane and putting me into an institution where there is COVID,” he said.

According to CSC, all new prison arrivals are held in quarantine for 14 days.

Collie, whose quarantine period ends Tuesday, said he comes out of his cell only to shower and use the phone.

“I’m very concerned,” he said. “I don’t want to have any contact… everybody is scared.”

Inmate transfers between federal prisons and from provincial correctional centres are continuing “within established policy guidelines,” said CSC regional communications manager Jeff Campbell in an email to the Free Press, referring a reporter to a link to a transfer directive that was last updated in 2018.

“Correctional Service Canada is focusing its efforts on minimizing the risk of introducing COVID-19 to institutions,” Campbell said. “This includes CSC’s active planning in early identification, containment and appropriate treatment should the virus be introduced to one of CSC’s sites.”

Manitoba Corrections has not transferred any inmates to Stony Mountain from Headingley Correctional Centre since an outbreak was declared at the provincial jail Oct. 13, a provincial spokesperson confirmed Friday.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca