SIOUX FALLS, S.D. -- South Dakota State Penitentiary Warden Herman Solem ordered a 'cell to cell' shakedown Sunday following a brief uprising in which a handful of convicts armed with clubs, chains and homemade knives attacked and injured 11 guards.
Inmates were released from a general lockup status for the first time Sunday to have breakfast, but will remain on a restricted schedule until 'we shake it down cell-to-cell,' said the warden.
Solem said the mood was 'quiet and subdued.'
The warden would not elaborate on the nature of the restrictions and said another cell-to-cell search for weapons was scheduled for Monday. Prison officials will then be assisted by members of the South Dakota Department of Criminal Investigations.
The uprising occurred about 4 p.m. Saturday when a guard was taking a convict to solitary confinement for assaulting another inmate. It was quelled by guards a little more than an hour later, Solem said.
'Eleven guards suffered injuries that included stab wounds and lacerations and as a result six inmates face attempted murder charges,' Solem said.
Four guards remained hospitalized Sunday but officials declined to reveal their conditions.
Six inmates involved were transferred to the Minnehaha County Public Safety Center. Attorney General Mark Meierhenry said inmates Allen Quam, Ron Dennis, Wiatt Franks, William Rurup, Jody Smith and Steve Layton are to appear in court Monday to be charged with attempted murder.
'I'm sure there will be more charges or different charges. These inmates are going to find out this is our number-one case,' said Meierhenry.
Gov. Bill Janklow arrived at the prison late Saturday to be briefed on the uprising along with Meierhenry. Janklow visited injured guards at a hospital then left for Pierre.
'It's not a staff problem at the penitentiary,' Janklow said. 'We're dealing with criminal punks in this case and it just might be too easy a place for them.'
The convicts involved in the attack should be slapped with 'long, long sentences,' said the governor.
Officials said they were unable to determine the cause of the uprising. A series of small fires were started inside the prison earlier in the day, but officials said there was no evidence the fires were linked to the attack.
The brick prison on the city's North Side was built 100 years ago - eight years before South Dakota became a state -- and houses about 650 convicts. The prison population has been overcrowded for at least 14 months.
Ted Spaulding, a member of the Board of Charities and Corrections, said he does not think substandard conditions exist at the prison and that about 75 percent of the inmates go to a lower standard of living when they get out.
