Honduras jail fire recalls horrific Florida prison blaze where 38 perished amid lingering questions

February 21, 2012
By: Jack Strickland
Gainesville

Last week’s horrific prison fire in Honduras shocked the world. More than 300 prisoners, locked in their cells, burned to death.

It is a reminder of a similar tragedy in Jay, an obscure town in the Panhandle, where more than 50 years ago 38 Florida prisoners died in a road prison fire.

New Information on the tragedy at Jay has recently come to light as statements from prisoners who survived the fire were made public. Witnesses who were at the fire, and officials who investigated it, have also disputed the official version of causes and events put forward by the Florida Department of Corrections in 1967.

At the time, the Florida Department of Corrections claimed that the prisoners deliberately started the fire in an apparent attempt to be transferred back to the State’s main prison at Raiford. The DOC press release said two prisoners, one black and one white, started the fire by lighting newspapers at both ends of the building housing the prisoners. The report said gas from a smashed fluorescent light bulb ignited and caused the fire to blaze out of control.

The DOC director acknowledged a series of fights among prisoners at Jay in the days immediately before the fire. He said he didn’t know why there was conflict or why prisoners were unhappy.

The medical examiner’s report seemed to confirm the facts as reported by the Department of Corrections. The examiner listed the cause of death of 38 prisoners as homicide by arson. The two prisoners who allegedly started the fire were identified. They were not charged or tried because they perished in the fire.

Opinions differ

The fire marshall offered a different opinion. He reported the fire resulted from a brawl among fighting prisoners. He said a gas line was ruptured in the brawl and escaping gas was ignited when a ceiling fluorescent light was knocked to the floor causing sparks that ignited the gas.

Some of the surviving prisoners were critically injured and permanently scarred. It was reported they were delirious and did not know where they were when treated at hospitals in the Pensacola area immediately after the fire.

When they ultimately were transferred to the prison hospital at Raiford, other prisoners, in morbid jailhouse humor, dubbed them “The Crispy Critters.”

All these years later, the cause of that tragedy at the Jay Road Prison is still in dispute. The truth is still coming out.

More controversy remains over why the prisoners were not rescued from the burning building. The prison was a converted World War II wooden army barracks. It was identical the one used in the award winning movie, “Cool Hand Luke.” It measured 40 by 90 feet and housed 51 prisoners. When the fire started, it should have been easy to release the prisoners and rescue them from the burning building.

For some reason, guards did not let them out of the building as it burned to the ground.

A gripping tale

Thirty-seven died in the blaze. One died after being transported to a hospital. Five of the 13 survivors were hospitalized with varying degrees of injuries. It was reported that the building housing the prisoners was a “tinder box” wooden fire trap that burned to the ground in less than eight minutes.

The Florida Department of Corrections honored one of the guards for heroism in saving the lives of the surviving “convicts.” When the surviving prisoners were interviewed, they told a very different story.

They tell a gripping tale of how the guard refused to unlock the door to let the prisoners out of the burning building. They say he feared they would escape. To him and his fellow guards, they said, it was much better to have a dead convict than an escaped convict.

The guards were trained to shoot to kill any prisoner who gave any indication that he might try to escape.

In 1967, Florida prison conditions and attitudes were similar to the accurate way they were depicted in the movie “Cool Hand Luke.” That movie was set in the late 1940’s. Conditions at Florida’s road prisons in 1967 had changed some. Chains and leg irons were used much less. But, shotgun work squads and attitudes had not changed and were still in force.

In reviewing the documents concerning the fire at Jay, one can almost hear the echo of the warden in “Cool Hand Luke” saying, “What we have here is a failure to communicate.”

Where were the keys?

The DOC version of events reported that the guard with the keys to the building, housing the prisoners, threw the keys over the fence for other guards to use in unlocking the “arsenal” storing shotguns.

His intent reportedly was to allow other guards to hold the prisoners at gunpoint after they were extricated from the burning building. It was reported that the keys became lost in the darkness. The door to the prison barracks could not be unlocked. Eventually, they claimed, the keys were found, the door was unlocked, and the surviving prisoners were extricated from the burning building. Only 14 of the 51 prisoners got out alive.

Later, the prisoners told a different tale. They said the keys were never lost. They claimed the door was not unlocked until a wall in the wooden structure collapsed from the fire, allowing several prisoners to run out of the burning building. Both guards and prisoners agreed that two prisoners ultimately ran out of the burning building, onto the prison yard, where they collapsed and died.

Racial unrest

It is significant that the cause of the brutal fights between prisoners was a result of forced integration. All of the knock-down-drag-out fights were between blacks and whites. Officials speaking for the DOC, who said they did not know why the prisoners were unhappy or were fighting, misrepresented the situation.

Until two weeks prior to the fire, all of Florida’s prisons–including the road prisons–were segregated. There were all black road camps and all white road camps. Court orders mandated integration of all facilities. The DOC closed the white road prison in the area–Road Prison Number 9 – and moved 16 white prisoners to previously all black Road Prison Number 12. At the time of the Sunday night fire the DOC count confirmed 35 “negro” prisoners and 16 white prisoners at the Jay facility.

In 1967 a convict’s life had no value. Prisoners were routinely abused. In the eyes of prison guards–and much of society–about the only thing lower than a “convict” was a black convict. The living conditions at Road Prison Number 12 were terrible.

Neither the blacks nor the whites wanted to be together. Published reports verify that there was a “two-week-long ‘brawl’ at RP Number 12” between the prisoners, from June 30, when the white prisoners arrived, until the fire on July 16. The guards did not try to break up the fights or protect the prisoners. Their procedure was to let the prisoners fight it out and count the bodies after each eruption of violence.

Prisoners had no voice or access to the media. If the guards fabricated a story, it went unchallenged. Prison guards were not known for their honesty or humane treatment of “convicts”. In the 1950’s, noted and respected newspaper columnist and radio broadcaster Walter Winchell investigated a story at the Florida State Prison.

He reported, “If you want to see the scum of the earth, the sorriest form of humanity ever to walk in shoe leather, go to the Florida State Prison and sit in the parking lot and watch the guards change shifts.”

Old wooden barracks

Not much had changed by 1967 when guards and officials put the spin on the fire at Jay. The truth did not come out until much later when prisoners and others, who were there at the fire, were interviewed and their stories were verified.

Years ago, the Florida Department of Corrections reported that all of the wooden World War II barracks, like the one at Jay, were fire hazards and are no longer used by the DOC. That is not entirely true. To this day one of those buildings is used at Gainesville Correctional Institution Work Camp.

It should be noted that the DOC calls it a historical monument because it was used in the filming of the movie, “Cool Hand Luke.” Because of it’s notoriety, some prisoners prefer to live in that barracks, over newer and safer buildings at the work camp. Some of the prisoners claim they sometimes see the ghosts of Paul Newman – “Cool Hand Luke” – and George Kennedy – “Dragline” – wandering around the old building late at night.

This week, the DOC reports this building—and all of the Gainesville Correctional Institution—is set for closing in March.