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Sheriff vows to sniff out food culprit

It's a scene right out of a Grade B prison movie: An inmate gets his tray, looks with disgust at the steaming mound of chili, slams down his knife and fork and growls, "I'm not going to eat this slop! It smells like (expletive deleted)!"

Well, with apologies to anyone reading this at the breakfast table this morning, an inmate said just such a thing during Wednesday night's chow Wednesday at the Cumberland County Jail.

And this time . . . gulp . . . he was right.

"It's created a lot of chaos throughout this entire facility," said a harried Sheriff Mark Dion. "Eating is an integral part of the daily routine here."

So, until further notice, is pre-meal sniffing.

Dion said he and his investigators will not rest until they get to the bottom (so to speak) of the biggest calamity to rock his jail since the bunk beds started falling off the walls two years ago: Someone put feces in the jail's chili - and if that's not cause for a hunger strike, it's surely enough to attract a horde of personal-injury lawyers.

Dion knew he had a problem on his hands Wednesday when, only minutes after the chili went out on rolling carts to the jail's housing units, the complaints came rolling back. Something didn't smell right, a number of inmates insisted, and we're not talking about the tomato sauce!

The sheriff ordered the entire batch seized, along with the "ghost meal" preserved from every feeding "just in case something like this happens."

He then immediately suspended all 14 of the inmate "trustees" who work in the kitchen under the supervision of three civilian cooks. He wisely put all of the trustees in protective custody until investigators can figure out who fouled the chili and, of course, why.

Meanwhile, up and down the jail's housing pods, the retching had already begun.

"Some people are sick," Dion said. "We've had a few cases of nausea, vomiting. It could be as much psychological as physical."

Either way, it's cruel and unusual punishment.

Dion met with the entire inmate population Wednesday evening and assured them that this assault on the entire facility - staff and prisoners all eat from the same food line - would not be swept under the carpet. He's even taken DNA swabs from everyone in the kitchen in the hope that one will match the tainted chili samples already under the microscopes at state health labs in Augusta.

And the prisoners' response?

"They told me that if I don't figure it out, they'll take care of it," he said.

By late Thursday afternoon, the interrogations were well under way. So was the examination of a security video showing various people coming and (perhaps) going during the preparation of Wednesday's supper. Of particular interest is a freeze frame showing one kitchen worker in the immediate vicinity of the large vat of simmering chili.

Dion, while confident the culprit will be found, said it could be days or even weeks before the necessary scientific evidence is compiled.

But solving this whodunit is only part of the challenge. Dion also must determine the appropriate criminal charge for someone who would, shall we say, stoop this low.

"The problem is we're having trouble finding an appropriate law to hold someone accountable," he said.

He's considered a statute which prohibits messing with the food in a public restaurant kitchen, but he's not sure a jail kitchen (not to mention jail food) qualifies.

"If you did it in a public restaurant kitchen, then you'd be over at my kitchen," Dion said. "But if you do it in my kitchen - is that a restaurant kitchen?"

Dion also has his sights set on two other possibilities: criminal mischief or obstruction of government administration. (For reasons that aren't entirely clear, he's ruled out assault with a deadly weapon.)

"Some people find it funny - and I suppose there is an element of humor," Dion said. But inside the jail, "everybody's saying, 'What about Hepatitis C? What about AIDS? What else have I caught? I can't eat here anymore!' "

Of course, sooner or later, they'll have to eat. And if it's any consolation, as inmates and guards see the food cart coming and grimace, chili is off the menu indefinitely.

"Nobody's going to touch it," Dion said.

http://www.pressherald.com/news/nemi...29nemitz.shtml