Yakima jail break blamed on overcrowding

Chronic overcrowding, understaffing and an outdated design contributed to the largest escape in the history of Yakima County's downtown jail, a union official representing corrections officers said.

"It was an accident waiting to happen," Wayne Johnson of Teamsters Local 760, which represents the jail's corrections officers and clerical staff, said Saturday.

Jail officials don't dispute the point. But jail Director Steve Robertson added that his officers reacted quickly in capturing five of the nine escapees before they could get off the building or the grounds.

The inmates managed to punch through the jail roof in the hectic late stages of the dinner hour shortly after 5 p.m. Friday when corrections officers were picking up dinner trays in the fourth-floor maximum-security housing units.

The conspirators punched a hole through the ceiling of Luis Soto's cell. Single cells are left open during the day to give inmates access to a larger gathering area. Soto's one-man cell is located near the shower stall where four inmates escaped in similar fashion in 1994.

Soto, charged with residential burglary, is one of the two escapees who were still at large late Sunday. The other is Gianno Alaimo, 26, of Yakima, charged with assault.

Friday's incident belies contentions made 11 years ago by corrections officials that they had blocked chances for a repeat escape. Yakima County Sheriff Ken Irwin said the inmates had an easier time reaching the roof than anyone thought.

Teamsters representative Johnson said the union has repeatedly said the jail is overcrowded and too thinly staffed for a population that sometimes exceeds 900.

Three weeks ago, Johnson submitted petitions to county commissioners calling for immediate action to reduce the jail population to 700 inmates.

About 800 inmates were in the main jail and its annex when the escape occurred; among the 800 are more than 300 held under contract with King County cities.

The two buildings were designed for 574 beds.

County Commissioner Mike Leita said the county is working to correct problems. One solution is to increase what it charges Yakima County cities to hold inmates.

But he said the fundamental question is whether the county should stay in the bed-rental business. "I can think of a better business to be in than bed rentals," Leita said.