The Northwest Correctional Complex is a state prison located in

Tiptonville Tiptonville is a town in and the county seat of Lake County, Tennessee, United States. Its population was 2,439 as of the 2000 census and 4,464 in 2010, showing an increase of 2,025. It is also home to the Northwest Correctional Complex, a maxim ...

Lake County, Tennessee Lake County is a County (United States), county located in the northwest corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 7,005, making it the fifth-least populous county in Tennessee. I ...

. It is owned and operated by the

Tennessee Department of Correction The Tennessee Department of Correction (TDOC) is a Cabinet-level agency within the Tennessee state government responsible for the oversight of more than 20,000 convicted offenders in Tennessee's fourteen prisons, three of which are privately man ...

. The facility can hold 2,391 inmates at a range of security levels. It has the second largest capacity of any state prison in Tennessee after the

Trousdale Turner Correctional Center The Trousdale Turner Correctional Center is a private prison for men, located in Hartsville, Trousdale County, Tennessee, owned and operated by CoreCivic (formerly Corrections Corporation of America) under contract with the Tennessee Department o ...

. As of May 31, 2020, there were 1,958 in the facility. It is the primary educational prison in the state system. In addition, inmates provide more than 100,000 hours of community service to state and local governments, and non-profit agencies annually. In July 2015 eight NCC inmates sustained knife wounds in gang-related stabbings. The prison, as well as the state's

Northeast Correctional Complex The Northeast Correctional Complex is a state prison located in the community Doe Valley, few miles outside the town of Mountain City, Johnson County, Tennessee, owned and operated by the Tennessee Department of Correction The Tennessee Depar ...

, was put on lockdown. The disturbances were attributed by ''

The Tennessean ''The Tennessean'' (known until 1972 as ''The Nashville Tennessean'') is a daily newspaper in Nashville, Tennessee. Its circulation area covers 39 counties in Middle Tennessee and eight counties in southern Kentucky. It is owned by Gannett, ...

'' to understaffing and a "severe manpower shortage" following Tennessee's decision to reconfigure correctional officers' schedules to save money on overtime. In May 2020, it was reported that 394 cases of

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

had been linked to the NCC. Specifically, 381 inmates and 13 staff at the prison had tested positive for the disease as of May 15. As of June 3, 2020 a total of 612 inmates and 28 staff members have tested positive; 382 of those inmates have recovered and 10 staff members have returned to work.

History

The Lake County Regional Correctional Facility (now called Site 2 within the complex) opened in Tiptonville in 1981, with a capacity of 500 inmates. The Northwest Corrections Center opened on the site in 1992, and is called Site 1.

Notable inmates

Notable inmates incarcerated at the facility include: * Letalvis Cobbins - convicted of the 2007 kidnapping, rape, and murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom * George Geovonni Thomas – convicted of the 2007 kidnapping, rape, and murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom * William Riley Gaul - convicted of the 2016 stalking and murder of Emma Jane Walker * Jim Adkisson - convicted of the 2008

Knoxville Unitarian Universalist church shooting The Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church Shooting was a mass shooting that occurred on July 27, 2008 when an unemployed Tennessee truck driver named Jim David Adkisson went on a shooting rampage at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Unive ...

* Joel Michael Guy, Jr - convicted of the 2016

murders of Joel and Lisa Guy On November 26, 2016, 61-year-old Joel Guy Sr. and 55-year-old Lisa Guy were murdered and dismembered by their son, 28-year-old Joel Michael Guy Jr., in Knoxville, Tennessee, United States. Guy Jr. stabbed his father at least 42 times, his mother ...

, his parents.

References

{{State prisons in Tennessee Prisons in Tennessee Buildings and structures in Lake County, Tennessee 1981 establishments in Tennessee