NCJ Number
176030
Date Published
1997
Length
140 pages
Annotation
This is an account, by one of the hostages, of the siege of the Huntsville unit of the Texas Department of Corrections in the summer of 1974.
Abstract
This is a personal account of what one person, a criminal justice professional, saw, heard and remembered of the 11-day siege of the Walls Prison. In the summer of 1974, three inmates of the Texas state prison in Huntsville, armed with handguns and a large supply of ammunition smuggled into the unit, took hostage 12 prison employees and four other inmates. The authorities hoped to take the inmates by surprise, force them to surrender their weapons and free the hostages. The rescue attempt was only partially successful. The inmates killed two hostages and severely wounded another. One inmate killed himself and another was shot to death by a law enforcement officer. Experiences and observations during the siege have formed the basis for a course on crisis management in criminal justice which deals with planning and preparing for hostage situations.