A security emergency was declared Saturday morning at the Montgomery County Correctional Facility in Boyds after locks on about 500 cell doors opened simultaneously.
The locks opened at approximately 12:20 a.m. and all were reset within an hour.
Montgomery County Department of Correction and Rehabilitation director Arthur Wallenstein told The Washington Post that no inmates tried to escape and the locks were reset. However, Wallenstein also told the paper that Saturday's incident marked the second time this week that the cell door locks had been disengaged. It also happened on Tuesday, when the locks were reset.
Wallenstein said that no inmates left their cells, and if they had tried to escape, they would have had to get past correctional officers and a fence. Wallenstein added that no housing unit doors or hallway doors were affected.
Wallenstein told the Post that maintenance workers and outside contractors were at the jail Saturday to try and fix the problem. The cell door locks are part of an electronic system guided by both computer programs and correctional officers.
