DPS Dispatch

The vaccines have been a game-changer

It’s been a year since the pandemic first hi

Every year, thousands of people complete their sentences in one of North Carolina’s correctional institutions and return to their community. 

The ongoing pandemic temporarily halted in-person educational programs in every state prison due to restrictions placed on outside visitation by instructors, as well as community colleges stopping classes. But it did not stop the N.C.

The Division of Prisons works tirelessly to train offenders for life back in the community. Educational and job training opportunities abound in the state’s 50-plus facilities through Correction Enterprises and other avenues, but the majority of those opportunities benefit male offenders.

Updated 3-3-2021: Requirements for the ELC program were recently ammended. Offenders with projected release dates in 2021 will be reviewed for possible participation in ELC.

Jerlene Epley, one of hundreds of employees who worked at Western Youth Institution during its 41 years of operation, saw it built from the ground-up. On Saturday, June 11, she will see the “High Rise” fall back to the earth.

Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, offenders in North Carolina prisons who needed specialty visits to outside medical centers for treatment of physical ailments could spend an entire day traveling across the state to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, transported by correctional off

Ground was broken on the imposing stone fortress known as Central Prison in Raleigh 150 years ago as convicts wielded shovels and chipped granite blocks from a nearby quarry to build its 30-foot walls.

Former warden Dennis Daniels looks back with a sense of pride and accomplishment on his nearly 40 years of service in the only fulltime work environment he ever knew. 

Members of the Prisons’ Special Operations Response Team, along with a member from the Prisons’ Special Operations Target Interdiction Team (Snipers), placed third overall in the 2019 North Carolina Tactical Officer’s Association 26th annual SWAT Competition at the NC Justice Academy in Salemburg

Pender Correctional Institution Officer Joshua Clark was stuck in traffic because of an accident when he noticed two men wrestling in a ditch and a State Highway Patrol cruiser on the shoulder.

Two North Carolina prisons’ food service personnel were honored recently by the Association of Correctional Food Service Affiliates’ Annual International Conference Vendor Showcase in Memphis. Central Prison Correctional Food Service Manager Conell Chapman was presented with the 2019 ACFSA Operator of the Year Award, while Maury Correctional Institution Food Service Manager Clarence Godley received the ACFSA Heroism Award for his actions during Hurricane Florence.

D.J. Loftis could not hold back her tears as she said thank you to a team of people for training her family’s service dog, Apollo.

Under an innovative therapy program, offenders in Central Prison have been crafting Christmas ornaments before the holiday season.

The work is therapy. The offenders are on the mental health caseload at the state’s largest prison.

NASHVILLE, NC – Carefully chosen offenders began the third year of the N.C.