Central Prison is a prison operated by the

North Carolina Department of Public Safety The North Carolina Department of Public Safety (NCDPS) is an umbrella agency that carries out many of the state's law enforcement, emergency response and homeland security functions. The department was created in 1977 as the Department of Crime Co ...

Raleigh Raleigh (; ) is the capital city of the state of North Carolina and the seat of Wake County in the United States. It is the second-most populous city in North Carolina, after Charlotte. Raleigh is the tenth-most populous city in the Southeas ...

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...

. The prison, west of Downtown Raleigh, is on of land and is bounded by a double wire fence with a razor ribbon on top. The Department of Public Safety website describes the original building as "castle-like."Central Prison
"

North Carolina Department of Correction The North Carolina Department of Correction (NCDOC) is the agency responsible for corrections in the U.S. state of North Carolina. NCDOC merged with several departments in 2012, and now falls under the North Carolina Department of Public Safety. ...

. Retrieved on May 9, 2010.

History

Seal of the North Carolina Department of Correction

Funding for the Central Prison was authorized during the

Reconstruction era The Reconstruction era was a period in American history following the American Civil War (1861–1865) and lasting until approximately the Compromise of 1877. During Reconstruction, attempts were made to rebuild the country after the bloo ...

by the

North Carolina General Assembly of 1868–1869 The North Carolina General Assembly of 18681869 met in Raleigh from November 16, 1868 to April 12, 1869 with a special session from July 1, 1868 to August 24, 1868. This was the first assembly to meet after the approval of the new Constitution of ...

. Inmates built the prison for 14 years, and granite quarried from an area outside of what would become the east wall of the prison was used to build the facility. The prison's construction was completed in December 1884; the prison, built for $1.25 million, was the first prison in North Carolina. A three story prison industries building, housing the state license plate fabrication shop and a complete print shop, was built in the 1940s. An acute care infirmary hospital with wards for 86 patients, operating rooms, X-ray laboratories, and a pharmacy opened in the 1960s. Two mental health wings with 144 single bed rooms opened in the 1970s. The state placed the prison under extensive renovations in the 1980s. The first phase had a price of $28.8 million. The first phase included a custody control and administration building, a maximum security housing building with 384 single cells, a central services building, and central plant utility systems. The $8.6 million second phase included a three story working resident building, which had 192 single cells for inmates assigned to jobs within the boundaries of the prison.

Location

It is adjacent to

Governor Morehead School Governor Morehead School (GMS), formerly North Carolina State School for the Blind and Deaf, is a K–12 public school for the blind in Raleigh, North Carolina. In the era of de jure educational segregation in the United States, it served blind peo ...

, a state-operated school for the blind.

Notable prisoners

Death row

Velma Barfield Margie Velma Barfield ( née Bullard; October 29, 1932 – November 2, 1984) was an American serial killer who was convicted of one murder, but who eventually confessed to six murders in total. Barfield was the first woman in the United States to ...

– American serial killer who was housed at Central Prison due to the lack of a women's death row unit in North Carolina at the time of her execution in 1984. Following her execution, a women's death row unit was established at the

North Carolina Correctional Institution for Women North Carolina Correctional Institution for Women (NCCIW) is the primary North Carolina Department of Public Safety prison facility housing female inmates on a campus in Raleigh, North Carolina, and serves as a support facility for the six other ...

. *

Samuel Flippen Samuel Russell Flippen (September 30, 1969 – August 18, 2006) was an American man who was executed in North Carolina for murder. Flippen was sentenced to death for the February 1994 murder of Britnie Nichole Hutton, his 2-year-old stepdaughter. ...

– American convicted murderer. Executed on August 18, 2006. Currently the last person executed in North Carolina and at Central Prison. * James W. Hutchins – American convicted murderer. Executed on March 16, 1984. First person executed since 1976 in North Carolina and at Central Prison. *

Henry Louis Wallace Henry Louis Wallace (born November 4, 1965), also known as the “Taco Bell Strangler”, is an American serial killer who killed eleven black women in South Carolina and North Carolina from March 1990 to March 1994. He is currently awaiting exec ...

– American serial killer who killed ten women

Non-Death row

* Otto Wood – American depression-era desperado and serial prison escapee * Trystan Andrew Terrell – University of North Carolina at Charlotte shooter

References

External links

Central Prison

. {{coord, 35, 46, 34, N, 78, 39, 24, W, scale:5000, display=title Prisons in North Carolina Buildings and structures in Raleigh, North Carolina Execution sites in the United States 1884 establishments in North Carolina