Mid-Orange Correctional Facility was an all-male, medium security prison located in the town of
Warwick, New York
Warwick is a town in the southwestern part of Orange County, New York, United States. Its population was 32,027 at the 2020 census. The town contains three villages (Florida, Greenwood Lake, and Warwick) and eight hamlets ( Amity, Bellvale, Ed ...
. It closed in 2011.
This facility was involved in a controversial case in which a correctional officer, Christopher Nuttall, started taking in cats left astray in the area. In collaboration with inmates, he cared for the cats and fed them. He was suspended and later fired on charges of "contraband and collaboration with inmates". Two months later, he was hired again, with the assistance of Council 82 (statewide correction officers union).
The prison was also the site of a strike by state prison employees in 1979. National Guardsmen were sent to the prison as
strikebreaker
A strikebreaker (sometimes called a scab, blackleg, or knobstick) is a person who works despite a strike. Strikebreakers are usually individuals who were not employed by the company before the trade union dispute but hired after or during the st ...
s, and were quartered in employee housing. This resulted in the only known caselaw for the
Third Amendment, the US 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals case
Engblom v. Carey.
The facility was targeted for closure in 2011 as part of Governor
Andrew Cuomo
Andrew Mark Cuomo ( ; ; born December 6, 1957) is an American lawyer and politician who served as the 56th governor of New York from 2011 to 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected to the same position that his father, Mario Cu ...
's prison closing program. As of 2022, the area surrounding the prison has been converted to Wickham Woodlands, a town park, and is also being developed for corporate and light industrial use as the Warwick Valley Office & Technology Corporate Park.
Notable prisoners
*
Gerald Garson, former
New York Supreme Court Justice
The Supreme Court of the State of New York is the trial-level court of general jurisdiction in the New York State Unified Court System. (Its Appellate Division is also the highest intermediate appellate court.) It is vested with unlimited civ ...
, convicted of accepting bribes
External links
NY prison information
References
Prisons in New York (state)
Economy of Orange County, New York
2011 disestablishments in New York (state)
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